These three alliances have been forming, growing and shifting for some time now and it is almost fair to say that they’ve reached a certain maturity that lets us take a look at what the future might hold.
There will always be shifts between alliances as time goes by but the major structures are now in place and let’s be honest in that airlines are not equal partners in these alliances. There are bedrock airlines and there are airlines who are really more associate partners.
In the Star Alliance, US Airways has definitely been more of an associate member than, say, United, Lufthansa or Singapore Airlines and with the recent addition of Continental and the close partnership its formed with United, US Airways is even more the redheaded step-child in this organization.
SkyTeam really has the strongest core though. Formed, in part, from the original Northwest / KLM alliance that began in the 90’s, it now has an extremely strong network that spans both the Pacific and Atlantic oceans. If it has a weakness, it is in South America among South American carriers and I’m not sure if that is really a weakness right now.
The Star Alliance and SkyTeam have both managed to work among themselves in pretty close partnership and develop strong networks playing on each others’ strengths. Schedules between those partnership airlines are pretty rational and they do tend to treat affiliate partners as having value in the organizations.
Then there is Oneworld. Oneworld isn’t so much a partnership alliance as it is a looser affiliation of airlines. To be sure, at one time Oneworld’s members represented a very strong core of airlines who were profitable and very strong on a global level. To a degree, they still are but this has definitely become the weak alliance over time and with the fight over JAL taking place, its now fighting for its life.
Oneworld doesn’t know how to work well with each other. Partners American Airlines and British Airways have dominated that relationship and because of their obstinance over trans-Atlantic routes and slots at Heathrow, they haven’t been able to work closely together over time and develop those relationships that have been grown in other alliances. Because of their dominance, other potential strengths in their network, QANTAS, JAL and Cathay Pacific for instance, haven’t really been exploited fully either.
Oneworld is, for most intents and purposes, an old style Anglo-American relationship with AA, BA, QANTAS and Cathay Pacific dominating that alliance. (If you don’t think Cathay Pacific is Anglo, look up its history and its executive team.)
If Oneworld loses JAL, I’m not sure this alliance survives in the long run. It cannot afford to be an alliance with two dominant partners (AA and BA) and it cannot afford to lose even one trans-Pacific partner. If JAL moves over to SkyTeam, then I suspect over the next few years we’ll see one or more “majors” in that relationship find homes elsewhere.
No matter what Oneworld does, they lose a major network in Japan if JAL leaves the alliance and they have no hope of luring ANA over to their alliance either. The best they can hope to do is build their routes systems into Japan with more direct flights from outside Japan. That isn’t very satisfactory.
They already lack a major partner in China itself (Cathay Pacific isn’t quite that kind of partner) and lack a major partner centered in Korea and Southeast Asia/India.
I suspect we’ll see one or more core partners in Oneworld slip away to one of the other alliances. It wouldn’t be too hard to attract LAN away from Oneworld, for instance. Nor would it be difficult to perhaps walk Cathay Pacific away from Oneworld. That would leave three basic Anglo American core partners who have no harmonized strategy and not much to offer smaller affiliate partners either.
What’s more, JAL doesn’t need their money now that they’ve gone into bankruptcy. The Japanese government is financing them and will provide all the capital they need at this point since they have little choice to do anything else. That means JAL is free to consider a long term strategy and if it can get some real signal that anti-trust immunity would be granted to a partnership between Delta and JAL and the rest of SkyTeam, that’s their best deal.
It has occurred to me that the reason there hasn’t been more worry about the dominance such an anti-trust immunity would grant is that, maybe, Delta has signaled its willingness to draw down its legacy network to and inside of Japan that it gained in its Northwest Airlines purchase. Northwest Airlines not only had a strong system to Japan, it also had a strong network system of flights originating from Japan to regional Asian destinations.
If Delta is willing to let JAL fly that system on its behalf, that may well satisfy regulators in the United States.
So, the Dallas Morning News Aviation Blog has THIS entry about the United States telling Japan to slow down on their assumptions that all alliances applying for antitrust immunity in anticipation of a new Open Skies treaty between our two fine country will receive approval. Apparently the Japanese government has been presuming that any and all applications are a done deal and approval is just pro forma. So the United States went to Japan and essentially said “Yeah. Not so fast. Not only do we not choose the alliance for our companies, but we actually don’t just rubber stamp things either.”
With all the talk over the past two weeks about how it was all but announced that JAL would switch to an alliance with Delta and SkyTeam, I could not understand how everyone could regard that as a done deal. Such an alliance meant that 50% or more of the trans-Pacific traffic between the US and Japan would be owned by a cooperating alliance. In the airline world, that’s market power.
To put my puzzlement in perspective, the trans-Pacific BA/AA/Iberia alliance wouldn’t come to close to controlling that much of the UK/US traffic and, yet, the DoJ and DoT have *not* given blanket approval to that application. The DoJ asked for modifications and the DoT (which actually gives the approval and which is more friendly in general to airlines) is waiting for more comments.
So, as I’ve already written a couple of times, I didn’t see an anti-trust immunity agreement between JAL and Delta as necessarily anything genuinely possible. Frankly, I don’t know why Delta thinks it so doable either but from their perspective, there is no harm in trying to form the alliance.
This is the cultural difference that exists between Japan and the United States. In Japan, government still very much has a hand in the direction of businesses and, in particular, the airline industry. Japan, despite its size, remains essentially a two airline country where one of those airline (JAL) has been a government arm for its entire existence. From Japan’s point of view, if the US wants an Open Skies agreement and knows that granting immunity is essential to that agreement, then surely the US will make that happen regardless. Obviously, our government doesn’t work that way.
I suspect that was a rather stunning reveal for the Japanese government and the executives at JAL. I also suspect that the CEO of American Airlines, Gerard Arpey, smiled yesterday despite everything else slamming into AA this week. Now that I understand what was going on on this subject, I reaffirm my belief that, ultimately, JAL will stay with Oneworld if only because of anti-trust issues and the extreme difficulties and logistics of getting such an agreement to pass in Washington, DC.
Southwest’s 4th quarter financials have been released and contrary to analysts expectations, Southwest not only made a profit in the 4th quarter, they’ve made a profit now for 37 years in a row. For details on the numbers, click HERE.
I’m sure many will attribute this entirely to Southwest’s “no baggage fees” campaign but I think that is doing a disservice to Southwest. I’m quite sure this has more to do with having an excellent service product, excellent staff and a new CEO who appears to have come into his own and really is a new SWA leader. Congratulations Southwest.
And that isn’t exactly breaking news, is it? Everyone knew it was coming and now it has happened. Japan Air Lines must now face the music, reorganize and find a way to survive.
It isn’t as if they were a shining example of profitability over the years. Indeed, it was yet another airline formed as a national flag carrier that was ultimately privatized and which ultimately went into deeper and deeper debt. Its cousins are airlines like Alitalia and Olympic, not British Airways and American Airlines.
