First departure in the morning moving up to 530am
Feb 12, 2015, 2:26 pm
#16
Join Date: Feb 2013
Location: CMH, West Coast
Programs: AA Executive Platinum, oneworld emerald
Posts: 2,741
Brutal. I've done a bunch of those 6:xx flights on WN, and they never get any better. I'm totally drained by the time I get to my destination. I've since started flying (especially to the west coast) on Friday nights instead of first thing Saturday morning.
No way will I fly at any time beginning with a 5. WN, you crazy!
No way will I fly at any time beginning with a 5. WN, you crazy!
Feb 12, 2015, 3:40 pm
#17
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Jul 2001
Location: Phoenix, AZ
Programs: HH Gold, AA Gold
Posts: 10,458
BINGO! ^
Plus, with the new AA re-banking their ORD and DFW hubs, the earliest flights from the west coast will move into the 5am hour. The first SEA flights will leave before 5:15am. PHX already has a flight at that time. I will be interesting to see if passengers are willing to rise earlier and, importantly, if the TSA will figure out how to staff correctly at SEA in the early am hours (I'm not holding my breath; the TSA staffing at SEA is abysmal and the agents are generally rude).
Plus, with the new AA re-banking their ORD and DFW hubs, the earliest flights from the west coast will move into the 5am hour. The first SEA flights will leave before 5:15am. PHX already has a flight at that time. I will be interesting to see if passengers are willing to rise earlier and, importantly, if the TSA will figure out how to staff correctly at SEA in the early am hours (I'm not holding my breath; the TSA staffing at SEA is abysmal and the agents are generally rude).
Feb 12, 2015, 5:25 pm
#18
Join Date: Jan 2010
Location: Houston (HOU/IAH)
Programs: WN, UA, DL, AA, Chase UR, Amex MR
Posts: 2,267
My work schedule requires me to be on duty at 5:00am so getting up super early isn't really a big deal for me. That said, the curbside drop off, luggage check, and TSA lines are brutal at that time of day since all those flights are going out 100% with local passengers. A-list helps a ton but the terminal at HOU tends to still be a mess either way at that time and it's all made even worse with the international terminal construction contributing a bit to the misery.
Last edited by alggag; Feb 12, 2015 at 7:23 pm
Feb 12, 2015, 7:08 pm
#19
Join Date: Aug 2012
Location: LAS
Posts: 1,525
Brutal. I've done a bunch of those 6:xx flights on WN, and they never get any better. I'm totally drained by the time I get to my destination. I've since started flying (especially to the west coast) on Friday nights instead of first thing Saturday morning.
No way will I fly at any time beginning with a 5. WN, you crazy!
No way will I fly at any time beginning with a 5. WN, you crazy!
Out of my home airport, the first flights of the day are often the busiest and have the least delays!
Feb 12, 2015, 9:58 pm
#20
Join Date: May 2006
Location: TUS/PDX
Programs: WN CP/A-List, AS MVPG75K
Posts: 5,798
By the way, that 5a PHX flight has been going on for years out of PDX and SEA. I have coworkers who are regulars on that.
Feb 13, 2015, 7:43 am
#21
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Sep 2002
Location: Chicagoland, IL, USA
Programs: WN CP, Hilton Diamond
Posts: 14,189
Man, some of you guys must be a lot younger than I.
Even though I need a lot less sleep than I used to, trying to get up at 3:30 to get to a 5:30 flight is just a killer. My A is dragging for two days.
For the cost of a cheapie hotel room, booked with points derived from MS, I'll just go the night before.
Even though I need a lot less sleep than I used to, trying to get up at 3:30 to get to a 5:30 flight is just a killer. My A is dragging for two days.
For the cost of a cheapie hotel room, booked with points derived from MS, I'll just go the night before.
Feb 13, 2015, 11:28 am
#22
Join Date: Oct 2004
Posts: 2,653
Looking the other direction, I've run across my first sighting of a scheduled WN arrival after 1:00am. In the summer schedule flight 3299 leaves Midway at ten pm and is scheduled into Boston at 1:10am.
I've seen plenty of arrivals after midnight in the last several schedule releases here and there, but this is the first time I've seen an arrival scheduled that late. I wouldn't care to be on the flight when that aircraft suffered from T-storm delays earlier in the day.
I've seen plenty of arrivals after midnight in the last several schedule releases here and there, but this is the first time I've seen an arrival scheduled that late. I wouldn't care to be on the flight when that aircraft suffered from T-storm delays earlier in the day.
