2014 Oklahoma Commercial Aviation Discussion

[Jeepnokc]

When Southwest announced OKC-ATL on AirTran DL immediately upgraded to all mainline.

When are they going to get rid of the small jet on the msp-okc flight? It is a miserable 2 hour flight on a jet way too small. I rebooked and flew SFO-ATL-OKC on Sunday just to avoid that flight (I could have gone through DTW but was $500 more and SLC wasn't available unless I went SFO-LAX-SLC-OKC with really short layovers)

[catch22]

When are they going to get rid of the small jet on the msp-okc flight? It is a miserable 2 hour flight on a jet way too small. I rebooked and flew SFO-ATL-OKC on Sunday just to avoid that flight (I could have gone through DTW but was $500 more and SLC wasn't available unless I went SFO-LAX-SLC-OKC with really short layovers)

I have no connection or insight to delta, but msp/okc seems to be a route they have forgotten about. I suspect as their 50 seat fleet continues to shrink that it will move over to CRJ 700's. DL's primary focus seems to be ATL and SEA right now.

[damonsmuz]

I know we're always speculating on future routes etc for OKC.

With DL expanding in SEA, I wonder if there's a future airplane order for Alaska Airlines that would allow them to add more routes. I saw yesterday they added a few more 737s to an existing order but it seems they're retiring a few so net change would be zero.

[HOT ROD]

actually, SEA is in trouble. DL is pulling back already and shifting towards LAX.

[catch22]

Allegiant resumes March 5. Sunday Thursday to Orlando Sanford.

[catch22]

Another HUGE month. September was the best month to date, with a nearly YOY 9% increase in boarding and Deplanements.

http://www.flyokc.com/statistics/Sep...nplanement.pdf

[OUman]

Very nice. That's more than 2.85 million total passengers year-to-date. Keeping in mind we still have the big travel months of November and December (and barring any significant travel hindrances like big winter storms) it should be a pretty good year all around.

[HOT ROD]

projection estimates anybody?

will we get to 4M this year?

[BG918]

How many flights are being cut by Southwest with the Wright Amendment ending? I had heard one daily to both Love and Denver, any others?

[venture]

How many flights are being cut by Southwest with the Wright Amendment ending? I had heard one daily to both Love and Denver, any others?

DAL is already scaled back to 3 daily - so no additional changes there. DEN remains at 3 daily...which they have been at for long time now. ATL, STL, and MDW are all dropping to 1 daily from 2 daily flights.

[HangryHippo]

Venture, do you see AA or United picking up the slack Southwest leaves?

[venture]

Venture, do you see AA or United picking up the slack Southwest leaves?

Nope. STL neither cares about. ATL is going to be DL and they are already full mainline. The only real overlap routes here are going to be Dallas (AA) and Chicago (AA & UA). AA isn't going to bump anything up because they are already capped on max number of mainline flights they are allowed per their ground handling scope clause. United has shown very little interest in maintaining much of any mainline presence here...especially going forward when they are getting ready to outsource all of their employees are something like 35 airports (OKC included) which will come with scope restrictions as well. ORD is also quasi limited in the number of flights it can handle as well, and I don't see them going beyond the normal 4-5 daily flights they typically have outside of the seasonal pull down in the winter.

More thoughts in a minute...

[venture]

I want to expand on Chicago a little bit since that is where AA & UA compete with WN the most...

As of right now, we only have the T-100 data from the DOT available through Q1 of this year, so that is all I can really compare it by. Overall for all of 2013 through the first three months of 2014, Southwest/AirTran has only filled 62% of the seats to MDW. This year has been pretty terrible...

SCH_DEP	PERF_DEP	SEATS	PASSENGERS	LOADFACTOR	UNIQUE_CARRIER_NAME	ORIGIN	DEST	YEAR	MONTH
30	30	3510	1728	49%	AirTran Airways Corporation	OKC	MDW	2014	1
26	26	3042	1397	46%	AirTran Airways Corporation	OKC	MDW	2014	2
42	42	6006	4487	75%	Southwest Airlines Co.	OKC	MDW	2014	3
2	2	280	96	34%	Southwest Airlines Co.	OKC	MDW	2014	3
7	7	819	491	60%	AirTran Airways Corporation	OKC	MDW	2014	3

Now this is also for what is considered the slowest period of the year outside of Sept/Oct. Regardless...this period gave an overall load factor of 60%. This is up however from 2013 which only had a 50% load factor. If we look at the 3 months prior - so Q4 for 2013...it is still only up 6 pts.

