Lots of good points from my HAL brothers.
After a couple nights of sleeping on this, I’m still convinced at least for the first couple of years the pilots that need to be worried have an Eskimo on their tail. I wouldn’t be surprised to see Alaska backing out some, and doing a couple more flights to Guadalajara every day like they used to before they found HI.
SWA guys still plenty welcome on the jumpseat. Lord knows I’ve Jumped on you guys many times in the past. Let’s keep this civil and let our managements figure it out.
Kingairfun really brings up some great points. Other airlines can bring all the planes out here they want to, but if they don’t have any place to park them it’s not going to help. Gate space at the Hawaii airports ALREADY looks like the parking lot of an outlet mall on Black Friday. That’s on a normal day.
Inter island will be more competitive, but from the mainland southwest passengers and Hawaiian passengers are two different types of people. NOTE: This is not a slam of anyone’s passengers. It’s a simple statement of fact. The target off of the mainland is Alaska, not Hawaiian. Like Kingair says, Most passengers that fly Hawaiian fly because they like Hawaiian not because they are chasing low fares. They are after a specific product.
With that said. No one does what Southwest does better than Southwest. At the same time, no one does what Hawaiian does better than Hawaiian. There’s room for both of us. It’s the others that should be worried.
Let’s give this a year or two and see where it shakes out. Until then, you guys might want to take this to the Alaska sub forum. [emoji481]