[Report] Nearly 1 in 2 WN flights late in Dec. 2010

[skeds_r_us]

Guys,

In reference to the "why are other airlines not impacted by Flight Stats error?"...I'm not entirely sure they're not, although honestly I haven't checked. I know that some of the other large airlines have automated feeds for both schedule data and operating data available to 3rd party vendors. We don't. The time and cost associated with developing that capability is not an investment that we have chosen to make (and it is NOT a small one!). The same information is provided (as required by regulation!) to a legitimate government agency *or* is available for purchase from OAG (to whom we provide our schedule data as a feed to Apollo) and Innovata (the data supplier for Sabre). Plus, developing this kind of one-off, 3rd-party distribution capability isn't an expense that contributes in any way to safety, low fares or customer service, which are our #1 objectives.

Let me know if you have more questions. Stay warm!

Bill

[username]

Didn't read through all the posts but my thinking is that WN schedules its aircraft too aggressively. When the load is high and there are weatehr problems, the delays just compound.

It seems to me another issue could be the routes an aircraft flies. If a plane goes up and down CA and CA is impacted by weather, the delays just compound and there is no way to catch up. WN probably has more of these runs than traditional carriers' mainline aircraft.

[traveller001]

Originally Posted by skeds_r_us

Guys,

In reference to the "why are other airlines not impacted by Flight Stats error?"...I'm not entirely sure they're not, although honestly I haven't checked. I know that some of the other large airlines have automated feeds for both schedule data and operating data available to 3rd party vendors. We don't. The time and cost associated with developing that capability is not an investment that we have chosen to make (and it is NOT a small one!). The same information is provided (as required by regulation!) to a legitimate government agency *or* is available for purchase from OAG (to whom we provide our schedule data as a feed to Apollo) and Innovata (the data supplier for Sabre). Plus, developing this kind of one-off, 3rd-party distribution capability isn't an expense that contributes in any way to safety, low fares or customer service, which are our #1 objectives.

Let me know if you have more questions. Stay warm!

Bill

Plausible... but in looking at extended details from flightstats you see the data source most reliably FAA. If they don't know we have bigger worries.

But perhaps it's WNs use of a single flight number to many cities that is causing problems when data would seem to overlap and flightstats isn't processing it correctly?

Right now (0032PST 01-12) WN 787 01-11 MKE-LAS seems in limbo not arrived over LAS on flightstats but reported as arrived on Southwest.com.

Flight: (WN) Southwest Airlines 787
Departure Date: Tue Jan 11, 2011
Status: Flight is Currently En Route
On-time
Last change to status more than 3 hours ago
Arrival Estimate: Estimated Touch Down at 2:13 PM


http://www.flightstats.com/go/Flight...ightNumber=787

I'm guessing Flightstats will show it that way indefinately.

Yet on Flightaware it arrived although 25 minutes late.

http://flightaware.com/live/flight/S...825Z/KMKE/KLAS