United Airlines may fail
"Before September 11 we were not in a comfortable financial state, with costs exceeding our revenue on a daily basis," Goodwin wrote. "Today, the situation is exacerbated with costs exceeding revenues at four times the pre-September 11 rate. Today, we are literally hemorrhaging money.
"Clearly this bleeding has to be stopped – and soon – or United will perish sometime next year."
Even with a $15 billion industry bailout, airline officials have speculated that bankruptcy was imminent for weaker carriers, although they did not name them.
"We're so far away from break-even that it's not even worth calculating," David Swierenga, chief economist at the Air Transport Association, said last month after the bailout had been approved.