Quote:
Originally Posted by ardecila
I feel for the people stuck, but I'm mainly a business or leisure traveler now - I would never dream of trying to fly somewhere during the holidays. I love flying Southwest out of MDW (esp since I live south of Madison St) and I haven't had any serious issues flying them over the past few years.
It seems like this kind of chaos is just par for the course now - it's Southwest taking the brunt this time, but next year it could be AA or United. Air travel at the holidays is just impossibly cursed - winter weather, airplanes, and huge travel volumes don't mix. I don't know why people even bother - use Zoom or FaceTime for the holidays, and then travel to see your loved ones at a different time of year.
Making it worse, the working-age people who tend to travel during the holidays are also the most sensitive to disruptions, since they have to travel within very narrow windows proscribed by their jobs and family obligations. For college students, seniors, etc a flight delay is less of a catastrophe.
I will stick with my Southwest Rapid Rewards account - maybe my miles will count for double if they lose a lot of business! Hopefully they find a way to fix their tech issues and come out stronger.
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Ok - Yes.... Storms impact air travel, but SW clearly did far far far worse than the other airlines. If we were talking about Frontier or Spirit, then it wouldn't even be a news story because people expect those carriers to be shitty. But SW has this reputation behind it as being the cool low cost airline that will deliver the same level of service as United/Delta or better. That image has now officially been shattered.
I flew SW out of O'Hare in May and had a horrible experience with them. They've clearly lost their way, and unless they change things internally (and fast), it will start to reflect on their bottom line. If I was one of the customers that got shit canned during this, I would never fly with SW ever again. Scale that out across thousands upon thousands of travelers, and you have a business problem.
Anyways - Tying this back to Steely's comment..... I could see MDW becoming a mini-hub for LCC airlines that may not want to pay the fees of O'Hare to operate out of if SW begins to free up some gates under a reduced capacity in the future.