American Airlines is gearing up for a busy Summer travel season. The Fort Worth based carrier released the details of their peak summer travel period via a press release touting some highlights of the schedule.
American Summer Travel by the Numbers
According to the airline, they anticipate serving as many as 72 million passengers between May 17th and September 3rd on almost 690,000 flights. The airline is expected to fly more seats in the market than any summer before and increase overall departures by 10%.
The busiest weekend of the summer season is scheduled to be around Memorial Day. The airline is planning to operate 39,000 flights and serve 3.9 million passengers between May 23-28th.
Unsurprisingly, their busiest day of the year also falls on a holiday weekend. WIth July 4th falling on a Thursday, Sunday July 7th is anticipated to be the single busiest day of the summer. American has 6,540 flights scheduled to operate that day alone.
As part of the summer schedule, the airline has added 10 new destinations serving popular vacation destinations. These include the brand new Tulum International Airport (TQO) and warm weather European destinations like Naples, Italy (NAP) and Nice, France (NCE).
David Seymour, American’s Chief Operating Officer had this to say about their summer operation:
Thanks to the hard work of our team members, vendors and partners, American is ready for the summer travel season. We look forward to welcoming you aboard an American flight this summer.
David Seymour, Chief Operating Officer
Competition from Other Carriers
American is also increasing the frequency of some flights due to competition. Ultra-low-cost carrier (ULCC) Spirit announced a large route expansion at American’s Dallas/Ft. Worth (DFW) hub earlier this month. American has since responded by increasing the frequencies on at least three of these routes beginning in August.
- DFW to Columbus (CMH) goes from 5x to 6x daily
- DFW to Kansas City (MCI) goes from 7x to 8x daily
- DFW to Milwaukee (MKE) goes from 3x to 4x daily
Summary
Living in Austin I find that it is often convenient to take American regardless of the fact they aren’t my preferred carrier. The increased flying this summer should allow more people to get to more destinations easily. An increase in competition on some routes should also put downward pressure on pricing during the busy summer travel season.
I have a few flights on American during this time, including a single day, six segment trip so I’ll be putting the airline’s efficiency to the test (Fingers crossed for no delAAys). Are you planning to fly with American this summer?
