At what point is Alaska willing to reaccommodate passengers onto another airline if there's a mechanical delay? I have someone flying AS19 MCO-SEA today with a 3 hour delayed departure. He asked to be reaccommodated on AA, but the Alaska (CO?) rep told him that they never reaccommodate for delays -- only for cancellations. It's not that bad of a delay, but it got me wondering what the threshold is. What about a 6 hour delay or a 12 hour delay?

That's my main concern when flying AS to outstations where there are only one or two flights a day. If there's a problem, you're going to be sitting there for a long time.