Southwest Airlines Says Some Cuts Could be Temporary

The sky isn't falling in on discount Southwest Airlines, a carrier that continues to reap profits (albeit lower profits) because of its prescient fuel hedges. Earlier this week the discount airline said it was excising 190 flights from its January 11-March 6, 2009, flight schedule. Lost, perhaps, in that announcement is the fact that WN (that's the carrier's code) isn't axing any cities from its route map, and only shelving a trio of city-pairs.

Southwest still doesn't know whether it will put Phoenix (PHX) to Birmingham (BHM), Nashville (BNA) to Oakland (OAK), and Nashville to Seattle/Tacoma (SEA) permanently on the shelf, or just in cold storage for a while.

Southwest spokeswoman Brandy King says WN isn't grounding any airplanes, and that “our fleet may grow” during the period. “The winter schedule simply shortens the aircraft duty day, and eliminates unproductive flights.” Both those moves save fuel.

In contrast, some major “legacy” carriers in this country have been excising entire cities from their schedule, and grounding whole fleet-types of aircraft such as classic 737-300s and -500s.

The lion's share of the 190 flights Southwest is eliminating consists of flight frequencies - not routes per se. King tells Cheapflights, “A portion of [that capacity] may return with our March schedule.”

© Cheapflights Ltd Jerry Chandler