KCI Flight Schedule Adjustments

[smh]

Why is the flight to Toronto so late in the day though? It doesn’t arrive until 8PM which makes it irrevalant as a stopover to European destinations.

We have flown AC from MCI to Europe several times. Mostly to CPH. I recall this connection not being an issue, though maybe the times have shifted. As I recall you arrived CPH around 11am.

The Toronto to Copenhagen flight in summer leaves at 7:20P. The KC to Toronto flight arrives at 8:00P. With an 8:00 arrival, you’re going to miss most any connection east making the KC-TOR flight only a one stop service. If it was arriving at, say, 4 or 5 the traffic on that flight would likely be much stronger and would feed international travel for AC. That small change would almost be like adding another IA to our market.

That seems strange. I always thought the whole point of the Toronto flight was to drive trans-atlantic traffic. Obviously not anymore!

[hartliss]

I'm surprised Air Canada doesn't run more of the Express or Rogue flights seasonally to some of the other hubs to mid tier cities like Kansas City. Would be kind of nice to see an Air Canada Express nonstop to Vancouver or Montreal

They MX base does a ton of work for AC, so it could make sense to run revenue flights with some type of maintenance stop-over, etc. I think AA used to do that when they did maintenance work here.

Jazz Air operates our AC flights. IIRC, our maintenance base only works on maineline AC widebodies(787,777,767). I’d imagine we would need to get AC maineline service before seeing any planes of that size getting subbed in.

AA used to fly 767s here for maintenance(among others). Before that, TWA would fly 747s on revenue runs here from STl for maintenance. Fun Fact: TWA 747’s carried less pax than current KCI airlines do on A321s. (Load factors used to be super low)

They also work on the Rogue line, which are the A319s, etc

[brewcrew1000]

I know we don't have a chance of landing this airline but I really think Tap Portugal is gonna see huge growth in next 5 years in the states. They offer free stopovers in Portugal similar to what IcelandAir is doing and the fares have been dirt cheap. I see Portugal as a much more attractive travel destination compared to Iceland and the Euro goes much further. I was looking at flights from Boston to Dublin via 4 night stopover in Lisbon and it was $134 one way.

[normalthings]

I know we don't have a chance of landing this airline but I really think Tap Portugal is gonna see huge growth in next 5 years in the states. They offer free stopovers in Portugal similar to what IcelandAir is doing and the fares have been dirt cheap. I see Portugal as a much more attractive travel destination compared to Iceland and the Euro goes much further. I was looking at flights from Boston to Dublin via 4 night stopover in Lisbon and it was $134 one way.

TAP is lead/owned by the same guy who started JetBlue and who is starting Moxy Air(US startup).

[normalthings]

American is adding a 7th daily flight to Chicago starting in June.

[normalthings]

Delta is uping frequencies to Boston from 1.6 per day to 2-3.

[brewcrew1000]

Delta is up if frequencies to Boston from 1.6 per day to 2-3.

The fares on this route might get even lower now. This is also a great route to use Skymiles on. I'm am always seeing this route priced at 5k-8k Skymiles each way

[hartliss]

Delta is up if frequencies to Boston from 1.6 per day to 2-3.

The fares on this route might get even lower now. This is also a great route to use Skymiles on. I'm am always seeing this route priced at 5k-8k Skymiles each way

I like the capacity increase but these planes are never full to Boston.

[brewcrew1000]

Wonder if we will see any cuts from WN once the new schedule comes out and the Max 800 being grounded

[normalthings]

Wonder if we will see any cuts from WN once the new schedule comes out and the Max 800 being grounded

Not Likely. Max 8’s make up a small % of WN service at KCI. WN is large enough that they should have enough spares and excess capacity to cover the relatively small number of Max planes taken out of service.

Air Canada is pretty much guaranteed to have some hiccups. IIRC, around 20% of their narrowbody fleet is made of Max8s and 9s.

My real worry would be that Icelandair cuts service or suffers financially.

[dev49]

Anyone know if there were any adds or drops by Southwest in the extension today? I don't pay attention enough to know the differences.

[dev49]

So I got bored and mapped out flights in the new WN Schedule. I never have paid a ton of attention before so I am not sure how this compares to last October.

