Originally Posted by
readywhenyouare
I think UA, AS, ans WN have the right idea. They're not doing any mass fleet retirements. It's better to keep airplanes and layoff pilots temporarily. It's far easier to bring those two things back quickly when the recovery hits. DL will be out of luck. DL will have no planes and their pilots will be furloughed far longer because of that decision to permanently remove fleets. UA, AS, and WN can just pull aircraft from storage. DL won't have that option.
Aren't you that guy who thinks MCO should replace ATL as DL's main hub?
Anyway, the industry line is a bit of doublespeak as they say recovery will take two years while also maintaining that business travel may never reach 2019 levels again with the shift to WFH/WFA. Street analysts are saying traffic level recovery is more like three to five years.
Much of the fleet DL is retiring now are pull-forwards of planned retirements in the next few years. Their order book is (more than) healthy enough to rebuild traffic levels as demand rises. They're working with Airbus to delay some deliveries.
DL's better balance sheet than UA and AA is allowing them to be far more tactical with their fleet today and setting the table to be a much stronger airline with a more efficient cost structure than the other two for the long term once a vaccine arrives.