It’s getting hot in Airlineville… a little too hot. Things are warming up so quickly for the Eagle that he’s had to take a breather, scaling back his plans this summer.
The Cirium data also shows a warm front building over… Idaho. You’d think that wouldn’t be good news for the Eskimo, but he seems smitten with the place.
The Widget had a busy week as well, rekindling an old flame in Cincinnati while doing a host of other things.
All this and more this week. Liks sands through the hourglass, so are the skeds of air lines.
Alaska Does Boise
Alaska, as announced, bulked up Boise with new flights to Phoenix and Pullman (WA). Meanwhile, Texas gets some love with Dallas/Love to LA + SF along with Austin – LA getting one flight upgauged from an Embraer 175 to an A320 around the end of the year.
Allegiant Moves Into the Harbor in the Sky
Allegiant finally filed its flights from Phoenix/Sky Harbor as previously announced. Provo and Stockton start in October. It will also fly Phoenix/Mesa – Pittsburgh and Fort Lauderdale – Northwest Arkansas.
American Pulls Down in July
American pulled down 80 to 90 flights per day in the first half of July with a focus on Dallas/Fort Worth. Why? It’s not for commercial reasons. Instead, it’s because it wants a buffer to build some slack as the operation begins to suffer from reliability problems. According to American, it’s a combination of things leading to this, including bad weather and vendor staffing issues.
American also pulled down Labor Day flying which is not surprising at all. The airline did have some good news, extending some seasonal routes into the winter including Chicago/O’Hare – Burlington and Portland (ME). Lastly, Newark – Phoenix apparently wasn’t filed past October. Now it is.
Delta Cuts Again
Like clockwork, Delta has cut again. Its August capacity is down nearly 3 percent, September 4.5 percent, and October 4 percent. These are far from final, at least, that’s the case for September and October. Beyond those months, Delta made more cuts. Some routes lost 3 to 4x weekly while others lost 1x daily, including Atlanta – Alexandria, Asheville, Baton Rouge, Boise, Bozeman, Columbus (MS), Fort Wayne, Gaineville, Gulfport/Biloxi, Houston/IAH, Jackson Hole, Jacksonville (NC), Las Vegas, Minneapolis, Moline, Oklahoma City, Ontario, Reno, Shreveport, Spokane, Tulsa, and Tucson. On the flip side, there is growth in Atlanta – Dayton, Des Moines, Green Bay, Madison, and Steamboat Springs. Routes from other hubs were impacted as well.
More interesting is that Delta has decided to go back into Austin – Cincinnati on September 8, the same day American starts. Something tells me that even though Austin is now the only one of those two that’s a focus city, Cincinnati is what’s driving this. Meanwhile, the other focus city, Raleigh/Durham, sees its non-hub flying suspension extended through Septemer.
Another random note: JFK – Baltimore, Edinburgh, and Norfolk along with Minneapolis – Helena, Montreal, Toronto, and Traverse City, Seattle – Calgary, Indianapolis and Milwaukee are gone at least through the winter, if not for good.
Lastly, Delta is cutting Cape Town before it even started. It will not fly the triangle route originally planned and will instead just operate roundtrip from Atlanta to Cape Town Johannesburg.
Spirit Heads North
Spirit filed its newly-announced flights from Manchester (NH) to Florida — Fort Lauderdale, Fort Myers, Orlando, and Tampa. It also extended its schedule out through March 8.
United Tends to the Outdoors
United may have already bulked up winter flying in outdoors/mountain markets, but now it has filled in the gap in September and October as well with more flying. This was offset by cuts in a lot more markets elsewhere. United’s September is down 8.8 percent while October is down 4.1 percent.
Other Randomness
- Aer Lingus pushed back its Manchester – US service since the borders remain closed.
- Air Canada continues to trim July over the Atlantic. It won’t fly Toronto – Dublin and Zurich, Calgary – Frankfurt, and Montreal – Tel Aviv.
- Air Transat won’t fly Toronto – San Juan this winter.
- British Airways extended its pandemic schedule through July, canceling all service to Atlanta, Austin, Baltimore, Nashville, and Newark while reducing frequency elsewhere in light of the UK’s refusal to open borders.
- China Airlines is planning on flying 2 flights in July and another 2 in August from Ontario to Taipei.
- La Compagnie will fly from Newark to Milan starting in November. It will also increase Nice flying this summer.
- Porter has extended the cancellation of all flights through July. It will now pretend it will restart in August.
- Qatar was supposed to be cutting Doha – Atlanta and Boston frequencies, but it looks like it has now been boosted right back up.
- Silver is giving up on Fort Lauderdale – Columbia (SC).
- Swoop filed service starting in September from Edmonton to Las Vegas and Phoenix/Mesa. Toronto – Orlando/Sanford starts in October.
- WestJet is actually launching a European route. It’ll fly Calgary – Amsterdam from August.
That’s it for this week. Stay tuned for next week’s exciting episode of Skeds of air Lines. And if you can’t wait, you can subscribe to Cranky Network Weekly. This week, we cover:
- American Takes a Step Back in July
- Delta Defends a Former, Shrinking Hub
- Alaska Builds Up Boise
- Delta Grows Its Range with Johannesburg Flight
- Spirit Makes a Secondary Market Play in NH