Amidst questions surrounding whether ‘diversity and inclusion’ drives are jeopardizing airline safety, Southwest Airlines deleted a post on X celebrating an “all female flight crew.”
The post featured an on-board photo of two female pilots and four air hostesses, two of whom are black.
Southwest Airlines is receiving a mix of praise and scorn over a policy giving obese passengers free seats to hold their overabundant girth. Basic economics suggests that it will result in healthy passengers subsidizing the humungous. Worse, some thin passengers will get booted from flights to make room.
Southwest didn’t announce its “Customer of Size” policy with fanfare. Rather, it came to wide public attention after fat TikTokkers started educating each other on how to take advantage of it.
Southwest has caved to the cattle.
‘Customers of size’ will now receive a free extra seat to accommodate their poor health decisions.
Yes. Even if the airline is overbooked.
Which means someone who is not a busted can of biscuits will have to deplane so southwest can cater to… pic.twitter.com/ZC0D1Wc444
Southwest was back in the news again today when it announced its fourth quarter results this morning. Anyone who did not partake in the annual holiday suicide ritual knows about the disastrous Christmas week suffered by Southwest when it was forced to cancel over 16,000 flights as the result of a scheduling meltdown. The company reported a loss of 38 cents a share or just over 4 times the 9 cents a share forecasted by the experts who are supposed to study these things. The company said the “operational disruption” hit their earnings to the tune of $800 million. Now that’s some disruption. Just like the stranded travelers last month, the investing public was not amused handing the stock a 5% beating as of 11 am this morning.
Southwest Airlines, which has canceled or delayed tens of thousands of flights this holiday season, has received massive amounts in federal subsidies in the last several years, records show.
Southwest has canceled over 15,700 flights since winter weather began to affect air travel on Dec. 22, far more than any other commercial United States airline, according to records compiled by FlightAware. However, since 2020, the U.S. government has handed Southwest over $7.2 billion in taxpayer funds for payroll and operations, filings show, calling into question whether the airline has managed its resources correctly.
“Airlines continue to take our tax dollars, yet they never seem to make long-term changes that will improve the experience for customers,” Adam Andrzejewski, CEO of the financial watchdog OpenTheBooks, told the Washington Examiner. “As soon as demand recovered, there was industrywide disruption.”
After canceling almost 3,000 flights on Monday, Southwest Airlines Co. canceled thousands more on Tuesday due to adverse weather conditions and inadequate staffing.
Late Monday night, Chief Executive Officer Bob Jordan spoke with WSJ, who said, “In all likelihood, we’ll have another tough day tomorrow as we work our way out of this.” He added: “This is the largest-scale event that I’ve ever seen.”
Flight tracker FlightAware shows as of early Tuesday morning, the Dallas-based carrier canceled 2,510 flights, accounting for 62% of its schedule today.
Southwest released a statement about the continued travel chaos:
“With consecutive days of extreme winter weather across our network behind us, continuing challenges are impacting our Customers and Employees in a significant way that is unacceptable.”
Southwest’s cancellations prompted the US Department of Transportation to review. The agency was concerned about the airline’s “unacceptable” rate of cancellations, delays, and lack of customer service.
Shares of Southwest fell 3.5% in US premarket trading to $34.81 on the continuation of flight cancelations which may extend through Wednesday.
Southwest Airlines canceled nearly 3,000 flights on Monday, as a historic winter storm and inadequate staffing made for a perfect storm of holiday chaos the day after Christmas.
Passengers line up at Denver International Airport (Hyoung Chang/ Getty)
As of 9PM on Monday, Southwest had canceled 2,882 flights – or 70% of its schedule, according to flightaware.com. Overall, 82% of Southwest flights were either canceled or delayed. By airport, Denver International saw 24% of flights canceled, while 29% were delayed.
Tomorrow is also slated to be a total mess, with over 2,400 Tuesday flights canceled.
Is it time for @USDOT to require Southwest the ability to rebook on other airlines during IROPS?