The blame lies in the company culture and by that I mean it went too long in a regulated and semi-regulated environment and then got set free into the competitive winds of the world with a crew of executives that never knew any real competition. Its one positive attribute was its service level which by most accounts was impeccable.
There has been a lot of criticism for the CEO, Haruka Nishimatsu, over the past few weeks. Particularly when it was announced that he was ultimately going to be replaced by Kazuo Inamori, founder of the Kyocera Group. I wrote about that announcement HERE. Tonight I remembered a video that was passed around among many airline enthusiasts as a kind of great example of what an airline CEO should be. Mr. Nishimatsu is shown riding a bus, eating in the general cafeteria of the company and generally being one of the people. I remember many people posting on other blogs about him earning just $90,000 in salary after cutting all his perks when he had to slash budgets and staff at JAL. (See below)
Let’s remember that this guy at least tried to do the right thing which is quite unlike many in this business at times.
So, what’s next? Well, JAL has to layoff thousands of employees, reduce costs at every level, probably purchase some new aircraft and find a way to claw itself back into profitability. That’s a tough thing to do even in good times.
I’ve some doubt about their choice of CEO to do it with. This is a man who plans to work for no salary and put in “3 or 4 days” a week as well as choose a second-in-command from the current airline ranks. Huh? Really?
What JAL needs is a seasoned airline executive who has extensive experience in competitive environments and who understands what it means to run both a national and international airline. There are plenty of those around in this world but, yes, it does potentially mean hiring someone who isn’t Japanese to run the airline. Or at least to lead the airline out of its current problems.
There is some precedent for this. Nissan’s CEO is Carlos Ghosn, a Lebanese-Brazilian man who came to Nissan from, of all places, Renault. He made enemies until he surprised everyone by bringing Nissan back to profitability. If they can’t stand to hire outside of Japan, then they would do well to find someone at ANA to take over.
If the Japanese government and JAL’s board want to be serious about recovery, they need someone who is the best, not someone who is politically safe.
JAL will likely rid itself of its 747 fleet in favor of a 777 / 787 fleet for its international operations. It is time for those Airbus A300 aircraft to go too. It will have to eliminate stupid routes like flying from New York City to Rio de Janeiro. Their focus on First Class and Business Class will have to be realigned. (An amazing portion of some of their international aircraft is dedicated to these two classes leaving only a small portion for Economy Class.)
But I have to say that I think this is going to turn much uglier before it gets better. I think JAL will flounder and I think the Japanese government will continue to pump money into it (and, in a way, they kind of have to since they provide the only competition to speak of for ANA.)
“We believe it is important to secure customer convenience by the injection of public funding. However, we are also highly concerned that the fair and competitive environment would not be secured under the financial support and injection of public funding.”
That kind of criticism is rare in Japan but ANA has had to fight for its success since its inception. They have a point but strangely even I find such a statement a bit tacky on this day.
Everyone says it is Delta and SkyTeam who will lure JAL away from the Oneworld alliance. I must say, given all the talk, I’m beginning to be swayed. However, I remain skeptical that they can enter into the SkyTeam alliance, particularly with Delta, without their being some anti-trust issues on the part of both governments. If they are leaning that way, I believe it is because someone in the Japanese government is leading them to believe there will be no issues. I do not think that that will be the case in the United States, however. One look at the criticisms of the AA/BA/Iberia anti-trust case and you’ll see what I mean.
Azul turns 1 year old and has posted some pretty impressive numbers. According to THIS Wall Street Journal story, Azul has managed to carry over 2 million people in its first year of operation.
Flying with a fleet of 14 Embraer E190/E195 jets with a 106 and 118 seats respectively, Azul plans to grow their fleet considerably ending up with a fleet of 33 aircraft by 2011. Azul was, to date, the best financed airline venture yet at $200 million in start up capital and is an excellent example of how to start an airline properly.
Owned and controlled by David Neeleman, former founder of Morris Air and jetBlue (and who also assisted in the founding of WestJet in Canada), Azul shows great promise for stimulating air travel demand in Brazil.
Ordinarily, I’m not too keen to talk about completely foreign airlines but this is one I like to watch because I have a feeling that Mr. Neeleman will come back to the US again one day and start yet another airline. I presume he presently has a non-compete clause in force between himself and jetBlue but I wouldn’t be surprised to learn he’s already looking at a map of the United States and making plans with himself for the future.
According to the Wall Street Journal Middle Seat blog, American Airlines has decided to match the bag fees recently implemented by Delta and Continental. You can read more HERE.
So, at present, Delta (including Northwest), American Airlines, Continental, United and US Airways are now all charging $25 for the first bag and $35 for the second bag with some of the airlines offering “discounts” if you perform your “bag fee purchase” online. That would imply that they each see this price for checked bags being a bit more elastic than one would have thought. Or, at the least, they see it as elastic as long as they all go for the same increases much as the case is with air fare increases.
So far, no low cost carrier has adopted this pricing model or even raised their checked bag fees. I suspect they won’t either as it gives them an opportunity to show themselves as the good guy while gaining some incremental revenue.
If this rise in fees sticks for the next 1 or 2 quarters, I do think it will put tremendous pressure on Southwest Airlines to institute their own version of bag fees, at least by institutional investors and analysts. So far, Southwest and its CEO Gary Kelly have resisted these calls to add checked bag fees and, so far, they believe it is resulting in incremental revenue from passengers switching to Southwest to avoid fees. Since CEO Kelly (and Southwest as a whole) is not one to shade the truth, I’ll continue to believe these claims.
However, with other LCC carriers such as Airtran and Virgin America and even jetBlue (on the 2nd bag) have added fees and do report significantly improved revenues from that, I would imagine that the call for Southwest to add these fees will be defeaning particularly when Southwest could implement a jetBlue or Airtran style program and see improvements to their quarterly results which haven’t been too impressive in the last year.
It is sad but I don’t believe we’ve seen the last of these increases. I do think that some airline will probe the upper limits of these fees just a bit more yet. I do think that Southwest will resist the call to add these fees for at least another 6 months but if there hasn’t been some kind of collapse in the price of these fees by then, I would not be surprised to learn that Southwest has begun to make changes to their infrastucture to implement them. I think the first sign will be the withdrawal of their “no fees for checked bags” advertising.
Sean Menke, largely the architect of Frontier Airlines’ success over the past several years and who was the innovator who brought a la carte pricing to both Frontier and Air Canada is leaving Republic Airways according to this Dallas Morning News Aviation Blog report HERE.
I don’t see this departure as a condemnation of Republic so much as Menke is probably wanting to move on to bigger and better things. With long ties to the Denver community, moving to Indianapolis probably wasn’t high on his list of things to do. With his track record in this industry, Menke represents the kind of talent other airlines need and I’m sure his list of offers is already growing rapidly. There are several airlines who could stand to have someone of his caliber. And let’s face it, with Brian Bedford in the top position at Republic, there was nowhere for Menke to go. In his mind, it was probably better to leave now than to stay in a position with no upward mobility and a narrowed scope.