SCH_DEP	PERF_DEP	SEATS	PASSENGERS	LOADFACTOR	UNIQUE_CARRIER_NAME	ORIGIN	DEST	YEAR	MONTH
2	2	280	181	65%	Southwest Airlines Co.	OKC	MDW	2013	10
56	56	8008	5590	70%	Southwest Airlines Co.	OKC	MDW	2013	10
3	3	429	246	57%	Southwest Airlines Co.	OKC	MDW	2013	11
52	52	6084	2484	41%	AirTran Airways Corporation	OKC	MDW	2013	11
57	57	6669	3166	47%	AirTran Airways Corporation	OKC	MDW	2013	12

So for one of the busiest periods of the year, to only average 54% full...Southwest has a capacity problem with having a fare structure that now demands higher yields.

If we compare this same period (Q4 2013) to UA with a 78% load factor...

SCH_DEP	PERF_DEP	SEATS	PASSENGERS	LOADFACTOR	UNIQUE_CARRIER_NAME	ORIGIN	DEST	YEAR	MONTH
4	4	200	185	93%	ExpressJet Airlines Inc.	OKC	ORD	2013	10
26	26	1716	1250	73%	SkyWest Airlines Inc.	OKC	ORD	2013	10
31	29	1450	1275	88%	Trans States Airlines	OKC	ORD	2013	10
31	31	2046	1769	86%	GoJet Airlines, LLC d/b/a United Express	OKC	ORD	2013	10
27	27	1782	1054	59%	Mesa Airlines Inc.	OKC	ORD	2013	10
1	1	50	43	86%	SkyWest Airlines Inc.	OKC	ORD	2013	11
18	18	1188	1020	86%	GoJet Airlines, LLC d/b/a United Express	OKC	ORD	2013	11
6	6	300	286	95%	ExpressJet Airlines Inc.	OKC	ORD	2013	11
23	22	1452	1111	77%	SkyWest Airlines Inc.	OKC	ORD	2013	11
22	22	1452	765	53%	Mesa Airlines Inc.	OKC	ORD	2013	11
33	32	1600	1353	85%	Trans States Airlines	OKC	ORD	2013	11
11	10	500	441	88%	SkyWest Airlines Inc.	OKC	ORD	2013	12
17	16	1056	861	82%	SkyWest Airlines Inc.	OKC	ORD	2013	12
23	23	1610	1155	72%	Mesa Airlines Inc.	OKC	ORD	2013	12
2	1	66	37	56%	GoJet Airlines, LLC d/b/a United Express	OKC	ORD	2013	12
15	13	650	573	88%	Trans States Airlines	OKC	ORD	2013	12
34	30	1500	1309	87%	ExpressJet Airlines Inc.	OKC	ORD	2013	12

And AA at 76% load factors...

SCH_DEP	PERF_DEP	SEATS	PASSENGERS	LOADFACTOR	UNIQUE_CARRIER_NAME	ORIGIN	DEST	YEAR	MONTH
31	31	1979	1583	80%	Envoy Air	OKC	ORD	2013	10
89	82	4100	2714	66%	Envoy Air	OKC	ORD	2013	10
29	28	1790	1446	81%	Envoy Air	OKC	ORD	2013	11
1	3	132	86	65%	Envoy Air	OKC	ORD	2013	11
81	77	3850	2808	73%	Envoy Air	OKC	ORD	2013	11
56	52	2600	2189	84%	Envoy Air	OKC	ORD	2013	12
61	58	3704	3006	81%	Envoy Air	OKC	ORD	2013	12

The take away from this is that there is still plenty of available - existing - capacity that can be back filled on all 3 carriers. I did leave out flights operated by Chautauqua since they operate for both AA and UA at times, though I think they would be under AA in this example (someone else can clarify for me). Regardless...still plenty of flexibility to absorb WN cutting one flight a day. I do expect AA to transition to the E-Jets on the ORD route as Envoy is rumored to be getting replaced by the E-Jets and also CRJs next year. We'll see what happens.

