American Airlines

[ethanegcc]

As part of US airlines reliability, I recently posted on DL thread, I will do AA's flights on here. Prepare yourselves.

AA 735 MAN-PHL departed on-time once in the last week! It had one delay of about 6 hours and the rest about 1hr.
The average delay overall for this flight is 1hr, compared to Delta's 10mins! (Delta also operated every flight in the last week on time)

AA 54 ORD-MAN departed on-time six times in the last week. One had a delay of 2hrs. The average delay overall for this flight is 40mins.

AA 211 MAN-JFK departed on-time five times in the last week. The delay on the other was fairly minor though. The average delay on this flight was 20mins. Very good to see this service performing with decent reliability.

We have actually seen a reversal in reliability on AA flights but none are great - PHL this week wasn't great and especially bad with many passengers making onward connections!

 

[Yawner]

I don't think slagging off the longest serving US carrier is particularly useful. There were problems with Chicago through the summer due to over stretching of the 788 fleet which have hopefully been rectified. Departure times are irrelevant. It's arrival times that matter for connections and business. The current performance is fine.

There has been one very late PHL arrival recently due to an on time departure suffering a cracked windscreen in flight. This was handled as well as it could possibly be. The subsequent return flight obviously suffering the knock on effect There has been one very late departure recently for reasons I don't know following an on time arrival.

You'll obviously be pleased that we have no AA service for 2 months on 2 routes and just a 6 day service on PHL

AA's biggest problem will be a lack of competitive hard product and relatively high pricing. Same as UA.

 

[ethanegcc]

'You'll obviously be pleased to know'

No, I won't. In fact, I use the PHL service frequently due to me having family living in Philadelphia. I know full well that the reliability is not great and I am not slagging them off, as I fly with them regularly and they offer a good direct option from Manchester. That is just a sarcastic comment, when I was just comparing the recent reliability of the US flights, am a MAN supporter so clearly don't want to see reductions and regular user of the MAN-PHL flight.

I am sure most users agree that AA's reliability is not great, as illustrated by this and you quite rightly point out that another separate issue is the product on board and high price - I am not slagging them off and how my post would single-handedly affect the longest serving US carrier at MAN is beyond me?

If you would like me to edit the post on AA for whatever reason, I will be happy to do that.

 

[Yawner]

It's probably the word disgusting that provoked my reply. Had you said "not great" like you did in the second post it would have been a more valid observation.

 

[ethanegcc]

Has anyone ever thought that MAN might actually get transfer passengers from the Finnair flights? I noticed that they codeshare on AA's TATL flights from MAN, so I took to their website and, sure enough, they do. Via MAN came up as the top option when searching HEL-ORD on Finnair's website. I will try the same for PHL and JFK.
View attachment 4287

 

[ethanegcc]

Sure enough, we are also the top option for HEL-PHL:
View attachment 4288

 

[ethanegcc]

And for JFK, let's remember the largest Finland-USA market that Finnair only serves with one afternoon flight, via MAN is again the top option. Pretty amazing really. Just thought I would share this on here.
View attachment 4290

 

[IanFarquharson]

Looks like AA JFK has been axed for W17/18
I assume this means it will now operate Summer only ?

 

[Land23R]

I assume you're asking will it come back in S18? A reasonable question.

 

[IanFarquharson]

Yes or has it gone the same way as BHX-JFK ?

 

[Aceshigh]

So AA think the UK only trades May to September.

 

[ethanegcc]

It hasn't gone the same way as BHX. It has been mentioned it is going seasonal for a while now.

 

[Coathanger16]

So AA think the UK only trades May to September.

Demand does generally drop between September and May. If AA thinks they're not going to get sufficient loads over that period, then they won't operate the flight. Doesn't mean they think there's no demand. Even without AA there's still flights offered by other airlines.

I thought it had been known for a while that JFK was only going to be seasonal for AA?

 

[Dobbo]

It's strange - very popular route with multiple carriers yet there must be a significant seasonal swing in demand.

MAN needs one of the carriers to persevere year round with a widebody - hopefully the market will support this.

Hardly paving the way for BA acting as the White knight, rather leaving them in the lurch...

 

[ethanegcc]

American Airlines W17 Chicago operation changes
AA are currently scheduling 767 operation on the MAN-ORD route right up until Christmas and I believe this was 757 in the winter season just gone. It does, however look like 5x weekly operation some weeks with sporadic mid-week days e.g. Wednesday and Thursday left with no flight (not sure if this was the case this year)

However, I think it is great that a wide body will continue on the route right up until the finish for Jan/Feb. Whether they are planning to continue the route year-round on this 5/4x weekly 763 schedule remains to be seen; I would be very happy if so.

 

[Dobbo]

Cautiously optimistic.

I think they are better off scheduling 5x weekly B763 than daily B752 (assuming the reliability of the B763 is okay and the legs of the B752 are what we think they are).

To be frank, if this is something that is genuinely going to be handed over to BA in a few years, they need to build up the traffic otherwise it will be a disaster when a much larger airframe than the B763 (i.e. B772) is used.

 

[ethanegcc]

Cautiously optimistic.

Exactly my feelings. I hope it continues year-round; could be a good and much-needed boost for the ORD route.

 

[ethanegcc]

Further to my post above,
AA are now scheduling 6 weekly service throughout the majority of November and December, with the 767-300ER in W17. One week in November (around 23rd) has some other reductions for Thanksgiving (the aircraft will be needed elsewhere)

From 11th December, through to 22nd, however, (end of current timetable), the 767-300ER is showing as daily operation.

Hopefully AA are building up the route to constitute for the new seasonality of the JFK route - we all know the ORD route has more potential.

 

[Dobbo]

Do you know how this meshes up with JFK? Do both routes take time off in January/February?

 

[ethanegcc]

The AA JFK route is now summer seasonal only (e.g. March to October), unfortunately. The PHL route is year-round A330 on a (mostly) daily basis.

The ORD route currently takes time off in Jan and Feb and is a 757 from November, but at least the latter part now looks likely to change.