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Why are so many Southwest flights cancelled?


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They say weather but why are the numbers less for other carriers?

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Southwest Airlines

@SouthwestAir

ATC issues and disruptive weather have resulted in a high volume of cancellations throughout the weekend while we work to recover our operation. We appreciate your patience as we accommodate affected Customers, and Customer Service wait times are longer than usual. (1/2)

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Southwest has canceled 1,018 Sunday flights as of 2 p.m. ET, according to flight tracker FlightAware. That's 28% of the the airline's scheduled flights and the highest of any U.S. airline by a wide margin.

American Airlines has canceled 63 flights, or 2% of its operation, while Spirit Airlines canceled 32 flights, or 4% of its flights, according to FlightAware.

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According to my flight-attendant nephew, who hopes to get a job with Southwest after he turns 21 on Dec. 28th and when flight numbers increase, it's a combination of a lack of crew and a lack of enough passengers on some flights although the Airlines will never admit the latter.  Right now, he's working for Mesa Airlines but is being assigned a lot of American and United flights, even though he's under their 21 age rule for their own attendants, because those airlines are short of attendants and Mesa is being paid a premium to provide attendants: Ryan owns United, American, and Mesa uniforms.

Ryan's young, vaccinated, already had COVID in the Spring of 2020 with very mild symptoms, and isn't strongly worried about catching it.  But a lot of flight attendants are not vaccinated or are worried - Ryan's training by Mesa in Arizona took a week longer than it should have because three trainees came down with COVID and 13 of the remaining 27 were NOT vaccinated.

All major airlines except Delta have mandated employee vaccinations as have many airports and thousands of employees are in line to be fired by the end of November who won't do it.

It's so sad that many, like my unvaccinated cousin who now has COVID, who saw her mother and two cousins die of COVID, don't want "mRNA running around in my body" and would rather take the chance of COVID RNA being injected into their body's cells!  Yet if you ask them what mRNA is or how the vaccine works, they can't tell you! And this resistance is despite the examples that Trump and all - or almost all - GOP got the vaccine - most or all the Pfizer or Moderna mRNA vaccines - and urged people to get it!

That so many resist getting vaccinated is beyond my ability to comprehend.  40% each year not getting the flu shot surprises me, but the very low death rate from otherwise healthy people helps explain it coupled with the lies about mercury in vaccines causing autism, even though it's in a less-absorbable form and less than what's in two cans of tuna fish. Not so with Delta COVID: it kills and the vaccines don't contain any mercury.

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34 minutes ago, Wilbur said:

 

You're better than this. This is a crock of shit and you know it. This is not an amazing moment as the U.S. Freedom Flyer stated. 

When has a pilot been called a criminal or terrorist for opposing a vax mandate? There were virtually no facts in this piece.

https://www.npr.org/2020/09/29/917747123/you-literally-cant-believe-the-facts-tucker-carlson-tells-you-so-say-fox-s-lawye

Just read U.S. District Judge Mary Kay Vyskocil's opinion, leaning heavily on the arguments of Fox's lawyers: The "'general tenor' of the show should then inform a viewer that [Carlson] is not 'stating actual facts' about the topics he discusses and is instead engaging in 'exaggeration' and 'non-literal commentary.' "

She wrote: "Fox persuasively argues, that given Mr. Carlson's reputation, any reasonable viewer 'arrive[s] with an appropriate amount of skepticism' about the statement he makes."

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7 hours ago, denniS said:

You're better than this. This is a crock of shit and you know it. This is not an amazing moment as the U.S. Freedom Flyer stated. 

When has a pilot been called a criminal or terrorist for opposing a vax mandate? There were virtually no facts in this piece.

https://www.npr.org/2020/09/29/917747123/you-literally-cant-believe-the-facts-tucker-carlson-tells-you-so-say-fox-s-lawye

Just read U.S. District Judge Mary Kay Vyskocil's opinion, leaning heavily on the arguments of Fox's lawyers: The "'general tenor' of the show should then inform a viewer that [Carlson] is not 'stating actual facts' about the topics he discusses and is instead engaging in 'exaggeration' and 'non-literal commentary.' "

She wrote: "Fox persuasively argues, that given Mr. Carlson's reputation, any reasonable viewer 'arrive[s] with an appropriate amount of skepticism' about the statement he makes."

I am not an MSM fan at all but that is the sentiment in the industry and what the shutdowns are all about. Not weather, not poor planning or scheduling.  It is simply pushback against mandated vaccines.  It is 100% political. This piece made that point.   Crippling the economy with this will be a political bomb and Carlson knows this.  Carlson is no more credible than Maddow or Lemon/ Cuomo.  All political theatrics, all the time. 