Mon-Fri 73 flights
Sat 47
Sun 77

A few things I noticed

OAK is down to mon-fri only. No weekend flights. This route has gone from 2x daily summer in past years to 1x summer this year, now to less than daily.
SEA is gone (assuming seasonal)
ECP/PNS/RSW also gone (assuming seasonal)
Nice to see a 2nd BOS on sunday.

Just weird how the west coast flying seems to be going away with PDX also going seasonal also. Maybe people are choosing Alaska over Southwest?

Full breakdown
M-F Sat Sun
ABQ 1 1 1
AUS 1 1 1
ATL 3 2 3
BWI 3 2 3
BOS 1 1 2
MDW 8 6 9
DAL 6 4 7
DEN 7 4 8
FLL 1 1 1
HOU 3 2 3
IND 2 1 2
LAS 4 3 4
LAX 3 1 3
MKE 2 1 2
MSP 2 0 2
BNA 4 2 5
MSY 1 1 2
LGA 2 1 2
OAK 1 0 0
MCO 2 3 3
PHX 4 3 4
RDU 1 0 1
SAT 1 1 1
STL 4 2 3
SAN 2 1 1
TPA 1 1 1
DCA 2 1 2
RSW Out of Season
ECP Out of Season
PNS Out of Season
PDX 1 1 1
SEA Out of Season

[normalthings]

So Delta has gone 3 daily on Boston and now WN is adding a second (on Sunday)? I’m not so sure this can last.

[dev49]

So Delta has gone 3 daily on Boston and now WN is adding a second (on Sunday)? I’m not so sure this can last.

Delta is only running 2 on Sundays so I guess Southwest adding a second Sunday just means overall frequency sun is the same as the weekdays. 4 total a day.

[normalthings]

There were 26 schedule changes/updates this week. I will post them later in the day.

[dev49]

Just to follow up my WN question on difference from last year.

Looks like BOS was 2 times last year during the week. I guess I didn't realize it ever was 2x a week. But in my opinion I would rather have more Delta on the route anyway.

first number is scheduled this year [last year] then my best guess why the numbers are different

subtracts
WN BOS-MCI OCT 1.1[1.7] cut a m-f
WN FLL-MCI OCT 1.0[1.6] cut a m-f
WN MCI-OAK OCT 0.7[1.0] cut weekend
WN MCI-RDU OCT 0.9[1.0] cut sat
WN MCI-SAN OCT 1.7[1.8] cut a sat
rough guess -14 a week

adds
WN LGA-MCI OCT 1.9[1.0] added sun-fr
WN MCI-MKE OCT 1.9[1.7] added a weekend flight
WN MCI-MSP OCT 1.7[1.6] added a weekend flight
WN MCI-MSY OCT 1.1[1.0] added a weekend flight
rough guess +9
rough guess total -5 a week. Hopefully we see they backfill more flights in when it gets closer.

I'll let normalthings post the other airlines

[dev49]

Any word on what happens to the KEF route if this MAX8 things drags out. I assume it will be fixed by then, but just something I was thinking about. I assume they already have their 757s assigned somewhere else so they would have big decisions on what to keep/cut.

[normalthings]

Any word on what happens to the KEF route if this MAX8 things drags out. I assume it will be fixed by then, but just something I was thinking about. I assume they already have their 757s assigned somewhere else so they would have big decisions on what to keep/cut.

I haven’t followed the greater Icelandair network that closely. However, I think before the grounding they had already reduced some frequencies and cut other cities. So I’d imagine Icelandair has a S’19 schedule that’s either roughly equal to or lesser than the S’18 schedule.

One of the benefits of getting Max’s was that the 757’s could be used less frequently and thus hopefully conserved till the 797’s roll out. I’d imagine a good bit of Max flying could be made up by just flying their 757’s harder again.

[normalthings]

German Government(tourism groups) have been spending money in KC recently. Hopefully this trend leads to a direct flight.

[dev49]

There we go.

Passengers that are booked on an Icelandair flight that was scheduled on a 737 MAX 8 do not need to contact Icelandair in order to be rebooked on a flight. We will be changing the aircraft on affected routes to either a 757 or 767 aircraft.

https://www.icelandair.com/blog/stateme ... perations/