Boeing Co. rocket machinists, who walked off the job a month ago in a dispute over health benefits, are beginning to cross picket lines and return to work as medical insurance coverage expires, Boeing and the union said.
And the company said its biggest engineers union voted to accept a new three-year labor agreement that boosts pay and preserves health-care benefits, helping the company avoid a strike and keep its Dreamliner aircraft program on schedule.
More than 200 of the 1,500 workers who struck Boeing’s rocket business in California, Florida and Alabama have returned to work, said Gary Quick, head negotiator for machinists in Huntington Beach, Calif.
Robert Villanueva, a spokesman for the Chicago-based company, said about 20 percent of workers in California have crossed picket lines, while machinists at all rocket sites are “slowly trickling in.”
The strike has forced delays in three government launches, including a top-secret military satellite from Vandenberg Air Force base and a NASA weather satellite at Cape Canaveral, Fla., Villanueva said.
Company medical coverage for the striking workers expired Thursday, Quick said. No talks have taken place since the work stoppage began Nov. 2, and none are scheduled.
Boeing’s proposal to the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers would raise employee health-care costs and eliminate retiree medical benefits for new hires. A similar offer was rejected by 19,000 airplane machinists in September, prompting a strike that lasted 24 days.
That strike was settled after Boeing agreed to keep health-care premiums at current levels and preserve retiree medical benefits for new employees.
Members of the Society of Professional Engineering Employees in Aerospace voted 89.5 percent in favor of the contract, Boeing said Friday. Wages increase 17 percent for the engineers and 15 percent for technical workers. Most of the 18,000 members work in the Seattle area.
