Aviation Industry Updates: July 4, 2023

June 30, 2023 Becomes The Busiest Day In US Aviation History

KEY POINTS:

• On June 30th, the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) announced a new daily record for individuals screened at airports nationwide. This surpassed a record set in 2019, on the Sunday just after Thanksgiving that year. This is yet another sign that air travel has recovered from the pandemic.
• On July 1st, the TSA announced that it had recorded its highest-ever number of passengers screened in a single day. Taking place on June 30th, 2023, the agency said it had screened 2,883,595 individuals at facilities across the country. This narrowly passed the previous record set in 2019. Crunching the numbers, June 30th, 2023, saw 680 more travelers screened compared to December 1st, 2019, which saw 2,882,915 individuals pass through TSA checkpoints.
• Despite flight delays and cancelations taking place over the past week in the northeast corner of the country, it's a hectic time of year in the United States. June 30th was notably the Friday before the 4th of July, America's Independence Day and a national holiday. While Monday, July 3rd might be a regular work day for much of the country, it's likely that many have opted to take the day off to create an extra long weekend. In some parts of the country, such as West Virginia, July 3rd has been declared a holiday for state employees. This, combined with the summer break between academic years most schools see across North America, equates to more vacations planned at this time of year.
• This new record tells us that air travel in the United States is stronger than ever. And, barring any large-scale, industry-wide disruptions, it's a record likely to be broken regularly in the years to come.

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Southwest Pilots Want Release From Mediation Bringing A Strike One Step Closer

KEY POINTS:

• Southwest Airlines Pilots Association (SWAPA) has requested release from mediated discussions with Southwest Airlines representatives, believing that all reasonable efforts to reach an agreement have failed.
•  SWAPA has raised grievances about Southwest Airlines' management, including executive leaders accepting stock compensation while threatening to furlough pilots and exhibiting evasive negotiating tactics.
•  SWAPA recently held a historic strike authorization vote, with 92% of members voting in favor. A strike could occur in late summer or early fall unless an agreement is reached or a Presidential Emergency Board intervenes.

Simple Flying

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July 4 Travel Weekend Breaks Record; United Tries To Make Amends

KEY POINTS:

• The millions of people who took to the skies ahead of the July Fourth holiday enjoyed relatively smooth travel over the weekend as the Transportation Security Administration set a record for the number of people screened at airports Friday.
• The agency said nearly 2.9 million people moved through checkpoints nationwide, topping the previous record set during the Sunday after Thanksgiving in 2019. The record came despite airlines operating almost 2,000 fewer flights than on the day of that previous record.
• United Airlines’s elevated rate of flight cancellations last week, along with images of crowded airports, piles of unclaimed bags and people sleeping on cots, had fueled fears the nation’s aviation system was poised for another holiday travel meltdown. Those concerns were unfounded as the airline recovered and the Northeast Corridor avoided the type of severe weather that had prompted delays days earlier.
• “I know this week was hard,” Linda Jojo, United’s chief customer officer, wrote to customers over the weekend. “Really bad weather, air traffic control issues and some of our own operational challenges led to a rough experience for you and many of our customers.”
• In a separate note to employees, United CEO Scott Kirby looked to explain why the airline was slow to recover after storms hobbled operations at its Newark hub, even as other carriers bounced back. Kirby last week sought to lay most of the blame on the FAA, which is grappling with a shortage of air traffic controllers — an issue particularly acute in a key New York center that manages flight traffic in the region.
• “Airlines can plan for things like hurricanes, subzero temperatures and snowstorms, but United has never seen an extended limited operating environment like the one we saw this past week at Newark,” Kirby wrote.

Washington Post

JetBlue Launches Inaugural Flight From JFK to Paris

KEY POINTS:

• “I think people are getting more adventurous as to where they want to go — we have a lot more Americans with passports now than we had 20 years ago,” said Robin Hayes, the CEO of JetBlue, in an interview with Travel + Leisure. “And so we want to better fill that demand. It's great that we can fly people domestically, but we also want to be their airline when they fly internationally as well.”
• The new route is part of the airline’s international expansion plans, which include adding a second flight to Paris from Boston next year, and launching flights to Amsterdam from New York in August and from Boston in September. And that’s not all.
• “There’s a number of great European destinations, and hopefully, in 2024, we can add at least one more,” Hayes said.
• Hayes also noted that the airline has ordered more than a dozen more long-range and extra-long-range aircraft.
• JetBlue first started flying to Europe in 2021 with service to London, which it later expanded.
• “We're here to shake up the market just as we did in London. We're here to bring an outstanding product and low fares,” Hayes said before the inaugural flight. “We compete against a very high fare legacy joint venture with a lot of flights, so it's not easy, but we're going to do our part to shake the market up and make it more competitive.”

Travel and Leisure

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2023 HIRING EVENTS

EAA AirVenture Oshkosh | JUL 24-29

OBAP | AUG 9-11 | MSY

LPA | SEP 14-16 | ISM

RTAG | OCT 7-8 | FTW