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Just why he was out of a job was in dispute. United Air Lines said he had taken a leave of absence last autumn to attend NRA hearings in Washington, that he had neither returned to work nor communicated with the company, thereby automatically ousting himself. Pilot Behncke said he reported for work at Chicago Dec. 22, when he was called into the office of Vice President D. B. Colyer and discharged for four reasons: 1) he had not secured proper permission to attend NRA hearings; 2) the company assumed he had severed connections; 3) his activities and utterances in Washington made it awkward to have him on the payroll; 4) he had preferred charges of intimidation against Vice President E. P. Lott and Chief Pilot H. T. ("Slim") Lewis. The subject of Behncke's Washington activities remained unsettled. It was raised when big airlines replaced obsolete 110-m.p.h. planes with new airliners flying more than 150 m.p.h. Since the faster speed would make pilots travel the same distance in less time than before, they demanded to be paid on a mileage rather than hourly basis. (On the per-hour basis, pilots' pay had averaged $6,500 a year.) Loth to sacrifice the economic advantage gained by speed, the airlines refused. The Pilots Association threatened a strike, called it off. submitted its case to the National Labor Board. Last week Pilot Behncke, no longer eligible to head his union since he is not an active pilot, complained to the Labor Board about his discharge by United.
Airmail Showdown