Southwest tries to send more flights per day by reducing time at the gate. Most of the time it’s great, since it means cheaper flights and less time as a passen

Southwest tries to send more flights per day by reducing time at the gate. Most of the time it’s great, since it means cheaper flights and less time as a passenger waiting around for folks to find their seat number. They have lots of hubs, so it’s easy to find a flight that fits your needs. But when things go wrong en masse, error propagates through the system fast. It’s the same failure mode as just-in-time manufacturing. There just aren’t gaps in the schedule for lots of things to go wrong, nor extra planes to pick up the slack. I’d recommend Southwest still, but not if your schedule is tight and the flight is can’t-miss. I suspect there are some other problems in their tech stack and personnel they have to sort out too.