However, Republic is going to miss this key executive in a bad way, I think. Menke was just the kind of person you need to merge brands together while preserving the image necessary to succeed in the airline industry. While Midwest is only a brand now, it is an important brand in that portfolio. Managing brands is something Republic has almost no experience in doing and this is a critical time for them.
I think Republic will find someone to do this but I also think this development does spell the end of the Midwest brand in the near future. It is just too difficult to manage to brands that, while both are good service products, both are not entirely in harmony with each other either. Frontier is ultimately the stronger brand nationally and has the service product that fits closest with with industry trends now. I think sometime in the next 12 to 18 months, we’ll see one brand (Frontier) and Milwaukee’s status as a “hub” will draw down to that of a focus city at best.
The key question is will Republic find someone who “gets” what they’re trying to do and can brand and market to that approach? And can they get him/her in time to keep the whole enterprise from stumbling. That’s where I worry because Republic isn’t in the habit of having to find such talent for a branded enterprise and it takes a while to figure out what you need and who you need. If CEO Bedford has strong industry contacts among the branded airlines, he would be wise to get work making those calls asap. An executive search for 9 months won’t fly for this.
Delta Airlines chose to announce they are increasing their checked baggage fees. If you pay online, your fee goes from $15 for the first bag to $23 for the first bag. The second bag checked rises from $25 to $32 (paid online). Continental matched those fees almost immediately. While it seems exorbitant to me, I wonder if anyone will really notice right now.
I suspect Delta did this simply because they have pricing power at most of their hubs (ATL, MSP, DTW, SLC, CVG, MEM) and because they don’t think it is going to affect the consumer’s decision about which airline to fly in most cases. Delta doesn’t get a lot of LCC competition at its hubs except for ATL and there seems to be a unspoken agreement with Airtran not to get too ugly there. Besides, Airtran has checked baggage fees too.
The thing is, most online sites that offer booking for airlines in the US do not mention baggage fees when displaying prices for routes. Delta will continue to appear to be very competitive on routes while likely adding additional incremental revenue through the “gotcha” approach. Quite honestly, I suspect they’ll get away with it. At least until there is a healthy recovery in the airline industry and that is likely 18 to 24 months away still. Maybe more.
Will others match it? I suspect that American Airlines might. There is no precise harmony among airlines on these fees, not yet anyway. Continental already had pretty high fees at $18 and $27 for online checked fees (with a $2 and $3 surcharge at the airport). AA is at $20 and $30 respectively whether you check online or at the airport. US Airways is at $20 / $30 for online (with a $5 surcharge for checking at the airport.) United is $15 and $25 for online checking.
By contrast, Southwest Airlines has no fees up to the 3rd bag, jetBlue offers the first bag free and $30 fee for the second while Airtran charges $15 for the first and $25 for the second. In other words, these fees are all over the place. The truth is, as competitive as airfares are on many routes, these fees can change the equation pretty dramatically in some cases since those fees are for each way on a round trip flight.
These fees have added dramatic amounts of revenue to airlines’ bottom line and I don’t see them going away at all. I don’t think the fees among legacy airlines will harmonize much at all until and if online travel sites begin showing an “all in” pricing when comparing fares. Even with such comparisons, I don’t think the fees go away so much as they just begin to merge together among the airlines.
Will anyone else raise their fees? Well, maybe. I’m sure it will be tempting to do so among all the legacy airlines. One or two may even try to raise the ante some. I kind of think both United and American Airlines will try some kind of new mix in the future. I don’t see the LCC carriers playing around with their fees much if at all. They have the revenue and now this may be their chance to follow Southwest’s strategy in a modified form by advertising lower checked baggage fees.
I don’t think Southwest will change its attitude on these fees based on this new development. Their strategy appears to be working for them and they don’t have a history of following the pack when something works. That said, I’m sure it is something they’ll re-examine from time to time and it doesn’t mean they won’t add fees at some point in the future. Right now, they appear to be capturing customers with their ‘no fees” approach and their aggressive advertising seems to have caught some attention.
As much as I hate these fees for the 1st bag checked, I hate that airlines and travel websites have done really little to truly show the “all in” price for these trips. It makes things just that much more murky for the consumer and that is a bad thing. However, the best thing you can do is learn the fees for the airlines you may be shopping for a trip and do the math yourself. You’ll be frustrated by it and no doubt resent it but there isn’t a ready made solution at this time.
Frankly, these developments are just one more reason why I wonder about Southwest re-joining the travel agency world. The world has changed since they left it and, quite honestly, I think they could re-structure their IT infrastructure and re-join those agencies with little incremental costs involved. At that point, they become the no brainer for many consumers from my view. Even as aware as I am of airline options and even being located in the DFW area, even I tend to forget about Southwest as an option sometimes.
One strategy for learning these fees is to visit LuggageLimits.Com (also linked in my sidebar).
Reuters is reporting HERE that JAL has announced a new CEO. The founder of Kyocera probably most known here for cell phones, Kazuo Inamori, has been named as the new CEO in place of Haruka Nishimatsu who agreed to step down as part of a restructuring by a Japanese government fund.
I see a few potential problems here. First, Mr. Inamori is 77 years old and in his statement regarding this new position, he said:
“I am old and a full-time job is hard for me, so I would like to work three or four days a week and I will work for free.”
That doesn’t inspire my confidence. The airline business is punishing and requires constant care and attention. Anyone who will guide a successful restructuring really needs to be making a comittment to long hours for the next 3 to 5 years.
Second, Mr. Inamori doesn’t have any prior airine or even transportation and/or hospitality experience. His background is in electronics. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, the airline business is a service industry. One of the things that often confounds outsiders to the business is just how much cash it takes to run an airline even on a *daily* basis. The amount of money flowing through an airline is staggering and newcomers often believe that simple “tweaks” will yield profit. They don’t.
Yes, there have been outsiders that have come into the airline industry and succeeded nominally. United Airlines is rather famous of seeking its CEOs from outside the business and most recently with its current CEO Glenn Tilton. However, many would argue that Glenn Tilton is the perfect example of why it should NOT be done and I would tend to agree.
JAL needs a dynamic leader with excellent ties to the Japanese financial world but who is also capable of leading JAL’s staff through what will be a very painful restructuring. Jobs will have to be cut. Routes will have to be restructured and new alliances found. Japan is in need of an LCC carrier and someone who could identify how to start one would be an excellent candidate for JAL. Sadly, LCC business models are outside the knowledge of most Japanese airline executives. (If you think JAL Express is an LCC, read THIS and you’ll find it really isn’t.)
JAL also have to figure out its international routes which just boggle my mind at times. For instance, JAL flies Tokyo-NYC-Rio de Janeiro and offers flights with 5th freedom rights between NYC and Rio. Now, flying JAL between those two cities might sound attractive but it strikes me as silly. JAL would be far better off flying to NYC and allowing AA (via the Oneworld alliance) carry their follow on traffic to Rio.
