Demand is down so much that Delta had to cut their Q1 earnings forecast in half in Mid-March! American had to double their loss forecast!

Cutting your profit forecast in half is a big issue.

Cutting it in half in Mid-March means that the big drop in demand came midway through the quarter. Had this demand drop been the entire quarter, Delta would have a loss for Q1 and American’s loss would be even more.

This isn’t fear mongering. These are facts.

 

People have become far too comfortable in the post covid airline world. Profits, load factors, and hiring have redefined the “normal” so much that any shift from that is considered to be the sky falling.

Q1 had historically been a losing quarter for airlines during the post holiday travel surge. An unfortunate cost of doing business that would be absorbed by summer and holiday travel later in the year. The fact that airlines are even posting any profit right now is still impressive.

The economy, politics, air travel, etc. is in constant flux right now. Today’s news isn’t indicative of tomorrow’s. I’m not going to clutch my pearls yet.

 

Glory days are over. Its back to how the industry has always been, cyclical.

 

The issue with that is that most spring travel was booked months ago when things looked more promising. Bookings for fall travel have fallen of a cliff compared to the same period a year ago

Average fares are also down. There is definitely a slow down. Remains to be seen how slow it will get.

 

I’ve heard this before. Heard end of last summer that holiday bookings weren’t there. Holidays were same as ever.

 

The headlines don't always paint the whole picture......

"Virgin Atlantic flags slowdown in US to UK travel in recent weeks

REUTERS 4:49 AM ET 3/31/2025SymbolLastPrice 025*
Airline profitable for first time since pandemic

Signals of slowing demand on U.S. to UK routes

UK to U.S. travel 'pretty strong'


By Sarah Young

LONDON, March 31 (Reuters) - Virgin Atlantic, majority owned by Richard Branson, said demand for travel from the U.S. to Britain had slowed, echoing a warning from its part-owner Delta Air Lines(DAL) over the impact of U.S. economic uncertainty.

Delta slashed its first-quarter profit estimates on March 10, citing weakening lower U.S. consumer and business confidence as worries about tariffs and rising prices take hold.

Virgin Atlantic, which specialises in connections between Britain and the U.S. and the Caribbean, said it was seeing a lower level of demand coming out of the U.S. after a "very strong" start of the year.

"When we say signals of a slowdown in demand...we've had weeks where it's been flat, we've had a few weeks where it's been negative," chief financial officer Oli Byers told reporters on Monday.

"We think that's quite a natural reaction to the general consumer uncertainty there is in the U.S. at the minute."

Shares in British Airways-owner IAG traded down 6% in morning deals.

Overall Byers said he still expected revenues from travel from the U.S. to Britain to grow this year compared to last.

Travel from Britain to the U.S. was "pretty strong", he said.

"We're seeing corporate demand being very robust and still growing significantly," he added.

Virgin Atlantic returned to profitability for the first time since the pandemic in 2024, posting a pretax profit before exceptionals of 20 million pounds ($25.9 million) compared to a loss of 139 million pounds the previous year.

Virgin Atlantic was impacted by the almost day-long shutdown of Heathrow, its main UK hub, earlier this month. It cancelled 75 flights as a result and diverted six.

"The cost for the home-based carriers is going to run into the tens of millions," Byers said, declining to comment on the cost to Virgin Atlantic specifically. ($1 = 0.7712 pounds) (Reporting by Sarah Young, editing by Andy Bruce and Paul Sandle)

 

none of this is mutually exclusive. You can still have a higher average for this year than last year due to strong momentum from plans made for spring / summer of this year that were booked late last year / early this year. The trend of future bookings is raising questions. Maybe it’s a non-event and will be made up. But for now it’s a departure from the past. “Flight path” !!!!

 

who did you fly the F-27 for?
I have the same type but did the sim training in the FH-227 in MIA. Completely different fire protection and electrical but it counted. Did my type in the actual plane.

 

updates are member submitted.
go email them the updates.

 

Looks like an Airbus is ready to leave the fleet in DEN. Titles and logos are stripped off and it’s at the hangar looking sad and lonely.