America West/US Airways Tenative Fall Schedule

[venture]

America West Express will upgrade all flights in September out of OKC to CRJ-900s; the 90-seaters. This will gear up for the merger with US Airways which will take place on September 15th. The airline will then operate as US Airways from that point forward. Current indications are that half of the existing CRJ-900 fleet will be moved to the existing US Airways network, likely out of Charlotte. I would expect announcements later in the summer for new service to Charlotte to be announced and then later Philadelphia.

I'll get the full schedule loaded for HP/US, and everyone else, loaded over on USAFlying.com in the OKC section sometime tomorrow.

[brianinok]

That is good news. Hopefully they will continue to expand their service in OKC at this rate for years to come. After all, it was only a couple months ago that they even started service.

As far as their combined network is concerned, I have a question. Since US Airways is loosing so much money right now, I assume they have empty seats on flights on the east coast. So, is their move of the 900's east replacing some mainline jets that will move west? Or are they actually adding capacity on the east cost?

[mranderson]

That is good news. Hopefully they will continue to expand their service in OKC at this rate for years to come. After all, it was only a couple months ago that they even started service.

As far as their combined network is concerned, I have a question. Since US Airways is loosing so much money right now, I assume they have empty seats on flights on the east coast. So, is their move of the 900's east replacing some mainline jets that will move west? Or are they actually adding capacity on the east cost?

Humm. I think someone reported in early June that America West would start using larger aircraft, then increase flight numbers. Odd. The person was right.

[venture]

Load factors are actually quite high in the network out east. Just remember...full planes does not equal profitable flights. The movement of the 900s will be to replace mainline jets out east...HOWEVER, the aircraft they will replace are not coming back west. They actually going to be removing 60 aircraft from the combined mainline fleets over the next year. The fleet plan for the combined airline looks like this (according to the plan of reorganization filed with the bankruptcy court):

Aircraft / 2005 / 2006 / 2007

Airbus A330-300 - 9 - 9 - 9
Boeing 767-200ER - 10 - 10 -10
Boeing 757-200 - 44 - 44 - 44
Airbus A32X Family - 193 - 198 - 198
Boeing 737 Family - 142 - 100 - 100
Total Mainline - 398 - 361 - 361

50-seat RJs - 174 - 138 - 134
70-seat RJs - 39 - 52 - 52
90-seat RJs - 38 - 55 - 65
Total RJ Fleet - 251 - 245 - 251

[venture]

Humm. I think someone reported in early June that America West would start using larger aircraft, then increase flight numbers. Odd. The person was right.

But when someone was too hard up for promoting a new hub, it kinda gets lost in the shuffle. Its like screaming we'll get an inch of rain tonight, but only get a tenth of an inch and turn around - "it still rained didn't it?"

Of course I could pull the same thing since they are following what was said earlier in regards to the US merger, but unlike someone - I don't need the final word on everything in life.