In 4Q 1998, with cheap fuel, it cost AA $1,929 per hour to operate a fleet of 75 F100's. The ran them over an asl of 604 miles and the actual aircraft cost per asm was 6.25 cents.

US Airways ran their fleet of 40 F100's over a 366 mile asl, with casm of 7.7 and hourly cost of $2,074. Both used 'em with 97 seats. When US Airways tried MetroJet, they left the F100's parked and used 30 year old 737-200's. That says enough about the F100.

Those costs are straight aircraft costs. No overhead, marketing, CRS, advertising, salary etc etc.

In the same year, SWA ran a fleet of 207 737-300's with 137 seats at $1,352 an hour, with an asl of 466 and an operating cost of 2.92 cents.

America West ran their fleet of 46 -300's at $1,900 an hour with an asl of 727 miles and a casm of 4.12 seats.

UAL ran their fleet of 101 -300's at $2,339, with an asl of 650 miles, 128 seats and a casm of 5.27 cents.

Southwest's 24 -500's cost $1,246 an hour, with 122 seats, an asl of 414 miles and a casm of 3.16 cents.

Northwest had 116 DC-9-30's that cost $1,900 per hour, with an asl of 520 and a casm of 6.20 cents.

You can see why they were parked. It's pretty fruitless trying to operate an aircraft that costs that much to operate, and try to compete at todays price points.

The F100 has only gotten worse since 1998 because Fokker is bankrupt and parts are expensive, and the new generation of aircraft are just that much more efficient than the 737 classics.

It stuns me that Harmony would head off down this road. Someone has a huge ego and too much access to Daddy's bank account. ;)

Perhaps they are looking to inflict maximum damage on the carrier that entered their Hawaii turf, with more frequency to YYC? Appears Clive didn't appreciate the subtleties of a foreign business culture. Pity in this case, for WS. HMY certainly managed to keep this on the QT.

And after all, you did advise them here that 757's were too large an aircraft to use YVR-YYC :) There must be ex-Jetsgo F100 pilots out there ready to go. And they also seem to be taking your advice to get more flying time out of the Boeings, if they're do a red-eye to YYZ.

Funny. I thought they were looking for an exit strategy? :o

Simon

HMY has made commitments to certain Asian people to carry their traffic beyond YVR and now must do this as cheaply as possible. The F100 will still be cheaper to operate to YYC than the B757.

This also release the B757 for other more suitable flying.

Sure they got themselves into a box, but this is a short term solution. I would wonder if HMY are owning the F100's or wet leasing them from a turn key provider.

HMY seems to be doing a lot of things "right" so maybe they know what they are doing???

They'll lose buckets flying domestic sched. They are already losing buckets, so nothing really changes.

I can assure you that ACE is very concerned about Harmony. ACE needs all the premium traffic in Canada. The last thing they want to see is a competing J class anywhere domestically, with same day return frequency. They won't give them any traction at all.

Remember how hard AC came down on Roots, the Wunder airline that lasted 34 days?

If Harmony gets an airplane that'll fly reach Asia, they'll have 3 different fleet types, likely with fewer than a dozen aircraft in the fleet. Now that's smarts..... :D

Anybody in the business would take $250K a month NG's or Airbus narrow bodies over $25K a month F100's. That's how bad they are. My stomach heaves at the operating economics of those slugs.

I guess somebody is spending daddy's money.

;)

And yet they don't have a China route - I've heard AC has sewn up the Guangzhou route for 2007 with its aircraft order. And good used 767-300s are extraordinarily hard to find. There isn't even a lot of crap on the market. They could face a three year backlog getting 787s, or a five year wait for an early delivery slot for an A350. Could lose a lot of money by then, maybe more than even Ho Ho Ho can stand.

Yes, and no doubt WS isn't worried at all, what with restive employees dependent on share price to make a living wage. And Calgary, their only base getting more expensive to live in by the day and tighter in labour every day. No, it never rains in Westjet land, unless it rains Kool-Aid and lollipops :rolleyes:

Every time you speculate on Dr. Ho's motives you only reveal you know nothing of them, so why bother? Coming from a "keep the growth up to keep the share price up" background obviously hasn't given WS any insight into the Asian way of doing business (note to CX, maybe think twice before getting hooked up with WS somehow).

There is no question that Ho does not want to lose face as he squanders Daddy's money.

Perhaps he thinks WJA will pull an ATA on him, and use Harmony to explore new directions, just as Southwest is using ATA to do the same. I wouldn't count on it, especially if he's locked himself into a fleet of Cavebusting F100's.

Dagger.....oops.....Sebring is correct in that ther is not a lot of good iron out there....but Ho's already been convinced that F100's is good iron, so who knows, someone might be able to convince him to get some 747-200's while he's at it.

As for WJ, keep plugging your voo doo dolls with pins. When you produce industry leading profit margins with $60 oil, margins that are not far off the record years, investors pay attention. Especially when your competition is losing money trying to stay competitive, and it's "profits" are driven by one time asset sales.

Oh, and for the record, the new pilot contract makes WJ drivers the highest paid narrow body pilots in Canada.

;)

Investors have sure been paying "attention" to WS in recent months. How's that stock price doing?

How about AC that was $40 in Jan and is now hovering around $30. Jazz is trading well below it's issue price too.

As explained to you, yet again, in another thread, stock prices require good earnings. WJ has made all the right moves in the past 24 months to position itself strongly going forward. Next weeks numbers will be proof positive of that.

Meanwhile, ACE continues to think short term and sells assets to keep it's stock price up. The 1.39% operating margin it earne last year doesn't even come close to covering it's cost of capital, and interest rates are moving north.

Forest, not trees, Simon.

;)

Takes more than pilots to run an airline :) So pilots are getting paid more, and WS isn't adding fuel surcharges - sounds like a recipe for a low stock price to me. Comments to Simon about trees are ironic. You seem blinded to any threats to WS, perhaps they operate in an enchanted forest? Nobody disputes WS lower cost structure, but your unbalanced, unending cheerleading is tiresome and unedifying. If this kind of hubris is typical of WS management, I'd be very nervous if I owned shares. If you want to say something meaningful, why not actually "analyze"?

I have no idea of the size of the Ho fortune, though I hear it's large. If he's willing to stick it out for the long haul and wait for the Chinese market, I'm sure he's can sustain losses or breakeven for a long time. Your correct the F100 is an odd choice, but it must be a combination of a/c availability, pilot avalability, lease cost etc.

It's not cheerleading.

Analyze the metrics.

Draw your own conclusions.

They are pretty obvious.

If I thought I could make money on ACE stock, I'd buy it. I don't invest in companies that have cleared off their balance sheet, yet still operate with 1.39% operating margins.

It's like Safeway selling off real estate to make the profits look strong. I want Safeway making money from their core business, selling what's inside the store, not monetizing assets.

;)



;)

They are pretty obvious = nothing will ever change, WS will always be gangbusters, forever and ever.

Interesting, perhaps not as far-fetched as it seems...