A220 Schedules
 

Sorry if this has been discussed before. What are the A220 schedules like? Is it a mix of different layovers? How many legs a day? Things like that.

A typical 4 or 5 day is usually two legs a day with a mid trip 3 leg thrown in. There’s very few penalty laps in NYC. Go home day is usually one and done mid morning to early afternoon. I think NYC 220 has the best commutability among narrowbodies.

If you don’t like Texas layovers you’re gonna have a hard time. If you’re a Texas commuter it will be the closest you’ll get to living in base at Delta. There are a handful of trips that start/end in AUS/DFW/IAH if you’re senior enough to hold them. This does of course vary with network requirements.

There’s lots of opportunities in BOS as well although our overnights are generally short there.

Overall it has the best commutability in the narrowbody fleet. Anybody who says it’s like the 717 is probably junior to you.

I remember the 220 crews telling me how the 220 was going to be texas heavy. Most layovers on the 220 are in IAH, DFW, SAT and AUS.

If you are in the west coast bases you'll get a lot of LA area, and bay area layovers too. Salt Lake has some Montana stuff, but has a mix of TX, CA, and NE layovers. Seattle has red eyes daily from Fairbanks and to IAD. Seen some to BOS and JFK in the last few months, too. 4-5 day trips can see you essentially NE based running TX or ORD turns from BOS and LGA. May only be 2 legs but AUS-BOS turns are lengthy. Stays clear of ATL (for now) is the biggest bonus.

Best part of the 220 is the fact it doesn’t touch Atlanta. You’ll learn why later on.

i only got to fly it a few months. Bit repetitive but super easy schedules compared to stuff 717/320/73N/even domestic 7ER go through. Mostly 1 or 2 day legs. Long skinny routes. Big cities, easy work, nice plane.

I think west coast now though has more shorter leg lengths and therefore can get some 3 or 4 leg days.

Yes, 3 and 4 leg days are becoming more common. As well as long penalty laps on go home day.

Is the 220 out of SLC or SEA pretty junior? What are the typical schedules like out of those bases?

Both are technically more senior than NYC, but newhires have been getting both bases. If not, it may be only a few months before you could switch to either with the new monthly AE's.
1 and 2 day trips seem to go senior and locals. Reserve sees mostly 3-5 day rotations. 2-3 legs a day. If you get worked hard on the first day or so the last is typically a single shot. I wrote some other stuff a post or two above. If you anyone reading this is senior to me it is repetitive, lots of BOS/LGA/JFK turns and a small jet. Fairbanks in winter. Stay away!

agree with all of this!

Also, the penalty lap last day is real.

For 220 NYC is there an airport most of the flying occurs out of? JFK or LGA? Or is it all pretty spread out / random for the 3 airports to cover or where trips start and end

no way to predict future pairings, but here’s Sept:
LGA 329/429
JFK 78/429
EWR 22/429

thank you very much

Are Green Slip opportunities in NYC common for the 220? Any comparison to the 320/737

Depends…not too long ago the 220 was PHAT on FO…almost no greenies and senior RES FO were going months without flying.

I’ve seen the same on the NYC 737…6 months later guys were rolling thunder with 8-9GS’s in a month.

Only constant is change.

Dang, ok that’s good to know.. not relying on green slips but will sure is a nice benefit to have

I'm curious why?

Can you tell us?

1) It's the wrong sized airplane for ATL (the 220 is meant for 2-5 hour routes, not 1-2 hour routes like the 717)
2) The engines take so long to start and have so many wind limitations they don't want it clogging up the ramp

I think he was more expressing disdain for operating out of ATL in regards to reroutes, delays, etc.

But yes, I do agree with your points above and think that it will be a long time before we see the 220 doing any meaningful amount of flying out of ATL. Its bread and butter is the longer routes, and quite frankly any long route out of ATL where the 220 would be a good plane probably warrants the seating capacity of a 737-800/900 or 320/321.

Because it's a miserable place. It's where trips go to be delayed by late inbound aircraft, late inbound crews, airplane swaps from T to F with 55 minutes scheduled, rude unhelpful gate agents, poor food choices with long lines and terrible service. Not to mention one small afternoon thunderstorm (an almost daily occurrence in the summer) just blows any semblance of a plan to smithereens there.

I feel like there are more than a few 2-5 hour flights from ATL

As I said above, any flights of those length out of ATL probably warrant a plane with more than 110/130 seats.

*vaguely gestures toward the a319 doing 2-5 hour flights out of atl*

I've been told by people that are probably in the know, that it's because we essentially have a monopoly on Atlanta, so we don't need the 220's efficiency there since there's no competition.

That explanation makes more sense than any other I've heard. The 220's efficiency lends itself to competitive markets. Engine start time having any effect is silly.

I’ve been called for a GS every day this week and I have starts and ends with deadhead limitation.

I kind of get that reasoning, but I’m stuck on something. If a 220 is going to fly 5 hours and a 319 is going to fly 5 hours, does it really matter what location the fuel is saved at? I guess cost of fuel at an individual airport could play into that, but for this it would only matter if ATL was cheap vs all other destinations. Am I missing something?

I'm on different metal but this week I'm being deadheaded from the west coast to ATL just to fly 1 short turn, then deadheading back to the west coast.

What's going on over there?

You've deduced the answer. There are no state taxes on jet fuel in Georgia. Ignore the politics and just read the part about fuel tax.

https://airlineweekly.com/2021/04/de...w-retribution/

We’ll there’s also the staffing part of the equation. How many long/thing routes out of ATL does the 319 operate? If you did start running 220s on those few routes you’d open up a can of worms by needing to run NYC or other bases crews through there to cover the flying with no immediate reserves available. With the Airbus however you’ve got tons of pilots in base minutes from the airport ready to cover a broken rotation via WS or GS. On the 717 a lot of the cancellations occur on flights from MSP simply because it is difficult to DH in pilots with short notice. So it makes sense to not dilute ATL 319 flying with the 220.

Ahhhh.... the unique customer service that only Atlanna-tude can provide!

You mean hearing "nex' guessin' liiiiiion!" doesn't warm your heart?

Thanks

filler

I get that, I was just trying to wrap my mind around the fuel reasoning.

Any ideas why a 1.5 hour flight (Bos-Rdu) would be pay optimized, where the agents make a point of saying they can't check any bags as that would count as more weight, for an airplane that's touted for it's efficiency, and ability to do transcons?

I get that the flight is full, and might have an alternate, but still seems odd.

Probably MLW, especially if there’s an alternate.

Occasionally this will trigger a message on the WDR to the effect "TAXI BURN REQUIRED". In other words, ZFW +FOB - Burn = Max LDG WT. Pax carry-ons don't add to the ZFW, checked bags do.

It is odd and most of the times payload optimized flights are not even close numbers wise when we receive a WDR. Last one I had that was payload was on this exact route, and we landed 1900 below MLW.

No clue where we are at in the process, but the A220 is a Tesla. Delta is paying $$$ to unlock higher MLWs. I know they’re more aggressive on this on the -300 side than they are with the -100s, but it is happening.

Which is why I always check with local load control 15 minutes prior. Every single time I'm able to get more people on, and usually can go out full. I'm at the point where I just shake my head when they say we're PO to 109

Don't the 321 NEOs also have long engine start times?

yep. And our coming 737max orders will, too. Even longer without dual cooling. Better keep them out of ATL

Do you mean we didn’t get the dual cooling on the NEOs or the leap engines in the max don’t have it?

Enough time for another cup of coffee.
https://youtu.be/ekt6o97tlmQ