US: Airlines to cut summer flights up to 90% with rebound remote
US airlines are starting to look past the coronavirus peak, anticipating a world where travellers remain leery about returning to the skies and flights are drastically reduced in the normally robust summer travel season. The bleak picture is compounding an already dire financial situation for the airlines, which are burning through cash and talking to the Treasury Department about grants. Newly revised federal rules will let the companies cut some routes by as much as 90% through September and eliminate others altogether to avoid flying nearly empty planes. A carrier that served a city less than five times weekly would need to provide only one flight a week under final DoT rules issued Tuesday on minimum domestic flying levels through Sept. 30. A company with more than 25 weekly flights would be able to scale back to only five. On some routes, the drop in service could be about 90%. The regulations open the door to major service reductions as airlines gird for a lean summer, when planes are usually jammed and the industry collects its largest profits. Underscoring the urgency of the cuts, the number of people flying in the US dropped to below 100,000 on Tuesday, 95% below the level a year ago. “The airline companies are hurting badly,” Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao said. “But there are still people that need to get to, for example, New York to California. They can’t spend three days driving.” The DoT is trying to balance all-but-nonexistent demand amid the pandemic with maintaining a semblance of normality in airlines’ domestic operations. <br/>
https://portal.staralliance.com/cms/news/hot-topics/2020-04-09/general/us-airlines-to-cut-summer-flights-up-to-90-with-rebound-remote
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US: Airlines to cut summer flights up to 90% with rebound remote
US airlines are starting to look past the coronavirus peak, anticipating a world where travellers remain leery about returning to the skies and flights are drastically reduced in the normally robust summer travel season. The bleak picture is compounding an already dire financial situation for the airlines, which are burning through cash and talking to the Treasury Department about grants. Newly revised federal rules will let the companies cut some routes by as much as 90% through September and eliminate others altogether to avoid flying nearly empty planes. A carrier that served a city less than five times weekly would need to provide only one flight a week under final DoT rules issued Tuesday on minimum domestic flying levels through Sept. 30. A company with more than 25 weekly flights would be able to scale back to only five. On some routes, the drop in service could be about 90%. The regulations open the door to major service reductions as airlines gird for a lean summer, when planes are usually jammed and the industry collects its largest profits. Underscoring the urgency of the cuts, the number of people flying in the US dropped to below 100,000 on Tuesday, 95% below the level a year ago. “The airline companies are hurting badly,” Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao said. “But there are still people that need to get to, for example, New York to California. They can’t spend three days driving.” The DoT is trying to balance all-but-nonexistent demand amid the pandemic with maintaining a semblance of normality in airlines’ domestic operations. <br/>