JAL just announced a closer partnership with Oneworld member, Mexicana, for carrying traffic from the US to Mexico. While there are strong ties between Japan and Mexico, this makes sense for JAL.
At one point, JAL was flying to destinations such as DFW, Cairo, Beirut and Copenhagen. That kind of flying reflects someone acting as a national flag carrier but not an airline acting in its own best interest. The new leadership will have to rationlize the routes, rationalize the fleet and figure out which of two major airline alliances to participate in.
The fleet is comprised of a mix ranging from Boeing 737s to Boeing 747Ds and capacity will have to be reduced and aircraft interiors reconfigured to reflect the accomodation of more coach class traffic. JAL is in the enviable position of having 2 airline alliances, Oneworld and Skyteam, court their membership and offering generous financial packages in return. But choosing the right alliance isn’t just about how much financial rescue packages offer, it is about identifying who can offer the best revenue improvements over the long term. I still believe that JAL will ultimately remain with Oneworld if only because fighting anti-trust issues by joining Skyteam is not what an airline should be doing during the fight of its life.
Since Virgin America began operations, I’ve been watching for something sensible to happen. There have been a few developments that make sense.
In addition to VA’s initial trans-continental routes, they began to add some West Coast service to places such as San Diego, Las Vegas and Seattle. This let me increase aircraft utilization since those routes from San Francisco and Los Angeles weren’t 6+ hours but, rather, 2 hour (or less) hops. And having a bit of network to feed into those trans-con flights made sense too.
But this put them into competition with a few very well established airlines as well. United, Southwest, jetBlue and Alaska Airlines all operate on the West Coast very effectively and on the same routes.
Alaska Airlines, a legacy airline with a very good full service product started to jump on the anti-VA bandwagon and issued a number of objections to their “US Owned” status to the DOT. Most likely because VA had a product that competed very well against their full service business class product and that was a major source of revenue. Alaska Airlines had a lot to lose on some of those routes in particular. Strangely, United remained pretty quiet and probably because their frequent flier program kept their business customer pretty loyal.
Speaking of frequent flier programs, that was another area that Virgin America was a bit lax in and that kind of surprised me too. They had 2 extra years to develop a strong program and have the infrastructure in place to support it. It was something that, in my mind, would have made sense since the business customer likes such programs and they had a good trans-continental service product to attract those people. Instead, it was rolled out a tad late and still lacks much of a partnership with anyone.
Although VA positions itself as a low cost carrier, it really offers a 2 class service product that is comparable to any legacy airline and, in many cases, it is a service product that is much better.
Aircraft are equipped with a two class cabin (first and coach) called, oddly enough, First Class and Main Cabin. There is a Main Cabin Select product but that’s really access to Main Cabin seats that have a bit more legroom (exit aisles and bulkhead seats) with some of the First Class service product (meals, beverages and premium tv channels are free). It’s an economy plus plus or semi-business class product.
I believe all airlines could stand to offer more service products through their cabins and this was an area that I thought VA was kind of smart in. I still think a lot of airlines could stand to differentiate even more but I liked what VA had there. It was more “business” than “coach” than a lot of airlines’ economy plus products and even competed very well against a similar offering from jetBlue.
jetBlue really took things to aother level with their LiveTV offering on their aircraft. Virgin America took it to yet another level by offering a full entertainment system (including TV) that even allowed shopping and the ability to order food and drink from a menu, thus eliminating the traditional beverage and meal cart services. The system, called Red, worked pretty well although some reviews had it not always working or in need or a re-boot from time to time. Such systems do take time to work out bugs and time for staff to learn to work with.
VA also got aggressive and was the first US airline to offer GoGo inflight Wifi on its aircraft. With accomodations like power ports at each seat and the existing entertainment offerings, this was likely adding whipped cream to the ice cream. All of their aircraft are equipped with it and Virgin says they’re doing OK with it. Probably more so than some airlines.
All of these offerings cost a lot of money to both purchase and maintain and VA continued to see red ink as time passed by. (It is difficult to get a very good picture of VA’s finances because it continues to be a private company instead of a public corporation.) At one point, rumors that its US investors wanted out spread around and Alaska Airlines filed yet another objection to VA with the DOT who, recently, yet again ruled that VA was more than sufficiently US controlled. (Read THISfor more info.) CEO David Cush did continue to speak publicly that their revenues were improving monthly and that he did think VA was edging closer to an operating profit.
In fact, VA did manage to eek out a small third quarter operating profit as reported in December which, frankly, surprised a lot of people. I know I was. It was a 59% improvement (according to VA) over the previous year’s third quarter and they managed to make it happen in what has been arguably one of the worst economic climates for airlines ever. This got my attention. Frankly, the climate hasn’t been good for VA since they started to improvement during those times is impressive, to me anyway.
Virgin America is also a bit unusual for the airline industry in that it has a number of women in senior leadership positions. Their SVP for Inflight Services, VP – Marketing, SVP-CFO and VP – Planning & Sales are all women.
Also curious is the rather interesting Canadian influence in their leadership. The Chairman of Virgin America is Canadian Don Carty, former Chairmen and CEO of American Airlines. Frances Fiorello, SVP – Inflight Services has had a long career with Candian airlines such as Canadian Pacific, Canadien Airlines and Air Canada. Bob Weatherly, SVP of Flight Operations, has a similar Canadian history.
And then there is the American Airlines connection which kind of puzzles me at times. Don Carty, David Cush, Diana Walke, and Ross Bonanno each have a history with AA. Virtually all their senior leadership has extensive with experience with previous airlines. In fact, after looking into their biographies, it made me realize just how VA might be managing to make it despite all predictions against them.
It’s a strong team with a strong background in successful airlines that, for the most part, have reputations for good cost control and good service products.
Virgin America has been on my death watch for at least a year. Now, a lot of my inclination towards that has been based on routes. Yes, they’ve grown and, yes, they’ve added routes. But they don’t seem to want to really compete except where there is really low hanging fruit against their service product.
They recently opened up routes between, of all places, Fort Lauderdale and Los Angeles and San Francisco. Obviously they saw some opportunity there but I don’t get what the attraction is in adding those two routes before a lot of other opportunities.
VA doesn’t have an East Coast network at all. They have destinations in NYC, Boston and Washington, D.C. (in addition to the Fort Lauderdale routes) and that’s OK. Competing on the East Coast is brutal and those three main destinations have enough originating traffic in them that they don’t necessarily need network traffic feeding in on the West Coast yet.
David Cush has, at times, talked of adding routes from the West Coast to Chicago but he wants O’Hare airport and claims there are no gates to be had. This isn’t exactly true. There are gates but VA doesn’t want to pay the price to get entry to them. There were, at one point, gates available at Chicago’s Midway airport but VA doesn’t like that idea either.
