Originally Posted by
mile ho
I'm going to make a prediction. It won't be 10% in May. Their projections are wrong. It will be much higher. I'm flying three r/t in May for pleasure myself with my wife.
There are others who are going to start traveling, too.
Things are changing even as we speak.
I hope the places that you are planning to go will not be having "stay at home" orders for May.
Here in Nevada, our state's current "stay at home order" ends Friday but the governor said today he will be extending it. He did not say what the extension will be yet so speculation runs like wildfire (mid May, end of May, etc.). Also here in Nevada implemented by the governor we have a 14 day self quarantine at home policy for anyone returning from out of state. I am on the NV/CA border so if I drive 30 minutes into CA for an hour to visit a grocery store then return to NV technically I am subject to a 14 day self quarantine.
I think 10% load factor will be about right for May. A few more people will travel, but not that many. I mean that would be almost double the April levels so that is quite an increase from April...
The problem here is when you travel you are going from Point A to Point B. If Point A is "open" but then Point B has a stay at home order, or a 14 day self quarantine rule for anyone entering from outside, it discourages load factor and it confuses people exactly what the rules are.
Up in Lake Tahoe, California side specifically they are threatening "non-residents" who come in with $1,000 fines because they do not want tourists going there. Real tough to enforce since Lake Tahoe is part NV and part CA and Tahoe residents live on both sides and go across the state lines to shop or do other business routinely. I think it is more of a scare tactic than anything else to keep tourists away. But it sure impacts load factor as typically Tahoe attracts tens of thousands of tourists, many via air travel, from all over the world every month.
People who would travel hear all these things then become scared to travel. And that impacts load factor significantly on the airlines.
The other issue is in many cases people need some sort of mutual agreement to travel. In my opinion it is very safe to travel on an airplane right now. There is hardly anyone flying. What is going to go wrong? Unfortunately my employer thinks otherwise and has canceled all travel. My family thinks otherwise and thinks I would be absolutely crazy to risk going on an airplane right now (...risk what the planes are empty...). So I cave in to pressure and do not pursue any airplane travel right now. Again this sort of thing impacts load factor. There is a ton of social pressure to not travel right now.
Oh yeah and all those risks about the COVID virus too. I almost forgot those. Hopefully you won't get unlucky and end up in an airport or hotel where an outbreak takes place like all those nursing homes, meat packing plants, churches, etc. where many have an outbreak. Local hospital laying people off due to lack of activity after spending who knows what to convert a floor in its parking garage into hospital beds. Ventilators never had more than 50% use the past month. Yeah, that thing. Tough to know what to believe at this point.