American Airlines' stock crash landing

American Airlines parent company AMR filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection this morning after struggling to overcome high labor costs and jet fuel prices.

AMR was the only major U.S. carrier that managed to avoid bankruptcy in the past decade, as rivals United Air Lines and Delta Air Lines filed for bankruptcy protection in 2002 and 2005, respectively. These moves by United and Delta allowed the companies to slash costs and restructure their labor agreements, which gave them huge cost savings over AMR -- which is the only major airline still funding worker pensions.