More recently, Mr. Cush dropped hints of adding a route possibly to Austin or Dallas / Fort Worth. Most agree that Austin might happen (there is a strong tech connection between Austin and the West Coast) but doubt the DFW possibility.
You see, my problem is that VA seems to be ignoring the possibities in the middle of the country. With their service product, they could compete very well against AA on routes between DFW and San Diego and Los Angeles. They could compete well with AA and United on routes between Chicago and Los Angeles and San Francisco. There is a strong connection between Denver and Los Angeles and despite the back alley fight going on in Denver, it has possibilities.
They’ve by-passed Portland, Oregon which has strong ties to both LA, Seattle and San Francisco and Alaska Airlines, who owns a lot of that traffic has already proven to be susceptible to VA’s service product.
Indeed, if you look at their route map right now, they have every appearance of avoiding any destination that is a real hub for a legacy airline.
I can’t think of a market that is more need of a real competitor in service product to destinations on the West Coast than DFW. Completely dominated by American Airlines, the service product and prices to West Coast destinations is weak and expensive respectively. Atlanta could stand a bit of competition on routes to the West Coast too. The same is true for Miami, Minneapolis / St. Paul, St. Louis, Detroit, Kansas City, Cleveland and maybe even Philadelphia and Baltimore.
It’s always a nice strategy to enter airports where the barriers to entry are easy and cheap when you’re getting started. But VA is more than 2 years old and clearly has a product that, like jetBlue, can compete against major airlines and win. In any of the major hubs I”ve named above, they are dominated by one or two airlines on those West Coast routes that are flying old aircraft with little new service product and who have much higher costs than VA. It isn’t going to get easier to compete with these guys with time.
That’s why a part of me continues to view VA with skepticism. New airlines don’t win by being afraid to compete. Airtran and jetBlue are perfect examples of airlines who were willing to go up against major legacy airlines and beat them on both price *and* service. Airlines who weave and duck from their opponents tend to lose. Skybus was a great example of that.
There are often moments that are ripe for smaller businesses to make a commitment to going against their major competitors and, if you wait too long, those moments go away and never come back. I’m starting to sense that Virgin America is beginning to lose those moments.
Would I fly VA? Sure. I’d love to enjoy their service product. However, they fly nowhere I want to travel so it is going to be a long time, if ever, that I get to try them. Would I suggest them? Absolutely. At least for now. They aren’t going to go bankrupt any time soon. They’ve managed to get past that infancy stage now and kudos to them. They offer some fantastic prices on their routes and I doubt anyone would be disappointed by flying them.
It has been 2 weeks since the Underwear Bomber made his attempt to take down a Northwest Airlines A330 en-route from Amsterdam to Detroit. In that time, we have seen all manner of posturing by the public, government officials and pundits as to this serious security lapse. My last comments on this are HERE.
Since my last comments, I’ve been appalled by a number of people’s statements on this issue. I’ve been appalled by former Vice President Dick Cheney making political hay out of this. I’m deeply disappointed at the criticisms and obstruction on the part of Senators Jim DeMint and John McCain with respect to the TSA and its nominated leader, Erroll Southers. I’m deeply disappointed by President Obama’s administration in describing this as a terrible failure in our security.
The most sensible writing I’ve found on this topic is by Bruce Schneier (which can be read HERE) and probably because, yes, it agrees with me. That doesn’t necessarily come easy from me because while I’ve respected Mr. Schneier’s opinions and while I do feel he is dead on right about these security issues (and has been for a long time), I also think he oftens shouts about these issues too loudly.
But he’s right. This wasn’t a failure in security. Certainly the terrorists didn’t win either. Mr. Schneier is correct in pointing out that our security reduced this attempt to a near certain failure.
For the past week, all I’ve heard and read about this issue is that we’re enacting measures to counter an attempt like this in the future. Well, in some respects, yes, we should do that. However, many people, including me, Mr. Schneier and others, have pointed out that terrorists, in particular Al Qaeda, *rarely* if ever make the same kind attempt twice. So, looking for a Nigerian with PETN sewed into his underwear while carrying a syringe on his person is almost certainly going to fail us.
Yes, the public does expect something to be done. And it should. It is even entitled to see something being done. Doing something doesn’t mean doing anything. It means doing something that really does improve both the real and perceived level of security we might experience when traveling. The biggest part of the problem in this whole debate is that despite excellent security already going on, the public does *not* feel that it either good, real or substantive.
The public is right, too. At the ground level, we observe too many Keystone Kop events taking place. Just a few days ago, we shut down one of the largest airports in our country and inconvenienced thousands and thousands of people because a TSA security guard left their post. Just walked away and allowed a man to enter the sterile gate area unchallenged. Read about the most recent developments in that HERE and HERE.
The TSA says it takes responsibility. Really? Frankly, I don’t care. The TSA and its guards should be one hell of a lot more responsible and professional than that at any time.
What is appalling is that TSA video cameras weren’t recording and it took 80+ minutes for the TSA to notify the NYNJ Port Authority (who runs the airports) of the breach and then they had to rely on Continental Airlines’ cameras to try to figure out what happened. Spokeswoman Ann Davis of the TSA said:
Davis said Monday that although the TSAwas unable to locate the man, any threat he may have presented was eliminated “by rescreening everyone and re-combing the airport to make sure he didn’t introduce anything to the environment or hand anything off to anyone.”
I have an answer. Having to clear a terminal and re-screen thousands of people and delay untold numbers of flights does not lend credence to the idea that the TSA has a handle on these issues. It just doesn’t. Don’t take responsibility for it, do something about it. Do something real and tangible. The TSA should be deeply ashamed and shunned for such a lack of professionalism. Right now, they look like a pack of huckleberries and that is not good. It gives terrorists the idea that something *is* breachable.
Lack of professionalism, good judgement or proper perspective is missing from other quarters as well. Take this opinion piece by Steve Danyluk on CNN which can be read HERE.
Pilot Danyluk (A first officer for a major US airline) reckons that an emergency alert should have been sent out and a major effort should have been put into action upon this act taking place. He’s outraged that he learned of the event on his iPhone after flying a 6 hour flight and landing.
That is absurd. First, there was no evidence whatsoever that this was a coordinated attack. You should respond in Danyluk’s desired manner if there is such evidence but there was absolute zero evidence that this was a coordinated attack. None. Too those who say you can never be too safe, I respond, yes, you can. To have responded in such a way would have been like presuming an entire neighborhood was under attack after one house experienced a burglary.
Second, I wonder what Pilot Danyluk would have done if he had been alerted. Neither he nor his captain can leave the cockpit and wander among the aircraft searching for suspicious people. His cockpit door is hardened in such a way that it would probably take more than a fire axe to breach it. His cabin crew are not the best trained security staff to identify and secure a suspicious person (and I have plenty of that evidence coming up.) The best thing he could have done was fly his airplane to its destination. He did that.
Third, an alert would have prepared him no more for an explosion. Even if he had experienced an explosion, he certainly couldn’t do anything about it any earlier. And if he had experienced an explosion, he would have been very busy getting that aircraft under control and pointed to a safe landing location.
