ABX Air cutting 84 more jobs at Wilmington
Monday, January 12, 2009
WILMINGTON — ABX Air Inc., the contractor which operates DHL's U.S. freight hub at Wilmington, is laying off an additional 84 employees by Jan. 23 as DHL prepares to transfer the hub's work to United Parcel Service at Louisville, Ky.
ABX Air notified the Ohio Department of Job and Family Services in a Jan. 8 letter of the new round of layoffs. The department posted it Friday, Jan. 9, on its Web site.
Most of the 84 jobs being cut are those of technicians and machinists.
ABX, the largest employer at the DHL hub, has announced at least 386 layoffs since mid-November alone.
DHL has said it is unlikely to need the Wilmington hub operation after January as it restructures to cut its $1 billion-a-year losses in the United States. DHL has said it plans to reduce its U.S. service to international deliveries only, and intends to hire UPS to take over its cargo flying and sorting from current contractors ABX Air and ASTAR Air Cargo.
ABX said it had 7,000 employees in Wilmington in May, but has eliminated at least 2,700 positions since then. DHL has also told ABX it will no longer require the use of ABX's DC-9 aircraft after January. Those are older aircraft than the Boeing 767 freighters ABX also flies.
