April 21, 2021

American & JetBlue Grow Northeast Alliance

American and JetBlue announced the next phase of their (legal for now) Northeast Alliance with a new flight to India for AA, the elimination of 50-seat jets in New York, and the two airlines swapping slots.

American is adding international service from JFK to New Delhi (DEL) beginning October 31. The flight will operate on a B777-200 aircraft 3x-weekly, except for holidays when it goes daily between November 17 and June 3.

Domestically, both airlines are expanding their reach out of LaGuardia with nine new destinations between them, and JetBlue’s six new routes from LGA being operated using American’s slots. The two will also combine for nine new destinations out of Boston, with JetBlue also adding six from JFK.

There’s a whole lot going on, and we don’t have enough room to tell you about it in this format. So, for a full breakdown of the news, visit today’s post at crankyflier.com.


US and Canada Extend Border Closure Again

The border closure between the United States and Canada has been extended for another month, this time to May 21. Reports say that the U.S. government is getting closer to relaxing border and entry restrictions as the vaccine rollout continues to grow, but with Canada going in the opposite direction right now this announcement was inevitable.

The border between the two countries has been closed since March 20 of last year and the closure has been extended, one month a time, ever since.

Despite the land border being closed in both directions with the exception of essential traffic, Canadians are not prohibited from entering the United States via air. Americans can fly into Canada only for essential reasons, or to transit to a third country. Americans can also drive into Canada at three pre-determined checkpoints if their intent is to continue to Alaska. Those continuing onto Alaska will have their car registered by the Canadian government and will be given a timetable of all the flights into the state as a reminder that much faster travel options exists.


Alaska On the Path to Zero

Alaska Airlines announced its commitment to reducing its carbon emissions to net-zero by 2040, a full decade sooner than United pledged last month. At this rate, Delta will be forced to announce its plan to to reach net-zero carbon emissions by this Christmas.

Alaska’s roadmap to net-zero emissions by 2040 includes the following focus areas: fleet renewal, operational efficiency, sustainable aviation fuel (SAF), novel propulsion, high-quality carbon offsetting technology, replacing water from on-board toilets with melted snow from Alaskan wilderness, and removing all on-board beverage options to reduce weight except Coke Zero.

Alaska also announced five-year goals to reduce waste through more sustainable packaging and restarting its inflight recycling program. The airline is considering removing all on-board packaging for food and drink and instead dropping everything into passengers laps and letting them sort it out for themselves.


United’s Travel-Ready Center Adds Testing

United’s Travel-Ready app has given passengers the chance to upload testing or vaccination verification to ease travel for several months now. It’s now going to be more useful, enabling United customers to schedule a COVID test at an approved testing site while confirming that the completed test is accepted based on the guidelines of the customer’s final destination.

Upon completion of a successful test, passengers will see a note that they are “travel-ready,” and receive their boarding pass. To ensure that travelers truly are “travel-ready,” the app will also be programmed to send helpful reminders just after passing through security, like “oh hey, did you remember to lock the back door?” This will presumably send travelers into a tortured panic that will result in passengers needing to change to a later flight… by paying a hefty fare difference, of course. Gotta pay for that “no change fee” policy somehow.

The ability to schedule the test and upload it in one location is designed to make travel easier for most passengers. The airline has over 200 testing sites available and plans to add more in coming weeks.


Boutique Adds Three

Boutique Air is putting three new destinations on its route map with new flights to Burlington, VT (BTV), New Orleans, and Las Vegas.

The airline has been in growth mode over the last year, adding more than ten new destinations despite having lost several EAS contracts across the country.

Burlington will be the airline’s first destination in Vermont, and it will fly to the city daily from Boston. The nonstop flight will be Burlington’s first service to Boston since 2008. Boutique is adding 3x-weekly service to New Orleans from Greenville, MS (GLH) operating on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday. Although GLH is an EAS airport, the New Orleans route is not a part of the EAS program, with Boutique operating it solely based on the revenue generated from transporting drunken revelers down to Bourbon Street.

Lastly, the airline will return to Las Vegas, where it once flew from 2014-16. Boutique will serve Vegas with 4x-weekly service from Merced, CA (MCE). Similar to Greenville, Merced is an EAS airport but Boutique is flying this one on its own, which is safer anyway since most EAS service to LAS ends up seeing the EAS subsidy lost on the slot machines inside the terminal.


Airline Potpourri

  • American expects to add 300 pilots by the end of the year with another 600 to be added back in 2022.
  • Global Crossing Airlines announced a $10 million financing deal with Global Logistics, Inc. These two have the entire globe covered.
  • Ryanair is launching three new routes to the UK and increased frequencies to Greece for this summer.
  • SkyUp is adding 3x-weekly service from Kiev (KBP) to London/Luton (LTN) beginning June 24.
  • Smartwings is adding to its operation from Poland, serving 28 destinations from six Polish gateways this summer.
  • Stobart Air, which operates as Aer Lingus Regional, is basing five airplanes at Belfast to operate to six other destinations in the United Kingdom.
  • TUI Fly Netherlands is resuming its operation of the B737 MAX.
  • Volaris is adding eight A320neo aircraft this year, because it found it could get them for cheap.

Andrew’s Moment of Levity

The CEO of IKEA was elected president of Sweden yesterday. He’s expected to have his cabinet together by the weekend.