The truth is, it takes a pretty big bomb to take out a commercial airliner. Oh, it could have severely damaged the aircraft and possibly hurt or killed someone but the likelihood of someone having enough explosive and a good enough detonator to wipe an aircraft from the sky with our current security in place is extremely statistically insignificant.
Take the example of the DHL Airbus A300 being hit in Baghdad in 2003 by a surface to air missile. You can read an account HERE. A large, twin engined, wide body aircraft that had just taken off from Baghdad executing a special rapid climb procedure and fully loaded with fuel was hit by a surface to air missile that was *designed* to take out aircraft and they still made it to the ground. Yes, the recovery was due to the professionalism of the pilots and some prior knowledge of how to use differential engine thrust to “steer” the airplane (as a result of the THIS incident) but this aircraft was hit by a flying bomb traveling more than twice the speed of sound with a 6lbs warhead with a high explosive impact fuse designed to fragment upon impact and survived relatively in tact. You can’t carry that kind of thing in your underwear.
I understand why Pilot Danyluk is “furious”. He’s a type A pilot and type A pilots think they can always do something about something. It’s a nice thought but there really wasn’t anything for him to do that he wasn’t already doing provided he was following standard security procedures while in flight. He can stomp his feet and write opinions on CNN all he wants but it does NOT mean that security failed him or anyone else.
It isn’t just pilots. Well, it is pilots (still) but it is also flight crew, ATC and even NORAD.
It would appear that a man became “unruly” on a Hawaiian Airlines flight from Portland, Oregon to Hawaii on Wednesday. The captain decided to turn back to Portland (probably because it was just as easy to go there as anywhere else) and suddenly the flight is being “escorted” by F-15 fighters scrambled up by NORAD.
You can not make this stuff up. Read about this incident HERE.
Can’t be too safe, right? Wrong. What is notable about this news story is that this aircraft returned to Portland, dropped the passenger off into the waiting hands of the FBI who, after a short while later, determined that no laws had been broken and released him. This is very suspicious and sounds much more like a flightcrew having a hissy fit over a grumpy passenger rather than someone who was acting in a manner that justified a 90 minute diversion and meeting the aircraft with FBI.
Certainly it would appear that sending F-15 fighters (and spending thousands of dollars) to escort this diversion was a bit foolish and wasteful.
The best security in any situation including on an aircraft is using good judgement. Good judgement is not “better safe than sorry” but, rather, assessing a situation for what it is rather than what it isn’t.
The pubic will begin to perceive that we have good security not when things like these events don’t happen but when how we handle them becomes professional, efficient and proactive. We have a decent defensive security process but what we don’t have is a uniform, professional example of it in the most public of representatives, the TSA.
Leaving all good sense and judgement in the closet and overreacting to events like this serve absolutely no good purpose and even weaken security in the long run.
USA Today’s Today in the Sky blog is reporting that Mesa Airlines has filed (voluntarily) for bankruptcy reorganization today. Read the story HERE.
I can’t say that I find this surprising in any big way. Their financial situation has been somewhat dire for a while and their stock prices positively abysmal. In many respects, Mesa is the perfect example of a company that is rough on its employees, rough on its customers and abrasive in its own PR. That really isn’t a recipe for success in *any* industry.
Mesa operates flights for Delta, United, US Airways and under their own grand in Hawaii as go! airlines in partnership with Mokulele. They fly the CRJ100/200 (47 aircraft), the CRJ700/900 (58 aircraft) and the Dash 8-200 (12 aircraft). With a desire to shed aircraft from their fleet, my guess is that they’re wanting to rid themselves primarily of the CRJ100/200 aircraft primarily and mostly by breaking leases.
It’s also notable that both United and Delta have worked to end their relationship(s) with Mesa and Mesa is currently in litigation with Delta over the attempt to break the Delta contract. The Delta contract was operated by Mesa subsidiary using ERJ-145 aircraft (numbering 34) and Delta sought to terminate the contract on the basis of poor performance by Mesa. Mesa contends the real motivation behind breaking the contract was to cut capacity rather than performance.
With this new development, I do wonder if Mesa hasn’t just become a candidate for being purchased by another airline.
The Dallas Morning News Airline Biz Blog has THIS story on Continentals’ new CEO, Jeff Smisek, deciding to give up his salary (and other bonus compensation) until Continental earns a full year profit. Smisek is not asking anyone else to give up their salary but is doing this as a good faith investment turning Continental around and setting an example for its employees.
While some are already calling this window dressing since Continental is set to earn some kind of profit in 2010, I think that is a very cynical viewpoint. Smisek is setting an excellent example for Continental employees and continuing a kind of tradition in that area that dates back to Gordon Bethune’s tenure as CEO. In addition, he *is* going to give up that compensation, at the least, for probably 12 months and that is probably compensation worth in excess of $1 million. No one does that as just a stunt. Particularly when other airline CEOs are likely going to be earning well in excess of that for the next year.
Airtran has decided to make Milwaukee an important crew base and is now using the term “hub” when talking about its Milwaukee operations. You can read more details about this HERE.
Initially, 50 pilots (B737) and 50 cabin crew (737/717) will be based in Milwaukee but expect those numbers to grow over time. Why? Because not only is Milwaukee a good place to connect flights to other destinations, the market between Milwaukee and many cities is one of good yield. There is a reason why airlines are starting to fight it out there.
It also offers a relatively inexpensive place for crew to live in, an airport that endures weather very well and customer base that has long been neglected by most airlines. There are a number of experienced flight crews in the MKE area that should be available for hire including pilots who know how to fly a 717.
This latest development is just one more reason why I believe Airtran’s route between Milwaukee and DFW to be flown by SkyWest will quickly move over to a mainline aircraft such as the Boeing 717. It’s also worth noting that air fares between MKE and DFW have already dropped with Airtran “buying” the business even before direct flights have been initiated. With service not expected to start before April 2010, it’s clear that Airtran intends to dominate that route and, unlike other airlines, Airtran isn’t afraid of going head to head with a major airline such as American Airlines.
According to the story . . .
In Milwaukee, AirTran now operates a line maintenance station, regional human resources, sales and community relations staff, and an airport station consisting of more than 200 customer service agents and other personnel. With the additional crew members added with the establishment of the new bases, the airline’s total Milwaukee payroll is estimated to be more than $11.5 million per year.
That’s a big commitment to the Milwaukee area and I do wonder how Republic will or will not respond with Midwest Airlines in that city. Midwest is hardly even a brand anymore since it flies none of its own aircraft. Republic Airways owned Frontier Airlines is flying 5 Airbus A319 aircraft (configured with Frontier seating) and Republic is directly supply another 20 E-170/190 aircraft for other routes.
Republic has moved about 200 maintenance and 100 customer service jobs from Frontier’s Denver but if Airtran continues to enlarge its operations and compete strongly with Republic in that city, one wonders how long it will last.