 

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44 minutes ago, Wilbur said:

That would require experience and the only way to achieve that would be legal immigration of experienced flight crew.  Then there would be the scab issues.  Remember Ansette Airlines? 

No job.  No unemployment.  Minds change.  The lines for vaccinations for state workers are getting longer in CT.

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37 minutes ago, maddmaxx said:

No job.  No unemployment.  Minds change.  The lines for vaccinations for state workers are getting longer in CT.

No rights.  <<< That is at the root of it.  

In Canada, Federal workers or workers who operate under federal laws are required to be vaccinated.  We lack the rights the US has so we have very high compliance in the sectors where laws are enforced.  

I just looked at US Freedom Flyers site and that is the repeated theme.  Freedom and rights.  My point is not to be political and start a bitchfest of old men again.  Nor is it uphold FOX as the arbiter of truth.  It is simply to say, weather isn't the cause of Southwests service outages.

@Mick, you nephew needs to learn to stay quiet on some issues.  Canceling flights due to load factors is illegal.  I wouldn't be talking about that.  We all know it happens, but that is never the reason given.  Blame the Weather or mechanical or duty day but never cite load factors. 

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19 minutes ago, Philander Seabury said:

Thankfully my daughter and husband usually fly United and they just made it home from Montana. 

My daughter was able to get a rental car and drove herself home 

She was lucky in that her uncle lives near Charlotte, and has a neighbor who works for Enterprise, looking for a car on our own we had no luck, but a call to the neighbor got her behind the wheel of a Challenger.    :happyanim:

Helps to have friends in high places 

And you never know where the high place is 

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48 minutes ago, Further said:

My daughter was able to get a rental car and drove herself home 

She was lucky in that her uncle lives near Charlotte, and has a neighbor who works for Enterprise, looking for a car on our own we had no luck, but a call to the neighbor got her behind the wheel of a Challenger.    :happyanim:

Helps to have friends in high places 

And you never know where the high place is 

Yeah, Steve Martin totally blew it trying to rent a car in planes, trains, and automobiles. :D

 

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4 hours ago, Wilbur said:

I am not an MSM fan at all but that is the sentiment in the industry and what the shutdowns are all about. Not weather, not poor planning or scheduling.  It is simply pushback against mandated vaccines.  It is 100% political. This piece made that point.   Crippling the economy with this will be a political bomb and Carlson knows this.  Carlson is no more credible than Maddow or Lemon/ Cuomo.  All political theatrics, all the time. 

 

Nobody quoted Maddow or CNN etc. I don't watch any of them. I get that it is a sick out. Neither side can admit it. Southwest blames the weather, the pilot's union is blaming IT. 

Let the anti-vaxers pay their own way. Put your money where your mouth is. Agree to weekly testing and 100% of medical costs if you get covid. 

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2 minutes ago, denniS said:

Agree to weekly testing and 100% of medical costs if you get covid. 

Maybe they already had covid and are immune for a while yet.

Hmm... so another mandate?

I don't like paying high insurance rates for obese people.   Maybe, the insurance rates should be based on BMI index, and/or how many steps you can climb before your HR is over 120.  How long before there are protests about that?

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5 minutes ago, Bikeguy said:

Maybe they already had covid and are immune for a while yet.

Hmm... so another mandate?

I don't like paying high insurance rates for obese people.   Maybe, the insurance rates should be based on BMI index, and/or how many steps you can climb before your HR is over 120.  How long before there are protests about that?

They are.  At least for life insurance where you have to get a physical.

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Flu shots were mandatory for womaxx before she was allowed into an infusion center for chemo treatment.  They were for me too if I wanted to go in with her.

Yes, we had the right not to get the shot.

Of course that meant no entry to the chemo infusion center as the other patients had rights too.

I still don't understand this situation at all.

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6 minutes ago, maddmaxx said:

Flu shots were mandatory for womaxx before she was allowed into an infusion center for chemo treatment.  They were for me too if I wanted to go in with her.

Yes, we had the right not to get the shot.

Of course that meant no entry to the chemo infusion center as the other patients had rights too.

I still don't understand this situation at all.

I think it isn't one really about the "right" thing to do (that's to be vaxxed if possible), but more along the perceived my "rights" argument. It becomes political fast as that's a path to power for some (and a path to ruin for many).

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12 hours ago, denniS said:

Nobody quoted Maddow or CNN etc. I don't watch any of them. I get that it is a sick out. Neither side can admit it. Southwest blames the weather, the pilot's union is blaming IT. 

Let the anti-vaxers pay their own way. Put your money where your mouth is. Agree to weekly testing and 100% of medical costs if you get covid. 

I agree. I am quad vaxed. I believe in pharma.  Not so much the government. 

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16 hours ago, Philander Seabury said:

And I don’t understand why people can’t accept that we do this for polio and mmr so it is nothing new. 

