By Karamjit Kaur, Aviation Correspondent

SINGAPORE Airlines (SIA), which froze cabin crew recruitment in February because of the business downturn, has started hiring again.

No major career fair is being planned, but The Straits Times understands that the airline has been contacting those who applied earlier, to fix interviews.

SIA girls who gave up their wings to have children are also being called back, as part of a re-employment scheme that allows them to pick up where they left off.

Airline spokesman Nicholas Ionides confirmed that hiring had resumed to address attrition.

But he did not say how many people SIA planned to recruit this time round.

On average, about four or five staff retire every month and several more resign.

The airline has a pool of about 7,000 cabin crew.

Hit by the downturn, which began when the global economy went into a tailspin in September last year, SIA introduced broad measures that included cutting capacity and grounding planes.

This led to excess manpower, addressed in part through a voluntary leave programme, a shorter work month scheme, and early retirement.

Those schemes are still in place.

While there is still some surplus manpower, Mr Ionides said: 'Given attrition rates and the lengthy training lead times for cabin crew, operational requirements dictate that we must prepare in advance to build up necessary crew numbers.'

It takes up to six months to train cabin crew.

As for cockpit crew, the airline has no plans to recruit new cadet pilots until the second half of next year, at the earliest.

There are currently 360 cadet pilots at various stages of training.

Qualified captains were last hired in October last year, Mr Ionides said.

Mr Alan Tan, president of the SIA Staff Union, which represents cabin crew and other rank-and-file staff, said the resumption of cabin crew recruitment was a positive sign that things were on the up.

'Given that the company is hiring new people again, we also hope it will consider more contract extensions for those who retire,' he said.

Under current rules, stewards retire at 57, while the women leave after 15, 20 or 25 years of service, depending on their rank.

But there is an option for the company to extend these contracts for another three years.

SIA is still not out of the economic storm. Earlier this week the airline stated it had lost $159million in the three months to Sept30.

This equates to $466million in total losses for the first half of the current financial year, which ends next March.

While conditions remain challenging and yields per passenger are still low, the airline is confident the next six months will see growth.

At a post-results briefing for media and analysts on Wednesday, chief executive officer Chew Choon Seng said the ongoing Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation meetings, as well as February's Singapore Airshow and the opening of the integrated resorts, should help boost traffic numbers.

This article was first published in The Straits Times.