TProphet1/ A lot of people have been asking for an explainer on what is going on with Southwest Airlines and the massive meltdown that occurred. Hi, I'm TProphet. I write the Seat 31B travel blog (https://www.seat31b.com) and closely follow the airline industry. More importantly, I have a friend whom Southwest abandoned in Las Vegas until New Year's (along with his cat), and there was literally nothing I could do for him. Ready? Let's dive in.
2/ Southwest is the largest domestic carrier in the US. They fly to 23 of the top 25 airports. When it suits them they say "we're a small carrier serving small places, the rules shouldn't really apply to us" (whether it's safety or anything else) but the reality is that they're a major airline. They should be considered as such, and treated accordingly.
3/ Southwest is highly unusual. Their IT is almost entirely homegrown, with software they built themselves. It's creaky and antiquated - you'll observe this if you watch their schedules. They're irregularly and manually loaded into the system.
The majority of airlines use standardized reservations systems like Sabre, Amadeus, etc. which integrate well with other standardized tools. Not Southwest, who only supports limited integrations in specific circumstances.
4/ Other airlines (apart from Southwest, Spirit, Frontier and a couple others like Avelo and Breeze) have relationships with airport hotels so they can issue vouchers to stranded passengers and crew. They also work with each other in a system called "interlining" where they take each other's passengers to avoid total systemic meltdowns like these. For example, when Delta melted down in the past, American and United have bailed them out (and vice-versa).
5/ In this case, it's the week between Christmas and New Year, and there are no seats on other airlines to book their passengers into. Even if there were, there is no interline agreement. So Southwest basically says "see you next week" and dumps you wherever they left you.
6/ So, about aircraft positioning and crew scheduling - Southwest is essentially a short and medium haul airline. They mostly don't do long haul services except for Hawaii.
Southwest turns aircraft quickly, in less than 30 minutes. They have higher aircraft utilization than any other major US airline. They often run their crews on tight loops where they're out from home and back the same day so they can save money on accommodating crews who overnight away from their home base.
7/ Yeah, about that. So when Southwest melted down, they didn't have nearly the number of rooms reserved that they needed for their own crew, and it was Christmas so hotels were full. Crews often did not get rooms. They just got dumped like passengers at airports. At least there are crew break rooms at most airports, but it's not very comfortable.
Major airlines usually have enough hotel relationships to be able to work something out (American has had some issues too) but Southwest does not.
8/ Southwest now has a problem where they need to figure out where all their crews are, and their planes are, and basically redo their entire crew and aircraft scheduling plan for the whole airline. The only real way they have to do this, because of the way they operate, is to stop for an entire day and set to work inventorying their assets and crews and then build out entirely new trips for everyone.
9/ However, they were just really mean to everyone who works for them. They also effectively required employees to come to work sick, making others sick just before they're most needed to recover the operation. Ben Schlappig wrote an article that covers the details here, so check it out: https://onemileatatime.com/news/southwest-airlines-meltdown-denver/
10/ Anyway, how does Southwest fix this? Just like in #infosec, every time there is a high profile problem, there is a vendor promising to magically fix everything with AI. Unfortunately, just like in #infosec, the problem space is very complicated and AI is not good at solving most of these problems.
11/ One way they could handle it is already proven, it's just expensive: holding crews and aircraft in reserve to recover from irregular operations. Qantas successfully does this.
A week ago, Qantas had an A380 unexpectedly land in Azerbaijan.
They thought there might be a fire in the cargo bay so they landed in Baku. It turned out there was a real problem with the aircraft and it couldn't be promptly repaired in Azerbaijan, a country which doesn't frequently see A380s. https://www.theguardian.com/business/2022/dec/24/qantas-sends-rescue-flight-to-azerbaijan-after-stranded-passengers-left-in-the-dark
12/ Because Qantas plans ahead for emergencies, and they absorb the expense of doing so, they're able to recover their operation. And to be fair, it's not just Southwest who does their route planning this way. You see the same sort of problems with Flair Airlines in Canada. They're an extreme example but fairly representative. Flair serves 34 destinations with 24 aircraft. You can imagine the follow-on impact if any flight, on any leg, has a problem.
