Originally Posted by
steve64
I worked in AA Operations at DFW 20 years ago. I can't imagine it being much different at NW.
I find it funny when folks ask crew to "call and have them hold my flight".
As if a majot airline with a massive hub and spoke route system has never had late inbound flights before.
[...]
The general rule of thumb is "we will NOT hold". Hundreds of factors are considered which could raise the chance of a given flight being held for connections:
- how many passengers are making the connection
- how many bags do those passengers have checked
- how many of those pax are Elite/First Class/Full Fare Coach
- how many pax on the connecting flight are Elite/First/Full fare
[...]
What a great post! From an operations research/logistics point of view, this is really cool to read about.
Just curious, was the objective function, i.e. the "goodwill" costs and benefits, given in dollars, or just as a number? For example, did you see that leaving on time would cause someone $250 of inconvenience, or would it be a 1.1 on a scale of 5.0 of "goodwill-ness"?