UPDATE 1-Delta, United must face class action over US airfares

Delta Air Lines and United Airlines were ordered by a federal judge to face a consumer antitrust class action accusing major U.S. carriers of conspiring to drive up domestic airfares by reducing the number of available seats. In a decision on Tuesday, U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly in Washington, D.C., said passengers offered a "fair amount" or circumstantial evidence of a conspiracy to reduce seating capacity in order to boost profit. "Defendants engaged admittedly and openly in the practice of capacity discipline on domestic flights, with the effect that diminished capacity resulted in higher industry profits," Kollar-Kotelly wrote in a 70-page decision.