Flight Wisdom

• US Airways will be adding service to three Gulf Coast cities from its Charlotte hub. Service will begin April 6th to Ft. Walton Beach, FL and Panama City. Service to Gulfport/Biloxi, MS will begin May 6th. Service will be operated by subsidiary PSA Airlines using 5-seat CRJ-200s.
• Horizon Air will begin Santa Rosa-Las Vegas service on April 24th. Horizon began serving the Sonoma County Airport in March with service to Los Angeles and Seattle, and added Portland service in October. A second daily flight to Seattle will run from April 6th through October.
• Horizon will also provide nonstop service from Prince George, British Columbia to Seattle starting May 1st. Service will be once daily. This is the first scheduled international service for Prince George.
• JetBlue is adding extra nonstop service from New York’s JFK and Boston’s Logan airports to Phoenix on Friday, February 1st and Monday, February 3rd in honor of the Big Game. Starting at 6:18PM on Sunday the 3rd, fans will be treated to one free alcoholic beverage to kick off the championship game.
• Airlines have rolled back recent fuel surcharges after they failed to take hold. United failed to push through a $50 fuel surcharge on roundtrip domestic travel, and this past week, American failed to double its charge to $40 on routes it had no low-fare competition on. With consumers resisting fare increases, airlines may simply reduce the number of lower-priced seats they offer on each flight.
• American Eagle will be adding a third daily roundtrip between Dallas/Ft. Worth and Roswell, New Mexico beginning April 7th.
• Delta’s blog reminded us that December 17th was a special day in their history…although they waited until now to tell us why. On December 17th, 1935, the first Douglas DC-3 aircraft took its first flight. Five years later, on Christmas Eve 1941, Delta flew its first revenue DC-3 flight with “Ship 41″. The plane is currently in the Delta Heritage Museum. We’ll have to get down there. Until then, they have pictures. DC-3s are still in use in a few places.
• Speaking of Douglas aircraft…Northwest Airlines plans to ground a quarter of its DC-9 aircraft as part of a fleet downsizing. They claim this will not result in a loss of pilot jobs. Northwest currently has 92 of the aircraft, which average about 35 years old and are less fuel efficient than newer planes.
• AirTran will add service between Milwaukee and New York-LaGuardia on May 6th. Service will be three times daily. AirTran failed in its merger attempts with Milwaukee-based Midwest Airlines, and did vow to increase its presence at the airport.
• United will be slashing its domestic capacity, with a particularly hard look at its Chicago O’Hare hub. It is expected to reduce 3.5-4.5% of its domestic capacity in 2008, and shifting planes and resources to more profitable overseas routes. The victims in these routes are cities downgraded to regional status, or losing their connections to United’s O’Hare hub.

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