Shock: Pre-Flight COVID Testing Reduces Number of People with COVID on Flights
Delta Air Lines along with the Georgia Department of Health and the Mayo Clinic have released a peer-reviewed study showing that when passengers all test within 72 hours before departure of a flight, the risk of someone getting on the airplane with COVID is lower than it would otherwise be. In other news, the sky is blue. We now wait for the announcement that Delta will open a chain of testing centers so it can increase profits from its ground-breaking discovery.
When the community infection rate was at 1.1%, there were only 0.05% of people infected in the sample. The data was collected on flights between Rome and both New York/JFK and Atlanta where nearly 10,000 passengers were required to test before flying. Of those, 4 tested positive and were not allowed to board the flight.
What this study doesn’t say, however, is whether finding 4 positive tests out of ten thousand offsets the annoying inconvenience of forcing everyone to wait in line at Walgreens just to get a test. The study also failed to note whether this somehow reduced the risk of actually catching COVID. As we know by now, the chances of becoming infected on an airplane are extraordinarily low, even when infected people are onboard.
Eurocontrol Shows Recovery Progress Varies Greatly By Country
Eurocontrol — the European air travel control organization — has released its August “snapshot” which looks at the number of flights operated by country compared to 2019. The results show that some countries have made a great deal more progress than others. On the whole, domestic flights within European countries have climbed to 70% of 2019 levels while international is at 55%. On the country level, however, the results swing wildly.
Spain, for example, has restored 96% of its domestic flights and 68% of international. We assume this is only because Ibiza is domestic, and that’s where all the cool kids are going to catch COVID party this summer. France is similar at 94% and 70% respectively, which is rather amusing since France has made a concerted effort to reduce the number of domestic flights so it can be green.
On the flip side, Germany has only 56% of domestic flights flying vs 2019 and 66% of international, again probably because of Ibiza. And besides, who wants to fly domestically within Germany anyway when you can take the train?
Norway shows what happens when you shut your borders to almost everyone. It had 94% of domestic flights operating with only 43% of international. And the United Kingdom shows what happens when you just don’t know what you’re doing. It had 68% of domestic and 46% of international flights operating.
Hawaiian Revises Q3 Outlook Significantly Downward
Hawaiian Airlines has joined the parade of carriers revising their 3rd quarter outlooks down due to weakened demand. The airline filed an 8-K with the SEC disclosing its downward trends, and thanks to a combination of the Delta variant and Hawaii’s governor telling people not to visit, things are looking notably worse than planned.
Hawaiian now expects total revenue to be down 34 to 37% instead of 28 to 33%. EBITDA is now expected to come in between -$20 million and -$40 million for the quarter. That range shifted $40 million for the worse.
In brighter news, the airline does expects costs to be down 13 to 15% vs previous estimates of 10 to 14%. The change is primarily due to Hawaiian having to buy significantly less POG juice.
- Air Canada Rouge is once again flying, so if you find your knees quaking in fear, now you know why.
- American is bringing live sports and news back on domestic narrowbody aircraft beginning tomorrow.
- American‘s pilots union is preparing to have its members picket to protest being overworked and not being given hotels properly.
- Austrian had the bright idea to actually sell tickets on winter charter flights instead of keeping them only as part of a package.
- British Airways flew one flight in the summer of 2021 without a slot, something we didn’t even know was possible. As punishment, BA has been fined £5,000. This sounds like JetBlue’s solution if it can’t get a permanent slot at the airport.
- Fly Jinnah is a new Pakistani low cost operator started in part by Air Arabia. It will launch next year.
- Hawaiian will bring back American Samoa service for the first time since the pandemic began, starting Monday.
- JetBlue has decided to give the permanent CFO job to its current “acting” CFO, Ursula Hurley.
- Porter realized that not flying airplanes was a pretty bad business model, so it has finally relaunched service today from Toronto/City airport.
- SAS has deferred the delivery of its last two Airbus A350-900s from 2022-2023 to 2023-2024.
- Singapore Air can breathe a sigh of relief as the Singaporean regulators have approved the 737 MAX to return to service.
- Southwest will let anyone who registers and flies two one-ways between Sep 9 and Nov 18 bring a companion for free between Jan 6 and Feb 28, probably because most flights will be empty anyway.
- Virgin Atlantic is extending elite status and voucher expirations by another six months.
Today is both National Ampersand Day & International Literacy Day. Celebrate by reading the WHOLE issue this time.