Logan Airport Flights and Airlines Discussion

Is the JAL load factor to Tokyo considered good? I think there are 186 seats 42 in business class. It probably depends to some degree on how many of the business call seats are filled.


Massport has released the February passengers numbers for Logan.

Total Airport Passengers: 1,935,511 (up 3.0% over February 2013)
Total YTD Airport Passengers: 3,951,716 (up 1.4% over 2013)
Total International Passengers: 257,633 (up 7.1% over February 2013)
Total YTD International Passengers: 548,695 (up 4.0 % over 2013)
Total Domestic Passengers: 1,671,834 (up 2.4 % over February 2013)
Total Domestic Passengers YTD: 3,391,537 (up 1.0 % over 2013)

Loads for JAL's Tokyo flight: 141 passengers
Loads for Copa's Panama City flight: 96 passengers
 
Is the JAL load factor to Tokyo considered good? I think there are 186 seats 42 in business class. It probably depends to some degree on how many of the business call seats are filled.

It works out to a 76% load factor which is pretty respectable. Yields are going to tell the who financial story of the flight. My friend travels to Tokyo regularly for work (always flies on the JAL flight) and he's said that the Business Class cabin has always been more than half full on the dozen plus flights he's been on. So at least on some flights the Business class seats are being filled pretty good.
 
Aer Lingus has shifted both the New York and Boston to Shannon routes to the contracted 757s. This will allow them to operate both routes year round whereas the A330 was too much plane even in the summer.
I'm going to guess that the second SNN-BOS flight is with an Aer Lingus A330. The westbound 757 flight is numbered "EIN1AC", which reflects its operation by the subcontractor, whereas the the second westbound flight is EIN135, which has been an Aer Lingus designation for that route for some time. Flight Aware doesn't identify the aircraft type, I assume that from its flight number, it's operated by Aer Lingus itself, which doesn't own or operate any 757s.
 
It works out to a 76% load factor which is pretty respectable. Yields are going to tell the who financial story of the flight. My friend travels to Tokyo regularly for work (always flies on the JAL flight) and he's said that the Business Class cabin has always been more than half full on the dozen plus flights he's been on. So at least on some flights the Business class seats are being filled pretty good.

If it's just 'more than half full', those aren't great loads, especially when you consider that just because someone is flying in business class, it doesn't mean a business class fare was paid. If they wanted my advice, I'd say knock J down to 24-30 seats and add in a premium economy product.
 
I'm going to guess that the second SNN-BOS flight is with an Aer Lingus A330. The westbound 757 flight is numbered "EIN1AC", which reflects its operation by the subcontractor, whereas the the second westbound flight is EIN135, which has been an Aer Lingus designation for that route for some time. Flight Aware doesn't identify the aircraft type, I assume that from its flight number, it's operated by Aer Lingus itself, which doesn't own or operate any 757s.

There is no second Shannon flight, this is the only one and it's the 757 operated by Air Contractors on behalf of Aer Lingus. Flight Aware screwed up. They do stuff like that all the time, it's not that great of a website.
 
You know, you may be right. According to this, EIN135 has been taxiing around Shannon Airport for the past four hours and is scheduled to arrive in Boston in about three hours (about 20 minutes after the 757 flight is scheduled to arrive). I wonder if it reflects a scheduled but unused slot owned by Aer Lingus.
 
I don't think it relates to a slot issue so much as it is a simple glitch in their system. On a few occasions I have seen this happen with British Airways flights where it shows an extra flight with an abnormal flight number similar to the EIN1NC that you saw and potentially other incorrect or incomplete information.
 
If it's just 'more than half full', those aren't great loads, especially when you consider that just because someone is flying in business class, it doesn't mean a business class fare was paid. If they wanted my advice, I'd say knock J down to 24-30 seats and add in a premium economy product.

What about having 4-8 First Class seats as well?

I do wonder how many J fares they are getting. I checked ITA software and the J fare ranges from $4976 to $20000. Looks like weekend dates are the highest prices for August and July Here's the question: is the high fare a sign of selling a fair amount of J Seats or are Japan Airlines fishing for a big score on certain peak times.

There's a cargo component to this route as well and they must be getting an above average economy fare.

I checked aviationDB and they typically bring in 800K lbs of freight from Tokyo and send 400K back.
 
I noticed an apparent nonstop to Cabo San Lucas while I was in terminal A on Monday morning. I don't remember this being around a year or two ago. Is this a new flight?
 
I noticed an apparent nonstop to Cabo San Lucas while I was in terminal A on Monday morning. I don't remember this being around a year or two ago. Is this a new flight?

