THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1997, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, February 16, 1997 TAG: 9702150207
SECTION: BUSINESS PAGE: D2 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: ASSOCIATED PRESS
DATELINE: GROTON, CONN. LENGTH: 33 lines
Electric Boat will have to cut 1,000 to 1,500 jobs this year due to a declining work load, the company's president said. Union officials expect the first layoff notices Monday.
President John K. Welch told legislators, local officials and union leaders at a briefing Thursday that the company must reduce its work force as two of the four submarines in its backlog are delivered this spring.
``There's anywhere from 1,000 to 1,500 people who have to come out of the work force this year,'' he said.
Union leaders said they expect 60-day layoff notices to be handed out Monday to as many as 500 pipe fitters, welders and other hourly workers.
A cut of 1,500 jobs would represent a 14 percent drop in its work force of about 10,800.
The work force at Electric Boat's plant at Quonset Point, R.I., which handles the early stages of submarine construction, has already hit bottom, with just under 1,000 employees, Welch said.
As work on the New Attack Submarine begins to filter into the Rhode Island plant, possibly by year's end, employment could begin to pick up, officials said.
But employment at Groton will continue to drop through next year as the first of two Seawolfs are delivered, and work is finished on the Louisiana, the last of the ballistic missile submarines.
Electric Boat has said it expects overall employment to fall to 6,000 to 8,000 in 1998.