United Airlines to Hire 2,500 at Newark in ‘Turnaround’ From Operational Challenges

The carrier says Newark has rebounded after outages and other challenges, with United CEO Scott Kirby hailing the airport as a ’safe and reliable crown jewel’

United Airlines planes land and prepare to take off at Newark Liberty International Airport in New Jersey. Fabrizio Bensch/File Photo/Reuters

United Airlines has announced it will hire more than 2,500 employees at Newark Liberty International Airport by 2026, expanding its largest East Coast hub as the carrier marks what it calls a turnaround in reliability after several months of operational challenges.

The hiring push, announced in Sept. 16 release, follows what United said was its best summer on-time record at Newark, where the airline flew more than six million passengers without any flight delays, putting it on par with New York’s other major airports.

CEO Scott Kirby said the airline had emerged from a difficult period of delays and cancellations, crediting improvements made by federal and state officials after a series of communication blackouts in the spring left controllers unable to contact planes. The outages—along with other challenges at Newark associated with air traffic control staffing, runway construction, and outdated equipment—forced United to cut schedules and prompted the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) to cap Newark traffic at 68 flights per hour, down from as high as 86.

“Newark is operating better than ever and United’s future here is bright—that’s a credit to the thousands of Newark employees who deliver for our customers and one another every day,” Kirby said in a statement, describing Newark as a “safe and reliable crown jewel” for millions of passengers.

As part of the turnaround, United said it will add service to more than 160 destinations from Newark this fall and winter—including Rome, Venice, Marrakesh, and Dublin—and become the first carrier to use sustainable aviation fuel at the airport. United already employs about 14,000 people in the New York area, including 3,000 pilots and 5,700 flight attendants.

United’s hiring drive comes as the nation’s air traffic control system faces mounting scrutiny. Previously, Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said that Newark’s outages were a reflection of America’s aging air traffic control infrastructure that “looks like it’s out of a 1980s’ movie” and pushed Congress to accelerate modernization efforts, including replacing copper lines with fiber optics and boosting controller staffing.

Kirby credited the efforts of Duffy and other officials, predicting that as the FAA and Department of Transportation continue to boost staffing and upgrade technology, the on-time performance and reliability at Newark “will only get better.”

The United chief also played down speculation that the carrier might look to buy assets from bankrupt Spirit Airlines. “It’s not in our wheelhouse,” he told Reuters, saying it would cost too much and take years to reconfigure Spirit’s planes, and that United lacks enough gates in Spirit’s main markets.

Spirit Airlines filed for bankruptcy protection last month for the second time in a year after a failed turnaround effort, and is now preparing to shrink its network and fleet. The restructuring is expected to put a range of aircraft, slots, and routes up for grabs—assets Kirby clarified United has no interest in pursuing.

United has also expanded ties with JetBlue Airways through a new “Blue Sky” alliance, which links loyalty programs and will return United to New York’s JFK Airport in 2027 via leased slots.