Southwest airlines hub cities8/16/2023 Because even if you have a flight leaving from a good weather station, it might have been a plane or a crew that was coming from one of those stations affected by the weather. “Our operations like dominoes, once that one domino falls, all the other dominoes follow. The downside of this structure is that when a major storm hits, while the other airlines can quickly adapt flights through their hubs, many of Southwest’s planes and crews were stuck, causing a cascading effect. “A point-to-point system, when it's working well is going to lower your costs.”ĭenver7 Steve Cowell, an aviation expert demonstrates how Southwest's model is different than other airlines. “It maximizes the utilization of the airplanes because airplanes, when they're on the ground aren't making money,” Steve Cowell, an aviation expert, shared with Denver7. The model was a disrupter for the airline industry as a whole when Southwest began using it, resulting in cheaper tickets for passengers. This is where the airline doesn’t have a hub or centralized city to send flights through but sends them from one destination to the next and so on before ending up in its original location. Southwest airlines, meanwhile, relies on a point-to-point system. ![]() The airlines have been relying on this model for decades. Major airlines like Delta and United use a spoke-hubs system where they have hubs in big cities like Chicago and Denver and connect many of their flights through them for efficiency. ![]() So why is the winter storm affecting this airline more than others? A big factor is the airline’s structure.ĭavid Zalubowski/AP Agents deal with travelers in need of ticketing services at the Southwest Airlines check-in counter in Denver International Airport, Tuesday, Dec. The pilots say employees are just as frustrated along with the passengers at the company’s response as passengers. Heads need to roll!”ĭenver7 has also confirmed that a plane left from New Orleans to Houston with nearly two dozen flight attendants onboard but no passengers because the airline’s system couldn’t tell them which passengers to take. “In 24 years, I’ve never seen anything like this. “Embarrassing is an understatement,” the email reads. They are also having a hard time getting hotel accommodations, so they are sleeping on the floors alongside passengers with nowhere to go. The email went on to say that crews have also had a difficult time getting through to scheduling to figure out where they need to be and when they are flying out, saying they spent hours on the phone waiting. Crews are stranded in the airports with the passengers, volunteering to take the passengers in the parked planes but the software won’t accept it,” an email circulating among Southwest pilots reads. Their antiquated software system has completely fried. The pilots say that the flight attendants are unable to get through to schedulers to get their assignments and so they are stuck at hotels waiting to find out what flight they will be working. Southwest pilots are blaming many of the cancelled flights on a lack of crew assignments and an outdated system. While the airline has maintained that severe weather caused the problem, pilots and flight attendant unions for Southwest blame a confluence of events for the cancellations and delays. “As we continue the work to recover our operation, we have made the decision to continue operating a reduced schedule by flying roughly one third of our schedule for the next several days,” a statement reads. ![]() ![]() The company has warned that it will continue cancelling flights until it can get its operations back on track. FlightAware shows that the airline has already cancelled nearly 2,500 flights Wednesday and roughly 1,160 Thursday. Those headaches are expected to continue throughout the week. Another 680 Southwest flights were delayed Tuesday. The airline made up about 63% of the total flights cancelled across the country. DENVER - Thousands of Southwest Airlines passengers were left stranded all over the country for yet another day after the company cancelled nearly 2,600 more flightsTuesday according to FlightAware.
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