Business Week is carrying THIS story on a regional/commuter airline and the training it provides. While it is a bad story and, frankly, has a fair degree of truth painted in its overall picture, it is only one story. There are good guys out there too.
Now that a few days have passed since a Nigerian attempted to set off an explosive device ( I won’t call it a bomb because it wasn’t) on Northwest Flight 253 from Amsterdam to Detroit, I’ll make a few final comments on the reactions to this event.
The response by the TSA (and other security organizations in other countries), once again, seems mostly aimed as a placebo rather than an in-depth examination on how airline security should be handled.
For instance, this time, airlines are supposed to keep people ignorant of where they are. For long haul, international flights, I can only imagine how the airlines are dealing with their moving map displays. I’d bet that at least in most cases, they’re simply turning off the in-flight entertainment systems. But keeping people ignorant of where they doesn’t stop a damn thing. You see, there are these things called windows on airliners. If someone wants to attempt to blow up an airplane near its destination or just near a population center, it remains quite easy to to figure out a good time. Furthermore, do we really believe that ignorance of location will be any kind of deterrent for a terrorist act?
Second, everyone now must remain seated in the last hour of a flight. Mmm, OK, so, what prevents a terrorist from organizing their device a half hour before that restricted period? And despite that rules against nominally having something that would conceal such an assembly, why are we to believe that having such cover is absolutely necessary. This does absolutely nothing to improve security or provide a deterrent to a determined terrorist wanting to explode a device on aircraft.
Third, you’re no longer allowed to have something covering your lap or in your lap. No blankets, pillows, laptops, etc. The idea being that no one can conceal the assembly of a device. Well, what about large coats, sweaters, etc. that a terrorist might wear? Again, this rule is absurd and does nothing to increase security or provide a deterrent to a terrorist determined to do something on an aircraft.
People are also undergoing more rigorous searches and at multiple points. On the surface, this may provide a small increased measure of security. But the main problem here is the woeful understaffing of security points particularly in the United States. At some point, this heightened security will have to be reduced because of a lack of staff to sustain it.
I’m not a security expert and I didn’t sleep at a Holiday Inn yesterday. However, it would seem to me that we are not addressing the correct positions for better, more extensive security measures. Surely we could do a much better job of coordinating secondary security against people who are on a list of people of interest? We have had 8 years to find a system of vetting people scheduled to fly who are on such lists. We also possess the technology to create a near real-time system for such checks.
Second, it would appear that one weakness that has been exacerbated by airlines’ new policies of charging for checked luggage is that a much larger percentage of people are trying to carry-on items capable of carrying liquids and gels (and other substances) that could be assembled into an explosive device. The fewer of these items that have to be scrutinized during the primary security check, the more time and attention can be paid to those items. Sadly, I feel the airlines will fight this approach tooth and nail given the revenue streams they are earning from the checked baggage fees.
We need to look long and hard at the staff employed to perform security checks. As a traveler who has flown since 2 years old (more than 40 years), I cannot discern that the quality of staff doing these security checks (at least in the United States) has really improved at all. Even after the events of September 11th, 2001. I’d far rather pay a $5 or $10 fee for improved security and see a dramatic improvement in the quality of security both in staff as well as servicing the number of people having to go through security. It’s a fee I could pay in good conscience and sense real value from.
I also wonder if we couldn’t do a much better job of closing gaps in security at airports when it comes to airline and other service staff at those locations. All too often, I myself see these gaps as I walk through an airport. Background checks at hiring and occasionally afterwards are important, yes. However, I’ve observed no great increase in security at the non-public points of entry into airport infrastructure.
Finally, it is time we realized that there is some inherent risk involved in traveling by aircraft no matter what. Airplanes are (and have been) popular targets for terrorist attacks because, by definition, success results in horrific results. However, as inherent that risk is, let’s also realize that the probabilities for being on an airliner attacked are so small that they are nearly insignificant.
Terrorists are not lined up by the thousands just looking for an opportunity. In fact, terrorists willing to (almost) certainly kill themselves in an attack are very few in number and rather hard to coordinate. Yes, they exist and they will continue to exist and should be considered the risk that they are. However, the notion that armies of terrorists are ready to board aircraft and create multi-airliner havoc is rather silly. Fly in peace because you are probably *more* likely to experience a non-terrorist event on an airliner than anything else.
It is time that governments get their act together on real security and its time for airlines to cooperate with each other and governments rather than act against those measures that may impede their ability to earn yet another dollar. It is against our interests to have private contractors provide security at $10 / hr. What we want (and need) is trained law enforcement officers performing this role. What we want ( and need) is real security measures designed to address the issue before a terrorist passes that security line and which provides a real deterrent in the form of detection.
After the events of September 11, 2001, I said that in the future, it will be very difficult to take control of or even act against an airliner. Prior to that day, protocol for such situations had universally been to cooperate. After that day, it became clear that crew and passenger action against such people would not just be tolerated but welcomed. That has been true ever since.
It’s a lot harder to take down an airliner than most people realize. Even with bombs. It takes a powerful punch to put a hole into an airframe and, even then, commercial airframes are very strong and an explosion doesn’t necessarily mean that aircraft is automatically coming down. Particularly with respect to today’s airliners.
I’m sure there will be a lot of speculation on how this Nigerian national managed to conceal an explosive device and carry it onboard an aircraft from, of all places, Amsterdam. If you’ve ever traveled from Europe, then you know just how strict security procedures are there and, in particular, in national airline hubs such as Amsterdam, Paris, Frankfort, and London. Right now, it would appear the device was created from items that would nominally pass security although how he concealed PETN explosive sufficiently to pass security remains to be revealed.
I’m equally sure we’ll learn that it was done in a manner that hadn’t received much consideration. Possibly it was that bad a lapse in security but I somehow find that hard to believe. I think we’ll learn something new and then we’ll see another round of procedures against attempts such as this one.
I’m sure we’ll not see the removal of the 3oz. rule for carry-on liquids. Indeed, I wonder if all liquids won’t be banned which potentially causes a huge problem for the airlines since that would likely cause many more passengers to want to check their luggage and airlines are now charging exorbitant fees for such service.
In the meantime, I remain confident that our airlines are safe. If anything, this event is a great demonstration at just how much safer we are today with people acting quickly than we were 10 years ago.
CNN is reporting that a passenger on a flight between Amsterdam and Detroit set off fireworks during the flight resulting in at least one passenger going to a hospital. The story is HERE.
Update 01: Government officials are now calling this incident an terrorist attempt. Apparently a Nigerian national set off an explosive device rather than fireworks in an attempt to blow up the phone. Read the update HERE.
Update 02: This Nigerian apparently used PETN, an explosive used as a “booster” for other explosives and also what was used by terrorist Richard Reid in his attempt to bring down an airliner traveling from Paris to Miami. He was in possession of only a quantity small enough to be in a syringe. My guess is his carried it in a small carry-on container and extracted it with the syringe. You can read the criminal complaint filed against him HERE.