I think what may be different is the lack of controversy associated with the polio and MMR vaccines.  The process for bringing those vaccines to the public was more traditional, and - regrettably - the medical and science communities were held in higher regard.  The information shared with the public about those vaccines was consistent, and so the public found the vaccines and the process trustworthy.

The rollout with the covid vaccines has been charged politically from the first.  Health officials espoused a view one day, then later reversed themselves without substantive justification.  For nearly every study there's a counter study.  People perceive the information is not consistent and reliable because the science and medical communities are divided and vacillating.  The end result is portions of the public don't trust what they're told.  Add mandates to a situation where trust is already tenuous and the reluctant only entrench because the mandates do not reassure them or alleviate any of their concerns.

 

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30 minutes ago, Thaddeus Kosciuszko said:

I think what may be different is the lack of controversy associated with the polio and MMR vaccines.  The process for bringing those vaccines to the public was more traditional, and - regrettably - the medical and science communities were held in higher regard.  The information shared with the public about those vaccines was consistent, and so the public found the vaccines and the process trustworthy.

The rollout with the covid vaccines has been charged politically from the first.  Health officials espoused a view one day, then later reversed themselves without substantive justification.  For nearly every study there's a counter study.  People perceive the information is not consistent and reliable because the science and medical communities are divided and vacillating.  The end result is portions of the public don't trust what they're told.  Add mandates to a situation where trust is already tenuous and the reluctant only entrench because the mandates do not reassure them or alleviate any of their concerns.

Let's be honest about this. The majority of unvaccinated people are not following science, the CDC, or the advice of their own family doctor. The majority of the unvaccinated are getting their information from BS on social media, the tinfoil hat brigade, and other idiots on TV. I do believe there is a small percentage of unvaccinated who are like you described, but it's less than 1%. If anyone has a question about whether they should get the vaccine, they should talk to their own doctor who understands their medical history. 

 

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5 hours ago, Thaddeus Kosciuszko said:

I think what may be different is the lack of controversy associated with the polio and MMR vaccines.  The process for bringing those vaccines to the public was more traditional, and - regrettably - the medical and science communities were held in higher regard.  The information shared with the public about those vaccines was consistent, and so the public found the vaccines and the process trustworthy.

The rollout with the covid vaccines has been charged politically from the first.  Health officials espoused a view one day, then later reversed themselves without substantive justification.  For nearly every study there's a counter study.  People perceive the information is not consistent and reliable because the science and medical communities are divided and vacillating.  The end result is portions of the public don't trust what they're told.  Add mandates to a situation where trust is already tenuous and the reluctant only entrench because the mandates do not reassure them or alleviate any of their concerns.

 

Is it possible that this situation has a great deal to do with the internet and it's ability to convey real time decisions (and the changes that take place in the understanding of complicated events by researchers) rather than the slower methods and access to news of days gone by.  

In other words are people having difficult separating reality from crap?

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41 minutes ago, maddmaxx said:

In other words are people having difficult separating reality from crap?

It’s worse than just information overload, it’s that certain media platforms reaffirm people’s already held opinions and flood them with similar information and connections with like-minded people. Yes, Web-MD made everyone an instant-fucking-expert, but put those people in an echo chamber and you end up with demands for malaria and parasite treatments for a viral infection. Or, in other countries, drinking camel urine. 
 

Johnson & Johnson vaccines should be hugely in demand for people who claim they don’t trust the technology of the mRNA vaccines. Especially now that with a booster the protection matches that of the 2-dose mRNA forms. But it won’t be, at least in this country.

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7 hours ago, Thaddeus Kosciuszko said:

I think what may be different is the lack of controversy associated with the polio and MMR vaccines.  The process for bringing those vaccines to the public was more traditional, and - regrettably - the medical and science communities were held in higher regard.  The information shared with the public about those vaccines was consistent, and so the public found the vaccines and the process trustworthy.

 

I suspect it was the lack of internet in the instant "information" age as limited to the local newspaper and 3 TV networks. One of my earliest memories when I was 4, vaguely the train trip and being on stage with the large TV cameras and some crazy man (Jerry Lewis) hyper jumping around then patting my younger sister and myself on the head while stating "These poor children lost their dad to polio, give money to fight this terrible disease." What I do remember after returning home, the entire city of Jacksonville was apparently in a panic and the Health Department (needlessly) quarantined us. Being restricted to home when doing nothing wrong is really my earliest memory.

The vaccine was discover 6 months later and I was considered high risk. Also, it is my mom that relayed that was Jerry Lewis, but nothing supports that has he began the MD telethons that he is known for a few years earlier. Polio was the original cause for the March of Dimes, so if he was their guest host on a televised fundraiser, I have no idea.

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