[catch22]

Just for clarification, there is no scope limit on outsourcing and mainline flights. Pre merger united had a contract limitation, pre merger Continental did not. And the combined carrier has no restriction. They can outsource a city if it makes business sense as the only justification, and number of mainline flights has nothing to do with that.

United is in a weird position right now. They do have an interest in the OKC market; but they are under tight watch from above on routes which under perform. They are cutting any flights which don't make money. I suspect as the pressure backs off United will add some slack again. (More flights)

[venture]

Thanks Catch, I wasn't sure if UA was in a similar position like AA - which limits outsourced stations to only have up to 7 mainline flights per day.

[HOT ROD]

I was suspicious that United might have interest in OKC given the article that was published. It would be fantastic if we could at least restore mainline service to DEN and ORD (one flight a day) in addition to the mainline into IAH and upgrade the overall product going to the other hubs (LAX, SFO, EWR, IAD). It would be nice if AA would throw us a bone with a mainline ORD flight as well just to compete (and they also had an article, hence the interest/compete).

I'd think with WN pulling back that there should be a shift to ORD which UA and AA could capitalize on (hopefully with a mainline a piece). Will be fantastic to see one or both of them send a 757 some day. - Dreaming, I know, but still .... -

[venture]

I was suspicious that United might have interest in OKC given the article that was published. It would be fantastic if we could at least restore mainline service to DEN and ORD (one flight a day) in addition to the mainline into IAH and upgrade the overall product going to the other hubs (LAX, SFO, EWR, IAD). It would be nice if AA would throw us a bone with a mainline ORD flight as well just to compete (and they also had an article, hence the interest/compete).

I'd think with WN pulling back that there should be a shift to ORD which UA and AA could capitalize on (hopefully with a mainline a piece). Will be fantastic to see one or both of them send a 757 some day. - Dreaming, I know, but still .... -

Maybe my points weren't really made too well. WN pulling the one daily flight really won't do anything to the market. This is excess capacity that will still leave plenty of open capacity in the market. So there really isn't anything for AA or UA to capitalize on. They already trump WN in frequency to Chicago, so there isn't much to go after.

Also as I stated, AA mainline to ORD will require them to give up mainline to DFW. AA is scope restricted to 7 daily mainline flights to a station that has outsourced below wing services.

[damonsmuz]

Ive always been curious as to why DLs seems to neglect the SLC hub, and not just with OKC but with many airports in The Plains. It seems to me that DL missed a possible opportunity to be a west coast dominant carrier but not trying to bring more flights west.

I don't have access to all the numbers like Venture and Catch but would it make sense to add 1 more flight to SLC on a -700 to compete with UAL and Denver or UAL in San Fran and AA in LAX??

[damonsmuz]

And speaking of DL and SLC... I'd love to know what ATC was trying to do with this plane Sunday night....

SkyWest (OO) #4444 ? FlightAware

[catch22]

Make sure you include the link that has the timestamp, or it will go to the current day's flight.

SkyWest (OO) #4444 ? 12-Oct-2014 ? KSLC - KOKC ? FlightAware

since the line of storms was coming through, they may have planned ahead and went towards Tulsa

A) to kill time for the line of storms to pass

B) in case OKC didn't open back up they are close to their diversion airport.

Looks like once they got close to Tulsa, the line of storms passed OKC, so they decided to come back around. They most likely held again NW of the city to kill off a little more time for the storms to get a little further away before attempting a landing.

[warreng88]

So, I read this weekend that Southwest will be able to do longer flights from Love Field and not have to travel out of DFW as much anymore. Anybody have any thoughts on that and how it might affect OKC?

[catch22]

Yes, we have reduced from 5 daily to DAL to 3.

[ljbab728]

So, I read this weekend that Southwest will be able to do longer flights from Love Field and not have to travel out of DFW as much anymore. Anybody have any thoughts on that and how it might affect OKC?

I don't see any particular affect on OKC other than less nonstop flights to DAL.

[OUman]

By the way, I remember AA had one or two MD 80s to ORD but that was a while back (late 90s-early-mid 2000s). That was of course before all the scope clauses went into effect and we had something like 10-12 daily AA/Eagle flights to DFW, with a mix of F-100s, ERJ 145s and ATR 72s.

[warreng88]

Yes, we have reduced from 5 daily to DAL to 3.

Have the flights to DFW increased?