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There really isn’t a way to do that — airline operations are based around renting “slots” from airports that give takeoff and landing rights at specified times.

There really isn’t a way to do that — airline operations are based around renting “slots” from airports that give takeoff and landing rights at specified times. Slots are expensive, so you build your operations and maintenance plans around them. You just don’t have an option to build unused backstop routes and the logistics around them, so either you’re bumping folks onto other carriers or having them wait for your congestion issues to ease.

lisper 5y ago
That's ridiculous. Yes, airlines have slots, but schedule changes, weather delays, mechanical delays, happen all the time. It's not like if you miss a slot you're just SOL. If you're flying from A to B to C to D to E to F and there's a bottleneck at B, you can deadhead the plane from A to C (or even take the pax who were going from A to C anyway) and pick up all the downstream connections. There are weather delays all the time. There are ATC problems all the time. But having either one of those turn into this kind of a mess is unprecedented, so there has to be something else in play here, and that "something else" is almost certainly SW screwing something up.
- ceejayoz 5y ago
  > But having either one of those turn into this kind of a mess is unprecedented... It really isn't. Just earlier this year: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/08/03/business/spirit-american-airlines-cancellations.html https://www.nytimes.com/2021/08/03/business/spirit-american-... "Spirit Airlines and American Airlines canceled hundreds of flights on Tuesday after several days of disruptions, frustrating passengers across the country." "By midafternoon, Spirit had scrapped more than half its scheduled flights for the day, according to FlightAware, an aviation data firm. The airline canceled more than 40 percent of its flights on Monday and 19 percent on Sunday. Spirit attributed those disruptions to “a series of weather and operational challenges.”" "American had canceled about 300 flights by the middle of the afternoon on Tuesday, about a tenth of Tuesday’s scheduled trips. The airline canceled about 18 percent of its flights on Monday and 9 percent the day before. American pinned the blame on a weekend storm that hit Dallas Fort Worth International Airport, its large hub airport."
  - lisper 5y ago
    Yes, a one-day disruption is not uncommon when bad weather hits a hub, even occasionally extending into a second day. But 1) Southwest has been cancelling flights for four days, 2) Southwest specifically said that it doesn't do hub-and-spoke (they blamed the problem in part on that) and 3) the weather in Florida has not been abnormal in the past few days. The Miani area had half an inch of rain on Friday according to weather.gov. That's nothing.
    - ceejayoz 5y ago
      I cited a three-day disruption, just a few months ago. The article indicates "upwards of 50% of our aircraft lines flow through Florida". There's more to Florida than just Miami, and the FAA backs up the weather claim. Meanwhile, none of the other airlines who also instituted mandates saw delays.
      - lisper 5y ago
        https://slate.com/business/2021/10/southwest-airlines-cancelations-why-it-happened.html https://slate.com/business/2021/10/southwest-airlines-cancel... "This appears not to be an aviation problem so much as a Southwest problem; other airlines were able to carry on with minimal cancellations after Friday’s disruptions."
        ceejayoz 5y ago
        That matches up with all my points. The other airlines mostly don’t have half of their flights transit Florida like Southwest does. That’s unique to SW.
        lisper 5y ago
        Well, yeah, obviously it's not just Southwest's incompetence at play here, otherwise they'd be cancelling flights all the time. The weather contributed, but it was just a trigger. The house of cards had been built by SW management long before the weather rolled in. "Southwest has generally struggled with coordinating its operations as of late; it had the highest percentage of cancellations and worst on-time performance among the country’s four major airlines in June and July. The Southwest pilots union further blamed the company’s technical systems and processes for reassigning pilots when disruptions occur, claiming that these are long-standing problems that executives have failed to fix for years. The airline has struggled with rerouting pilots partly because it uses a “point-to-point” system, which focuses on flying passengers directly to their destinations. This is opposed to the “hub-and-spoke” model that American Airlines uses, in which passengers are often first routed to a main base of operations before departing for their final destination. While the point-to-point system has the advantage of reducing travel times and the number of connecting flights, it can be difficult to adapt to unexpected situations. Southwest’s point-to-point network also covers an unusually large geographic area, which makes reassigning pilots even more complicated."
- samstave 5y ago
  Do they fuel the craft to skip B? Or do they top-up at B in order to reach C?
  - ktpecot 5y ago
    Diversions mid-flight are pretty rare, usually they will choose to skip B before taking off. That said there are some interesting instances where airlines can "tanker" fuel by fueling up more than they need to in a city where prices are cheaper
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
danielfoster 5y ago
I believe only two US airports are slot-restricted.
vineyardmike 5y ago
> There really isn’t a way to do that There is always a way to do anything, you just have to be willing to pay for it. They decided this wasn't a failure mode to prepare for (read: spend money against) so they now deal with the consequences.
- ipaddr 5y ago
  There is always a way but never enough political and actual capital to do this. You could build your own airports, buy other airlines but you run the risk of losing the spot if you don't actually use it. The cost would be so high tickets could double if it was even possible.
- t0mas88 5y ago
  It's not just some money it's insane amounts of money and even then you can't always do it, for example because you cannot own slots for flights you don't actually operate. Those revert back to the airport and get sold to someone else.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- TylerE 5y ago
  Airlines, especially post-deregulation, operate on razor thin margins.

