NEW YORK (AP) — Southwest Airlines canceled hundreds of flights over the weekend, blaming the woes on air traffic control issues and weather.
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The airline canceled more than 1,000 flights, or 28% of its schedule, as of 3 p.m. ET Sunday, according to flight tracker FlightAware. That was the highest rate by far of the major U.S. airlines. Next in line were Allegiant and Spirit, which had respectively canceled 5% and 4% of their flights on Sunday, according to the flight tracker. American Airlines canceled 2% of its flights.
Southwest could not immediately be reached for comment, but took to Twitter on Saturday.
“TC issues and disruptive weather have resulted in a high volume of cancellations throughout the weekend while we work to recover our operation,” it said on its Twitter account. “We appreciate your patience as we accommodate affected customers, and customer service wait times are longer than usual.”
However, Henry H. Harteveltd, president and travel industry analyst at The Atmosphere Research Group, based in San Francisco, points to other causes for the cancellations.
First, he says Southwest has scheduled more flights than it can handle, a problem that started in June. He also noted that Southwest operates what’s known as a point-to-point route network, and when a delay occurs, it “cascades” along the remaining flight segments. That’s because, for example, a Southwest flight departing Fort Lauderdale, Florida, for the airline’s home base of Dallas may make multiple stops along the way.
But Harteveltd says the most troubling reason is the likelihood that some pilots who oppose Southwest’s decision to mandate COVID-19 vaccinations are participating in an illegal job action where they call in sick or are engaging in a “work slowdown.”
In a statement Saturday, the airline’s pilot union, Southwest Airlines Pilots Association, said that’s not the case.
“SWAPA is aware of operational difficulties affecting Southwest Airlines today due to a number of issues, but we can say with confidence that our pilots are not participating in any official or unofficial job actions, “ it said.
Harteveltd noted Southwest’s woes could linger and affect its fourth quarter financial performance.
“All of this is happening as people are in the midst of booking their Thanksgiving and Christmas/New Year holiday travel,” he said. “It’s very possible that some people who might normally book on Southwest may see this news and choose to fly other airlines.”
They’re denying it is covid vax mandate related but it is- flight traffic controllers walked out and so did pilots
To fight the mandate
Apparently the news wants to pretend it’s not happening so we don’t get copycats across America
The other side of the story:
Southwest Airlines COVID-19 vaccine mandate states that all their employees must be vaccinated by December 8, 2021. The move was met with much protest, which led to Southwest Airlines pilots filing a lawsuit on grounds that it unlawfully imposes new conditions of employment.
Liars! Its coz of the vaccine mandate!!!!
BIDEN AND HIS ADMINISTRATION IS KILLING THIS COUNTRY SLOWLY, TO THOSE PEOPLE WHO VOTED FOR THIS PATHETIC PRESIDENT IS A PRETTY MUCH A FOOL, JUST LIKE THE PRESIDENT.
Employers constantly changed rules for their staff, for hosts of different reasons. I am not any kind of expert on labor law but will go ahead and say that they can lawfully do it, otherwise, they would be dealing with the nightmare of having different rules for different employees, predicated on their date of hire.
And so, if Southwest Airline employees indeed filed a lawsuit re “new conditions of employment,” I predict it will get them nowhere.
After all, many companies, large and small, including the most sophisticated ones, and many government entities, already imposed vaccination/testing mandates on their staff, and I refuse to believe that they didn’t take into consideration such a predictable contingency.