bobble

the company has found passengers and thus money at those times of morning and evening. I don’t think they’re going anywhere.

Vne469

Yes you can get anywhere in a few months, ATL and MCO might be six months.

e6bpilot

Andrew Watterson addressed this stuff recently in leadership briefs. Short answer, redeye flying is coming. He said it isn't going to be big, but it has a place in our network. 40-50 planes a night, mainly from Vegas east. He was pretty adamant that our current customers do not want Hawaii redeye flying, but he didn't really say whether this was an official stance or not. In any case, we have technological issues to iron out and until the SWIFT replacement and the new flight scheduling software gets implemented (two years current timeline) don't expect anything.
As for the shoulder flying, he said it is going to be tweaked, but it won't go away. Right now it is in place to get planes and crews moving in the system in the morning. As we approach more normal levels of manning and aircraft, it will subside, but won't go completely. Customers hate the 0500 Providence to BWI departure, but they love having the next plane at that gate in Providence take them to Orlando at 0630
With redeyes, you will fill up the plane coming from MDW to providence at 0500 that is mostly empty right now with Vegas and LAX redeye customers. That evens the loads out across the system and makes those morning shoulder flights make a little more sense.

KelvinHelmholtz

40-50 planes a night is not insignificant.

Lewbronski

But red eyes at SWA will suck less than they do anywhere else because at SWA we will do them exceptionally well. All of your cohearts working the red eyes with you will have the warrior spirit and stuff. And you get a 3% override - which we might give away in the next contract.

e6bpilot

40-50 redeye flights a night is pretty small in a network our size.

waterskisabersw

I usually agree with you wholeheartedly on everything you say, and I totally agree with you that red eyes suck no matter what. I will never ever do a red eye here. Ever. Period.

That being said, I actuality think that red eyes will go senior for the most part here, because of our pilot group and because they will pay well per block hour because they're rigged by the calendar day. So a "two day" redeye with two flights will actually pay 19.5+override.

ZapBrannigan

Watch. They’ll embed a red eye into a three day trip and make it so it’s not commutable. Literally the ONLY benefit to red eyes for a pilot is that they’re commutable on both ends. They will undoubtedly find a way to neuter that.

Zard

they’ll find a way to make them an AM turn PM 4 day and then be shocked, shocked I tell you, that fatigue calls are skyrocketing.

hoover

I dont think they'll be true red eyes. I think they'll have a flight that lands before 0200 then sit till 0400 and fly another leg or two. As long as the flight doesnt touch 0200-0400 they can fly you again.
that's what they mean by red eyes