THE beleaguered airline industry suffered another blow last night - reinforcing fears that the world was sliding into recession.

First, Canadian company Bombardier announced cuts at its Shorts aircraft plant in Belfast.

Gloom deepened when US carrier Delta Air Lines announced 13,000 redundancies - a 15 per cent reduction in capacity.

And Air Canada said its previously announced plan to lay off 4,000 workers would now be increased to 9,000 because of the impact on the industry of the US terrorist attacks.

The announcements leave Southwest Airlines as the only major American carrier not to axe jobs.

Shares began to slump in the wake of the cuts.

By early afternoon trading, the Dow Jones Industrial Average was down about 90 points. The Nasdaq Composite Index was down about 24 points.

The announcement came too late to have a significant impact on the British stockmarkets, but traders will be eyeing the FTSE nervously when trading starts this morning.

Delta said it was cutting jobs and flights following ''dramatically lower demand'' for air travel.

Capacity will be cut by 15 per cent from November, while from March next year flights from New York to Dublin and Shannon will be suspended indefinitely.

Bombardier, which employs 7,600 workers in Belfast, producing a range of small civilian aircraft, said it was having to adjust production and staffing levels because of lower demand for new aircraft in the US.

A total of 890 jobs - a mixture of full-time, temporary and sub-contractors - will go before next February and a further 1,100 will be cut early in the New Year unless demand increases.

A total of 3,800 workers in the UK, the US and Canada will be laid off, and a further 2,700 will go unless markets recover significantly.

''We are saddened to have to take such measures, but we will do everything we possibly can to create the conditions we need to bring these employees back to work," said Bombardier president Robert E Brown.