Originally Posted by
ty97
Is this for very early January (e.g. the few days at the end of New Year's holiday?). AA has done flights like this at Thanksgiving/Christmas/New Years peak time before, but I've never seen them outside of that (though I could have missed them). It would be very interesting if these become regularly schedule flights.
Originally Posted by
Exiled in Express
I was looking at first week of January yes. I didn't think New Years was such a significant travel generator. Midnight flights to LAX, PHX, DFW, and SAT came up on my searches. I am a regular on the 10:30PM to MSP which is usually the last scheduled departure for mainline and within 15 minutes of the last ORD departure so it threw me off.
It appears to just be a bank 11PM Jan 4 to 1AM Jan 5, i.e., the night before the first weekday after the EOY holidays.
There was a late night Sunday after Thanksgiving bank a few years back, but that seems to have largely stopped. I think these were pre-COVID. Could be that with more flexible work arrangements, people were more able to travel outside of the classic "peak" holiday times, so no one really wanted the midnight flights from ORD/DFW, or westbound redeyes, anymore. I guess AA is trying it this year post-New Years, perhaps because most people will likely be traveling over the weekend based on where holidays fell this year.