AMR posts aviation's largest loss

DALLAS: AMR Corp, the corporate parent of American Airlines, has posted the biggest yearly loss in aviation history. The world’s largest airline, battling a perception that it would have to follow some major rivals into bankruptcy, reported on Wednesday a loss of US$3.5bil for 2002, and warned that it must cut costs drastically to keep flying. 

Analysts and AMR executives said although AMR’s quarterly numbers actually showed improvement, the underlying trend indicated the company was operating at an unsustainable level – losing about US$5mil a day.