Post-deregulation there was a lot of adjustment that had to happen. That's mostly over now.

Also BK laws are now more severe than in the past, not in the favor of the debtor-in-possession (ie the airline managers who want to keep their jobs). No coincidence at all that both DAL and NWA filed BK immediately before the new laws took effect.

BK of a big airline will be a risky move in the future and likely involve a bailout anyway since the 4-5 biggest pax airlines are frankly too big to fail. Once you shutdown and yank their AOC, that lift is gone until someone else can acquire the planes, process them onto their cert, and hire/train the crews.

I think it would have to get pretty ugly to see big airlines in BK court.Of course ugly can happen for unforeseen reasons too...