Feb 13, 2015, 11:46 am
#23
Join Date: Sep 2011
Location: ORD/MDW
Programs: AA EXP, DL-Plat, WN-CP | Hotels: Choice-Gld, IHG-Plt, Rad-Gld, HH-Dia, Hyatt-Glob, Marriott-LtPlt
Posts: 2,889
Looking the other direction, I've run across my first sighting of a scheduled WN arrival after 1:00am. In the summer schedule flight 3299 leaves Midway at ten pm and is scheduled into Boston at 1:10am.
I've seen plenty of arrivals after midnight in the last several schedule releases here and there, but this is the first time I've seen an arrival scheduled that late. I wouldn't care to be on the flight when that aircraft suffered from T-storm delays earlier in the day.
I've seen plenty of arrivals after midnight in the last several schedule releases here and there, but this is the first time I've seen an arrival scheduled that late. I wouldn't care to be on the flight when that aircraft suffered from T-storm delays earlier in the day.
Any 2:00am or later arrivals?
Mar 12, 2015, 12:02 pm
#24
Join Date: Apr 2008
Location: HOU
Programs: WN CP, A+, UA Sil, MR Amb LTP, Hyatt Plat, HH Dia, National EE
Posts: 466
Anything earlier than 515am?
I show AUS-BWI and AUS-BNA at 515am.
edit: Looks like 515am is the earliest, with these being the current offerings...
AUS-BWI
AUS-BNA
LAS-HOU
LAS-STL
MCI-MCO
MKE-RSW
I show AUS-BWI and AUS-BNA at 515am.
edit: Looks like 515am is the earliest, with these being the current offerings...
AUS-BWI
AUS-BNA
LAS-HOU
LAS-STL
MCI-MCO
MKE-RSW
Last edited by bon95; Mar 12, 2015 at 1:10 pm
Mar 12, 2015, 7:26 pm
#25
Join Date: Jan 2004
Location: MSP
Programs: AA Plat Pto, IHG Plat, HH Gold, Hyatt Globalist
Posts: 2,536
It is how you add capacity without capital costs. ex-MSP SWA only infringes on the 6AM barrier with 5:55A on select days. The other big three have 5:08 (IAH), 5:10 (CLT), and 5:20 (ATL). I flew on the US CLT flight a few months ago and it was a later schedule as I recall it being fitting the first daily flight out be Delta.
6AM is about my limit. I am too close to the airport to justify a hotel and usually too cheap to get a taxi so allow my flight window to be dictated by the transit schedule. I am a three block walk and a 20 minute ride to the airport, doing anything else seems wasteful.
6AM is about my limit. I am too close to the airport to justify a hotel and usually too cheap to get a taxi so allow my flight window to be dictated by the transit schedule. I am a three block walk and a 20 minute ride to the airport, doing anything else seems wasteful.
Mar 12, 2015, 8:07 pm
#26
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Jan 2005
Location: home = LAX
Posts: 25,933
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red-eye_flight
Southwest doesn't fly red eyes, which would be a flight that leaves someplace west late in the evening and arrives someplace east in the morning (largely due to crossing multiple time zones).
Red eyes doesn't mean simply an early morning flight.
Mar 12, 2015, 10:33 pm
#28
Suspended
Join Date: Oct 2010
Posts: 3,790
This might have been a one-off flight for Thanksgiving, but I was on a 5:00 AM flight down to MCO that was completely full of college students (funnily enough all of them I knew and lived on my floor) and basically everyone else was a family with 2-5 year olds travelling to Disney. So maybe these flights won't work everyday, but they do work depending on the O&D and time of year.
Mar 13, 2015, 8:41 am
#29
Join Date: Mar 2011
Location: BDL, JFK
Posts: 658
Wife and I refuse to do these early flights at the start of vacation. Who wants to get up at 4 in the morning to start a vacation? So when our vacation starts on a Saturday we do a positioning flight Friday night. For example for BDL-CUN we did BDL-BWI Friday evening then took the morning flight to CUN the next day. BWI airport hotels have very cheap point requirements.
Mar 13, 2015, 2:14 pm
#30
Join Date: Mar 2010
Posts: 616
I try to shy away from morning flights altogether. I'd rather leave work early and take the last flight of the night then leave in the early am.
Now when I used to work overnight I would go to work for a few hours and then leave about 5am to catch a 7am flight. At the time I was flying fll-Tpa and the flights were essentially me and pilots who had flown the red eye. We were a very peppy bunch!
Now when I used to work overnight I would go to work for a few hours and then leave about 5am to catch a 7am flight. At the time I was flying fll-Tpa and the flights were essentially me and pilots who had flown the red eye. We were a very peppy bunch!