eponymous_coward

No.

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/ameri...ts-please.html

SoCal

Thanks for the link. I notice "The merger must be approved by the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the southern District of New York, and is subject to regulatory approvals, customary closing conditions and approval by US Airways shareholders. We expect the transaction to be completed in the third quarter of 2013." I'm guessing US will still be in the Star Alliance by our travel dates, though not for sure.

LA_FadeAway

I think as long as you book before the switch over you'll be okay, even if your travel dates are after the switch.

FWAAA

When US and AA announce such vital news, there will be numerous threads and sticky threads, probably with some bold print.

dtremit

In recent days, execs have tentatively stated that they hope to announce that timeframe at the time the merger closes, which is currently expected in late August or early September:

(From http://www.businesstravelnews.com/Mo...irlines&a=proc which is one of the most substantive merger articles I've seen recently.)

In other words: nothing is likely to happen fast enough to help the OP.

eponymous_coward

Thanks for the link- starts giving us a vague timeline on how things might work out. ^

jsieds

This is the most informative article I have seen about the merger.

SoCal

That is an informative article. "Isom said he expected US Airways during those first six months to transition to Oneworld from the Star Alliance. " That would not be bad for us, especially if my wife wants to earn TAM miles by flying US, as they'd both likely still be in Star at that point (both will move to Oneworld, US as a result of its merger with AA, and TAM as a result of its merger with LAN, moving to Oneworld sometime earlyin 2014). We could still opt for AA on that trip, but will know our options of miles.

Hope the merger is easier than that of UA and Continental, which led to many problems on computer systems and elsewhere, especially on the actual day of the final merger, and days (weeks?) afterwards. At CLT, we saw UA agents working mightily to deal with angry passengers in the midst of computer system problems.

AZ Travels the World

I agree! I'd never even heard of BusinessTravelNews -- thanks for the link dtremit! ^

Fanjet

Why on earth would CLT-Brazil survive post merger? The O&D numbers don't support it. And MIA serves plenty of destinations in the SE for whatever connecting traffic there is aside from MCO. Which probably isn't that much. This is a waste of a few 332s. Which could generate more revenue by flying to LHR or TLV. AA already flies to Brazil from MIA, JFK, and DFW, with a pending approval from LAX. What gap in the new network does CLT fill regarding Brazil?

phlwookie

Even ignoring how the US-Brazil traffic flows, MIA is pretty clearly the best geographic gateway to Brazil from the US mainland except for points well west of the Mississippi that are service by routes like DFW-GRU.

Are the slots that US has recently begun to acquire limited by the USA-Brazil air agreements tied to CLT though? Can they move them to MIA or are they for CLT and no where else? That might be a deciding factor as to whether CLT loses GIG/GRU and that moves to MIA.

abeflyer

I'd like to see a chart similar to the one recently on Cranky Flyer http://crankyflier.com/, but instead of showing the connections east and west, show the two airlines north and south.

While eveyone beats up CLT, frankly from Middle America, connections for South America do not go through Miami. I just don't see the new AA/US making new thin domestic flights to Miami, when there are existing flights that can connect to South America through CLT along with the rest of the south more efficiently.

Miami may be a great hub for South America, but as Wal-Mart originally discovered, there are a lot of money to be made in Middle America. It may not be sexy and have as much prestige as Miami, but it's profitable. Any of us that have flown on US for years know that this managment keeps their eye on the bottom line.

fieldeng

Me too. I have a better upgrade percentage on AA than I did as a Plat on UA with UDU.

Not to mention, the new airline would be giving up incremental revenue gained from people buying those e500's. One would think in this economic climate, they wouldn't walk away from that kind of dough.

Fanjet

Someone may have the correct answer, but I thought that an open-skies agreement between the U.S. and Brazil was coming before the end of next year. However, GRU IIRC does, and will still have, slot controls. If the CLT flight can be shifted to another U.S. airport, it would make more sense to switch it over to ORD, or add a second JFK flight. I seriously doubt that there is any significant traffic connecting though CLT onto Brazil that can't be routed via MIA, DFW, or JFK. Just because ROA or ILM is only connected to CLT out of those 4 hubs, that doesn't mean that there is enough traffic going between such cities and Brazil each day that a CLT flight is still needed.

joejones

CLT has lower operating costs than MIA and has much more domestic feed, both in terms of number of destinations as well as frequency to major destinations. And I'm not just talking about commuter airline backwaters. Many large cities in the east and midwest -- DTW, CVG, CLE, PIT, PHL, etc. -- only have a couple of AA flights a day to/from MIA but have several US flights to/from CLT, and if you look farther west there are a number of major business cities like SAN, AUS, etc. that have CLT service but no MIA service whatsoever.