Northwest Airlines
Corporation has announced that the preliminary
tally of votes indicates that its Plan of Reorganization has been
approved overwhelmingly by its creditors.The unofficial vote tally indicates that 96.9 percent of the
airline’s creditors who voted, representing 98.4 percent of the dollar
amount of the claims that voted, approved the Northwest plan. The
final voting results will be filed late this week with the U.S.
Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of New York, the court
overseeing Northwest’s restructuring.

  Doug Steenland, president and chief executive officer of Northwest
Airlines, said, “We appreciate our creditors’ confidence in the
Northwest Plan of Reorganization, which provides creditors with a
stake in Northwest Airlines going forward and represents a substantial
recovery on their unsecured claims.”

  “Today’s creditor approval is another step in Northwest’s efforts
to complete its restructuring next month and to move forward as a
strong, fully-competitive airline. In recent weeks, we have announced
the composition of our new board of directors, indicated a desire to
list our new common stock on the New York Stock Exchange and reported
a first quarter profit, excluding unusual and reorganization items,
for the first time since 1998.”

  A confirmation hearing on the airline’s Plan of Reorganization is
scheduled to begin on May 16.

  Northwest received Bankruptcy Court approval of its Disclosure
Statement on March 31 and was authorized by the court to solicit
creditor approval of its plan. Creditor voting ended May 7.

  Northwest Airlines has filed an application with the New York
Stock Exchange to trade its new common stock under the ticker symbol
“NWA” after the airline emerges from Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection.
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