lisper 5y ago

That's ridiculous. Yes, airlines have slots, but schedule changes, weather delays, mechanical delays, happen all the time. It's not like if you miss a slot you're just SOL. If you're flying from A to B to C to D to E to F and there's a bottleneck at B, you can deadhead the plane from A to C (or even take the pax who were going from A to C anyway) and pick up all the downstream connections. There are weather delays all the time. There are ATC problems all the time. But having either one of those turn into this kind of a mess is unprecedented, so there has to be something else in play here, and that "something else" is almost certainly SW screwing something up.

ceejayoz 5y ago
> But having either one of those turn into this kind of a mess is unprecedented... It really isn't. Just earlier this year: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/08/03/business/spirit-american-airlines-cancellations.html https://www.nytimes.com/2021/08/03/business/spirit-american-... "Spirit Airlines and American Airlines canceled hundreds of flights on Tuesday after several days of disruptions, frustrating passengers across the country." "By midafternoon, Spirit had scrapped more than half its scheduled flights for the day, according to FlightAware, an aviation data firm. The airline canceled more than 40 percent of its flights on Monday and 19 percent on Sunday. Spirit attributed those disruptions to “a series of weather and operational challenges.”" "American had canceled about 300 flights by the middle of the afternoon on Tuesday, about a tenth of Tuesday’s scheduled trips. The airline canceled about 18 percent of its flights on Monday and 9 percent the day before. American pinned the blame on a weekend storm that hit Dallas Fort Worth International Airport, its large hub airport."
- lisper 5y ago
  Yes, a one-day disruption is not uncommon when bad weather hits a hub, even occasionally extending into a second day. But 1) Southwest has been cancelling flights for four days, 2) Southwest specifically said that it doesn't do hub-and-spoke (they blamed the problem in part on that) and 3) the weather in Florida has not been abnormal in the past few days. The Miani area had half an inch of rain on Friday according to weather.gov. That's nothing.
  - ceejayoz 5y ago
    I cited a three-day disruption, just a few months ago. The article indicates "upwards of 50% of our aircraft lines flow through Florida". There's more to Florida than just Miami, and the FAA backs up the weather claim. Meanwhile, none of the other airlines who also instituted mandates saw delays.
    - lisper 5y ago
      https://slate.com/business/2021/10/southwest-airlines-cancelations-why-it-happened.html https://slate.com/business/2021/10/southwest-airlines-cancel... "This appears not to be an aviation problem so much as a Southwest problem; other airlines were able to carry on with minimal cancellations after Friday’s disruptions."
      - ceejayoz 5y ago
        That matches up with all my points. The other airlines mostly don’t have half of their flights transit Florida like Southwest does. That’s unique to SW.
        lisper 5y ago
        Well, yeah, obviously it's not just Southwest's incompetence at play here, otherwise they'd be cancelling flights all the time. The weather contributed, but it was just a trigger. The house of cards had been built by SW management long before the weather rolled in. "Southwest has generally struggled with coordinating its operations as of late; it had the highest percentage of cancellations and worst on-time performance among the country’s four major airlines in June and July. The Southwest pilots union further blamed the company’s technical systems and processes for reassigning pilots when disruptions occur, claiming that these are long-standing problems that executives have failed to fix for years. The airline has struggled with rerouting pilots partly because it uses a “point-to-point” system, which focuses on flying passengers directly to their destinations. This is opposed to the “hub-and-spoke” model that American Airlines uses, in which passengers are often first routed to a main base of operations before departing for their final destination. While the point-to-point system has the advantage of reducing travel times and the number of connecting flights, it can be difficult to adapt to unexpected situations. Southwest’s point-to-point network also covers an unusually large geographic area, which makes reassigning pilots even more complicated."
samstave 5y ago
Do they fuel the craft to skip B? Or do they top-up at B in order to reach C?
- ktpecot 5y ago
  Diversions mid-flight are pretty rare, usually they will choose to skip B before taking off. That said there are some interesting instances where airlines can "tanker" fuel by fueling up more than they need to in a city where prices are cheaper

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

danielfoster 5y ago

I believe only two US airports are slot-restricted.

vineyardmike 5y ago

> There really isn’t a way to do that There is always a way to do anything, you just have to be willing to pay for it. They decided this wasn't a failure mode to prepare for (read: spend money against) so they now deal with the consequences.

ipaddr 5y ago
There is always a way but never enough political and actual capital to do this. You could build your own airports, buy other airlines but you run the risk of losing the spot if you don't actually use it. The cost would be so high tickets could double if it was even possible.
t0mas88 5y ago
It's not just some money it's insane amounts of money and even then you can't always do it, for example because you cannot own slots for flights you don't actually operate. Those revert back to the airport and get sold to someone else.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
TylerE 5y ago
Airlines, especially post-deregulation, operate on razor thin margins.