DOT Approves American & JetBlue Northeast Alliance
The Northeast Alliance between American Airlines and JetBlue Airways passed the Department of Transportation’s regulatory review on Tuesday, despite objections from competitors including Spirit and Southwest. In a unique agreement, the airlines will be allowed to coordinate schedules in New York and Boston, a rare treat for domestic partners. They only had to divest a few slots at New York/JFK and Washington/National plus give assurances that they will use their slots better than they did before the pandemic in order to gain approval.
Both carriers will begin coordinating schedules very soon, to be in-place for the first-half of 2021. With JetBlue’s feed, American is still planning to add two new long-haul flights from JFK, one to Athens and one to Tel Aviv. JetBlue will be increasing its presence at all three main NYC airports, not just JFK as the airlines will be free to trade slots. Codesharing and mileage earning and burning will soon follow.
The negotiations between the two airlines and the DOT came down to the wire. The final sticking point was the DOT insisting American also divest itself of two rows in its Main Cabin product to give everyone more legroom on its aircraft. AA stood its ground and refused, willing to blow up the whole deal. In the end, the airline and the government compromised with AA agreeing to take the idea under advisement and gather a blue ribbon panel to study the effects. The government leapt at the chance to introduce another blue ribbon panel, satisfying both sides.
There will be more on this at crankyflier.com tomorrow morning.
CDC Requires COVID-19 Testing for All Travelers to the U.S.
Beginning January 26, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) will require all travelers inbound to the U.S. to show written proof of either a negative COVID-19 test received within 3 days before travel or having recovered from COVID-19. Though we have not confirmed, we believe that you just writing on a piece of paper that you don’t have COVID-19 will not be accepted as “written proof.”
The CDC says that this combined with the recommendation that travelers get tested again 3-5 days after returning home and isolating at home for 7 days after travel will help slow the spread of the more infectious variants of the virus that causes COVID-19 that have been emerging in other countries.
The burden appears to be on the airline, saying that if proof is not provided, the airline must deny boarding to the passenger at the point of origin. There is nothing in here suggesting that those who have been vaccinated will be exempt from this ruling, so get ready to get tested if you’re leaving the country.
JetBlue Suspends Service to Eight Destinations; Introduces its A220
JetBlue Airways is suspending service to eight destinations on its route map for longer than originally planned. Burbank, Ontario, San Jose, and Baltimore were all suspended through March, but that will now go into June at the very least. In addition, Albuquerque, Burlington, VT (BTV), Minneapolis/St. Paul, and Portland, OR will lose JetBlue service on February 11 through at least April 1 (for now).
In happier news, the airline also introduced the on-board product for its A220-300 aircraft after recently having taken delivery of first out of the 70 it has on order. JetBlue’s A220 will offer an experience similar to what JetBlue has on its newly-refurbished A320s. The main differences seem to be that there is now a USB-C charger instead of just USB-A, and there will be fewer LiveTV channels onboard. So… not much.
The A220 itself, however, provides a great passenger experience with big windows, wide seats, and only 1 middle seat per row instead of 2. One unique touch, as a nod to JetBlue’s home in NYC, are subway tile patterns installed in the lavatories which is great, because we’ve always wanted to relive our youth by urinating in the New York subway. It’s unclear if the authentic New York subway smell will also be pumped in.
Allegiant Adds 21 New Nonstop Routes & Three New Destinations
Fans of low-cost travel to and from random point-to-point destinations will be excited to learn that Allegiant Air added three new destinations to its route network on Tuesday, announcing nine routes to the three new cities: Jackson Hole (JAC), Key West (EYW) and Portland, OR (PDX).
Jackson Hole will see flights to and from four cities on Allegiant: Los Angeles, Phoenix/Mesa (AZA), Las Vegas, and Reno all begin in early June. Key West will receive service from two cities, Nashville on June 2 and Orlando/Sanford on June 4. Last but not least is three destinations from Portland: Santa Maria, CA (SMX) beginning April 15, plus Monterey, CA (MRY) and Idaho Falls (IDA) both beginning May 28.
Allegiant is also adding service from both Sarasota and Denver to noted global travel mega-hub Peoria, IL (PIA). Charleston, SC will add Belleville, IL (BLV) on the fringes of the St. Louis metro area while Baltimore sees service to Punta Gorda (PGD) on May 27. Finally, it will add service in some markets that it had planned to start before the pandemic derailed plans.
Virgin Atlantic Seeks Further Refinancing
Virgin Atlantic finds itself rushing through a refinancing deal in which it will complete a leaseback program with Griffin Global Asset Management. The sale & leaseback should raise approximately $231 million for the beleaguered airline.
The cash will be used to pay back Davidson Kempner, the hedge fund which helped Virgin Atlantic survive the first lockdown. The airline owes approximately $160 million to the hedge fund, leaving it $70 million for use to operate the airline.
In a bit if Virgin irony, Griffin Global, the company paying for the sale & leaseback, is a subsidiary of Bain Capital, the hedge fund that has taken control of 93% of Virgin Australia. When asked to comment, a Bain Capital representative did not answer the question about whether or not the hedge fund really knew that Virgin Atlantic and Virgin Australia were not the same airline.
Airline Potpourri
- Allegiant has gotten the exemption roulette 2.0 started, asking the DOT to consider the schedules for the week of January 16, not January 9 as the baseline for service to avoid forcing holiday schedules to endure.
- Atlas Air placed the last order ever for four new B747-8 freighters.
- Kenya Airways took delivery of a Dash 8-202 on Monday from Elix Aviation Capital, the first aircraft from Elix delivered to Kenya Airways.
- Qatar resumed its daily service to Riyadh on Monday.
- SAS president & CEO Rickard Gustafson will leave the airline, effective July 1.
- Spirit, Frontier and JetBlue joined the chorus of U.S. airlines in banning emotional support animals onboard their aircraft.
- United announced that it won a cleaning award that it possibly made up, but probably didn’t. But it’s definitely possible.
- Vistara will begin daily nonstop service between Dehli and Sharjah, UAE (SHJ) on January 20.
Andrew’s Moment of Levity
A man was driving along a deserted highway when he saw a hitchhiker and offered to pick him up. The hitchhiker got in the car and was very appreciative. He thanked the man and said “this is very kind of you — how did you know I wasn’t a serial killer or someone crazy?” And the man replied “Because sir, the odds of two serial killers being in this car at the same time is practically impossible.”