Southwest’s Weekend from Hell Continues
The holiday weekend may be over, but Southwest’s operational challenges remain, as the carrier’s meltdown is now in its 4th day. After canceling nearly 2,000 flights combined on Saturday and Sunday, Southwest axed another 350 on Monday and is still expecting cancellations into the triple digits on Tuesday.
The reasons being bandied about for the meltdown are as varied as the number of cancellations themselves, from bad weather, to FAA staffing issues, the carrier overextending itself with its scheduling, a potential pilot work action over vaccine mandates, a honey roasted peanut supply chain issue, the airline misplacing its boarding number signposts at airports across the country, and someone unplugging an important computer at operations HQ in Dallas and no one has realized it yet to plug it back in.
As Southwest gets its planes and crews back where they need to be, it hopes to be back to normal on Wednesday, operating most flights as scheduled with some of them operating on-time. For more on Southwest’s operational meltdown and its attempted recovery, visit today’s post at crankyflier.com.
LCC Startup Bonanza Continues Down Under with Bonza
The newest entrant into the LCC world is down under, as new Australian airline Bonza plans a mid-2022 launch, flying a fleet of B737 MAX 8 aircraft in an all-economy configuration.
The new carrier will be entering a crowded Australian market that includes Qantas and its LCC subsidiary Jetstar, but also Rex and Virgin Australia. If Rex spent most of the last year complaining about competition from Qantas, there’s no way it’s going to be happy with another entrant into the market.
Bonza plans to focus on a network of regional leisure destinations across the country via point-to-point service, a different approach in a country where most air travel is focused on the vaunted triangle of Sydney, Melbourne, and Brisbane.
Bonza’s CEO Tim Jordan gave the LCC boilerplate about low cost not meaning low quality, and that the airline will be for all Australian travelers, implying that Qantas is only interested in the business traveler and it is turning away customers at the boarding door who appear they’re going on vacation. It plans low frequency service of two or three times a week to as many as 45 airports around the country, some of which are places people really want to go.
American Expects Strong Fourth Quarter
American Airlines is “planning for a robust peak travel period in the fourth quarter,” it said in an 8-K filing with the SEC today, also announcing a stronger than expected third quarter.
Its full Q3 fiscal report will be released soon, but the carrier said its Q3 revenue was down 25% from Q3 2019, on the high-end of its forecast at the start of the quarter where it expected a loss between 24% and 28%. American paid $2.08 for jet fuel in the quarter and consumed 941 million gallons of gas. It saved $0.20 per gallon from the original price of $2.28 because it bought all of its on-board snacks for its entire operation at one Safeway in Northern California, and used the accumulated points on its Safeway card for the savings on the 900 million gallons of fuel.
AA flew 61.1 billion total available seat miles, a drop of 19.4% from Q3 2019. Sixty of the 61.1 billion miles were flown circling DFW waiting for storms to clear and a gate to open up, with the remaining 1.1 billion used to fly customers around the world. AA expects to end the quarter with about $18 billion in liquidity which it expects to use to hire new pilots to replace the ones who won’t get the vaccine.
- Aer Lingus is in talks with the Irish government for additional state aid. Fellow Irish carrier Ryanair is taking the news well.
- Air Belgium took delivery of its first of two A330-900neo aircraft.
- Air Canada is increasing the check-in and baggage drop-off deadline to 90 minutes prior to departure in Toronto for flights to U.S. and international destinations, two groups that are not exclusive of each other.
- AirAsia is requiring all customers check in via its app. The app will confirm vaccination status and other requirements from the Malaysian government.
- easyJet predicts a £1.1-1.2bn pre-tax loss for its FY2021 that ended in September.
- Enter Air entered into a $19.6 million loan agreement with the Polish government.
- Ethiopian has resumed flying 3x-weekly to Enugu, Nigeria (ENU).
- Fiji Airways is resuming operations on December 1.
- Great Dane Airlines is not having a great day as the carrier filed for bankruptcy on Monday.
- Greater Bay Airlines is having a great day as it secured its AOC from the Hong Kong government.
- LATAM plans to fly 56% of its capacity from October in 2019 this month.
- Porter is launching a co-branded porter style beer with Beau’s Brewing Co. known as the Porter Porter to distract the public from the fact it didn’t operate a flight for a year and a half.
- Qatar has requested government permission to move its route to Brisbane from seasonal to year-round.
- Ryanair and Wizz Air both plan to open new bases at Venice/Marco Polo next spring with Ryanair saying “Marco” while Wizz Air replies “Polo.”
- Singapore will operate 4x-weekly seasonal service to Seattle and Vancouver. The flights will operate from December 3 through February 15 and will operate from Seattle to Vancouver and then to Singapore.
- SWISS will begin service to Beirut with twice weekly flights beginning December 2.
I was invited to a Halloween party this weekend, but it’s a costume party and I don’t really want to go. So I decided to dress up as a Southwest B737 from this past weekend and cancel.