Was it Delta, Alaska, United or someone else?

It could have been a charter/1-off kind of deal.

Also - are you sure it wasn't a 1-stop via Detroit/Atlanta on Delta or Houston/Newark on United?
 
Which way will the breakup of AA and JetBlue cut for Boston? Fewer synergies, or more competition?
 
Was it Delta, Alaska, United or someone else?

It could have been a charter/1-off kind of deal.

Also - are you sure it wasn't a 1-stop via Detroit/Atlanta on Delta or Houston/Newark on United?

After researching, I realize it was a one-stop that wasn't clearly displayed as such.
 
haven't these always been fully separate companies?

Yeah, but they had a long-term partnership to feed JetBlue passengers to AA flights to London, and they also did some slot trading that got JetBlue its first flights out of National.
 
Which way will the breakup of AA and JetBlue cut for Boston? Fewer synergies, or more competition?

Check kmp1284's post (#1701): Discusses some possibilities for new AA/US flights that will compete with JetBlue or may make them think twice on entering.
 
What about having 4-8 First Class seats as well?

I do wonder how many J fares they are getting. I checked ITA software and the J fare ranges from $4976 to $20000. Looks like weekend dates are the highest prices for August and July Here's the question: is the high fare a sign of selling a fair amount of J Seats or are Japan Airlines fishing for a big score on certain peak times.

There's a cargo component to this route as well and they must be getting an above average economy fare.

I checked aviationDB and they typically bring in 800K lbs of freight from Tokyo and send 400K back.

In the case of Boston and a couple other JAL 787 routes, namely San Francisco, Frankfurt and Moscow, a four seat F cabin would probably work, along with a modest decrease in the number of J seats and some premium economy. Not that I have any expectation of the configuration changing, but creating a subfleet for a few specific routes like that can get hugely problematic when weather and mechanical issues interfere. When BA rolled out their new F product they naturally attempted to concentrate it on their most lucrative routes - New York, Hong Kong and Sao Paulo. When all was going smoothly it was fine but once things got out of whack they were subbing in old F left and right and it took them days to catch up. The old F product, which is still in use on about a third of their 747s, is a perfectly good product but it's not up to the same standard and it's not what those customers were expecting. Having seen plenty of equipment substitutions where people have been downgraded to a lower class or didn't get the product they expected, I can say it's not generally a good thing for an airline to get in the habit of doing. Usually seven out of ten people take the compensation and deal with it but there are always a few who will make a stink. Unfortunately, when it's a guy who flies paid F back and forth to London fifteen or twenty times a year, you kind of have to go out of your way to ensure that he remains a happy, loyal customer.
 
Check kmp1284's post (#1701): Discusses some possibilities for new AA/US flights that will compete with JetBlue or may make them think twice on entering.
It seems to me that JetBlue now has every incentive and complete freedom to make a bid for DAL-BOS via the 2 gates at DAL (Dallas Love Field) that AA must divest. Whatever use Virgin America would put them to, JetBlue could do better (including DAL-BOS, but also JFK, DCA, LGB, FLL, and SFO), and, frankly burst Virgin America's IPO bubble, because, without DAL, Virgin is looking pretty stagnant and its gates at LGA and DCA look stranded.
 
It seems to me that JetBlue now has every incentive and complete freedom to make a bid for DAL-BOS via the 2 gates at DAL (Dallas Love Field) that AA must divest. Whatever use Virgin America would put them to, JetBlue could do better (including DAL-BOS, but also JFK, DCA, LGB, FLL, and SFO), and, frankly burst Virgin America's IPO bubble, because, without DAL, Virgin is looking pretty stagnant and its gates at LGA and DCA look stranded.

JetBlue does not have any interest in these gates. They probably do not want to tangle with Southwest in their home airport. I'm sure they would have loved to serve Dallas Love originally.
 
Is it just me or are the Copa ticket prices out of BOS really high? Some friends had recently considered flying out of BOS but found it was _much_ cheaper to fly out of JFK, also on Copa (even if it meant a 3-4 hour ride down there from the Boston area). They're flying through PTY on to GYE (Ecuador) and the price was $599 out of JFK vs $950 from BOS.

Maybe this is just the norm for these boutique BOS non-stop/long haul flights? Seems like they could actually fill the flights with somewhat cheaper ticket prices. And with the Massport incentives and marketing the ticket gouging doesn't seem right. From what I've heard the flights are only flying at 50-60% capacity (the PTY flights).
 

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