Due to the building midestern winter storm that is already gaining strength, airlines are, once again, waiving change fees to diminish the impact of looming cancellations and delays.
For a list of airlines and details on their current policies, visit USA Today’s Today in the Sky blog HERE.
If you have any flexibility at all, consider attempting to depart on your flight early or, perhaps, re-routing yourself through a connection in a city likely to be unaffected by the weather. Considering the current weather picture and current forecast, hub cities such as DFW, Houston, Atlanta, Phoenix, and Denver.
Hub cities such as Denver, Chicago, Minneapolis, Detroit, Cincinatti, and Cleveland are all likely to be affected at least somewhat by the looming weather over the next few days. Based on that, airlines likely to be most affected might be Delta / Northwest Airlines (Minneapolis, Detroit), United Airlines (Chicago and Denver), American Airlines (Chicago), Airtran (Milwaukee), Southwest (Minnesota, Wisconsin, Illinois, Colorado, Michigan), and Continental (Cleveland).
Hint: If you are a member of a frequent flier program, see if there is a dedicated phone number you can call.
Hint: Make sure your cellular phone is charged and you have your charger in your carry on luggage.
Hint: If you have a laptop computer, consider traveling with it in your carry on luggage.
Hint: If you are seeking to re-route yourself, explore options among codeshare partners with your airline when speaking to a reservations agent.
Hint: If you must board and travel on a flight in a city being affected by the storm, purchase some snacks and water in the terminal to take on the aircraft with you.
Tarmac delays seem to produce lots of passion on both sides of the debate. Consumers are very attracted to this issue, in part, because they’re often abused by airlines in so many different ways. This is one issue where the consumers can get together on their outrage. Industry insiders and airlines are vehemently against this kind of rule frequently citing conditions that aren’t addressed by it or pointing to certain conditions of the rule as being silly.
This morning, I had 2 emails asking my opinion and I’ve been engaged in a debate with two other people on the subject as well. What do I think? I think the rule is a good idea.
Not because it solves tarmac delay problems. It doesn’t. Not because it strikes a blow for consumers across the country, it really doesn’t. I like it because it sets some sort of criteria for a situation that needed to be addressed. It’s a start, not a finish.
Lots of issues related to airline traffic, delays and congestion have been deferred for years by a debate on how to render a solution for everything. That’s never going to happen. However, it is possible to address certain issues and this new rule is simply a limit on some egregious behavior.
Let’s look at some of the arguments against this rule:
If a pilot is next to take off and hits his 3 hour window, he has to turn and head back to the gate immediately! Balderdash. If a pilot is next in line to take-off, ATC can give the aircraft an exception because it *will* disrupt airport operations if that pilot has to now taxi down the runway to get back to the gate. For that matter, do we really believe that the FAA is going to fine an airline for waiting an extra 5 minutes to complete a take-off at that point? Really? I don’t. The FAA is many things but they grant variances to certain conditions all the time already (including safety related items.) They understand that those situations are not always black and white.
Food and water are required after two hours. Well, personally, I agree with the Cranky Flier that the food requirement after two hours is a bit silly. However, is this a reason not to have a rule setting a standard? No, of course not. What this food requirement really means is that airlines will need to stock some snacks on those bad days and distribute them after 2 hours. When you think about it, distributing a small snack and some water after two hours isn’t exactly a bad business decision anyway. Doing that should help keep some tempers cooler. And think about this: What if the delay isn’t a take-off delay but a diversion delay? What is that aircraft was flying for 3.5 hours, landed at a diversion airport and two more hours have passed? That’s a minimum of 5.5 hours since departing a gate and, yeah, feeding some people at that point is probably a good idea again, isn’t it? Could the requirement be written better? Certainly. On the other hand, it’s not a good argument against a 3 hour rule.
What if everyone wants to stay on board after 3 hours and continue to try to take-off? What if almost everyone want to keep trying and just a couple of people want off? Well, in theory, that sounds like a real moral dilemma. let’s take a look at what reality is more likely to be. If an aircraft hits its 3 hour point and isn’t anywhere close to taking off, it’s time to give it up anyway. If it is near taking off, then almost by definition this aircraft won’t be able to “leave the line” without massively disrupting airport operations and under that circumstance, the ground controller is going to issue an exception and keep them there.
This wouldn’t have fixed the Rochester incident. Granted, that ugly incident was more a result of an uncooperative party than anything else. However, the fines issued in that incident and this new rule clearly communicate that airlines need to do better and cooperate more with each other. The FAA fined all three parties to that incident and made it clear that while Mesaba was the obstacle, neither ExpressJet nor Continental exactly wielded their influence in that situation either. More could have and should have been done. Airlines are getting that message and acting accordingly now. Regardless if this would have or would not have fixed that particular incident, it still isn’t an argument against doing something and setting some standard to live by.
Airlines are doing better now anyway! Maybe. Maybe not. We’ve only just entered this winter season and while I grant that the airlines in the NYC area did *much* better with last weekend’s storm, it doesn’t mean it can’t happen again. Most people would agree that those airlines acted as they did last weekend because of public backlash. They cancelled flights earlier and managed their loads with larger equipment. Something they should have always been doing but didn’t. Let me also point out that airline capacity has been dramatically reduced over the past 18 months and it’s no wonder that there was less of an issue. That capacity will come back someday, however. So, if they’re doing better, how does this rule harm them? It doesn’t and it’s not a good argument against a standard.
This rule means that with more cancellations, more people won’t get home for the holidays. Again, maybe. Maybe not. First, it will depend on whether or not there are delays during the holidays. Last year, major holiday periods didn’t see any severe weather. This year, we will see some. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, passengers can be much better consumers in most cases and plan their travel to reduce their delay and cancellation risk. Just as airlines need to do better, so do customers. But this rule doesn’t arbitrarily mean that more people don’t get where they’re going for the holidays. And, so, again, it really isn’t an argument against a standard or rule. And, let me point out again that airlines coped with the last storm by *cancelling* earlier and more flights than they would have originally be inclined to do so. In other words, even the airlines who claims they’ve fixed it, fixed it essentially the same way this rule forced them to do.
I do think the rule could be a tad better. I do think that we need more solutions to more of the problems that contribute to these delays. This isn’t an end to the problem. It’s the beginning of finding a solution to just one of those problems. And after 10 or more years of egregious tarmac delays*, it’s time to try something. So we’ll try this for a while. You can be sure that no one is going to go bankrupt from this rule and the delays certainly aren’t going to get worse because of this rule so let’s see how this works out.
* Most people date tarmac delays to the infamous 2006 Kate Hanni in Austin on American Airlines incident. Well, these delays were going on for a lot longer than that. I can recall delays in the Chicago area for summer storms reaching 5 and 6 hours back in ’98 or ’99. I remember horrific tarmac delays in Detroit (and nearby cities) in the summer of 2000, too. The pot simply boiled over in 2006.
