Originally Posted by
mduell
1) You're the first person to mention rate; the article never says rate. The "amount of fuel burned" (their actual words) is a quantity, not a rate. Fuel burn rate would be a rate.
I actually wasn't the first, and I didn't even say whether or not I agreed with that interpretation (I don't, because as a pilot I understand the concept of headwinds). Just the way that sentence was worded and the lack of any context about winds reducing ground speed could lead one to imply burn rate based on that article.
Originally Posted by
mduell
2) Increasing fuel burn rate (and airspeed) isn't uncommon when flying into a headwind to minimize the impact. 100kts on the nose is less impactful in terms of time if you're making 550 through the air instead of 450. I don't know if United is doing this.
I don't know what they're doing with cost indexing either. They very well could be bumping it up to try and make up as much time as possible, and thus burning more fuel. That sort of goes back to my point though about the lack of context with that sentence in the article.