13/ This holiday season could have worked out really well for Southwest. They did their route planning the same way that American companies do supply chain planning: "just in time" with no slack or contingency planning. If it all melts down, they dump the problem on their customers. Southwest, after all, legally has no responsibility to anyone except for their shareholders. They are covered by their Contract of Carriage and US Department of Transportation rules (which are lasseiz-faire at best).
14/ You didn't get home for Christmas? You got stranded in Las Vegas for a week? Well, dear consumer, Southwest won't help you, the government won't help you, nobody will compensate you for the losses you suffer, and you also can't sue because the federal government has given airlines a liability shield along with endless taxpayer bailouts. If you don't like it, you're looking at one middle finger from the federal government, and another from Southwest.
15/ One last piece of airline trivia before I leave you all to digest this thread. American Airlines cancelled less than 1% of its schedule yesterday. Southwest cancelled over 70% of its schedule.
Southwest will likely (successfully) claim that under the Contract of Carriage, they do not have to pay for stranded passengers' hotels. Keep this in mind any time that politicians show up saying that every problem will be fixed with tort reform to keep evil class action lawyers from driving up costs.
Sparkle TeaYikes.
Interesting breakdown of the Southwest problem. Did not expect the expose about tort reform at the end.
Thanks!
Taco 🌮@tprophet Really informative and well written. I appreciate you taking the time to write this out.
Thanks!
Christopher Becke@tprophet Thank you for the explanation. I’ve been wondering what was going on.
mav 
@tprophet this is very informative thread, thank you for sharing all of this
Rose Hayden-Smith, PhD@tprophet thanks for this info.
That Anonymous Coward@tprophet
That face when RyanAir looks like a premium carrier next to Southwest.
That face when RyanAir looks like a premium carrier next to Southwest.
ask330 🪨🦣@tprophet dont give these subpar airlines your money! Also get a credit card with trip interruption reimbursement.
Kadugga@tprophet great recap, thanks.
Rufus T. Firefly@tprophet Thanks for the background. This is a reason to buy travel insurance, I guess. Also maybe not to fly Southwest if there are better alternatives out there.
kalany@tprophet It's having some really "fun" knock-on problems—like, ATC staff apparently get scheduled by how busy it's supposed to be. This whole holiday storm crisis led to a friend who works in ATC being scheduled for emergency shifts, but regulations about ATC overtime mean that he and a bunch of his coworkers have got a mandatory rest coming up … just as SW is trying to shuffle all their planes around. 🤦
davidnewman@tprophet @Jessicascott09 The sales pitch for US airline deregulation in 1978 was that it would make things wonderful for the consumer.
In some ways it has: A ticket is far less expensive today than it was when deregulation began.
But mostly the effect has been to reduce competition, starve out smaller markets, make a mockery of the terms “convenience” and “amenities,” and transfer wealth away from reinvestment and into executive compensation and stock buybacks.
https://airandspace.si.edu/stories/editorial/airline-deregulation-when-everything-changed
J.P. Stewart@tprophet This thread is great. Thank you. It’s a small solace that it wasn’t worse when our flight to see family was canceled on Friday (but only after we were at the gate & 3 delays, with a partial crew already onboard). We stayed in hotels Thurs/Fri (because no to Queen Anne on ice). But we at least we were home the next day. (No family though. The next flight on this route was going to be two days later.)
flyingdutchman@tprophet yes, they don’t use the hub model, so lots of tight connections to get from one place to the next. Too many potential “points of failures!” Brand reputation severely affected!
Kyle Rose@tprophet thank you!
lostdoco@tprophet thankyou for explaining this, very interesting
Voron@tprophet thank you
Manoj Kasichainula@tprophet Sec. Pete Buttigieg is claiming the government will hold Southwest to paying for hotels and other such things: https://youtu.be/rWP6KmTg9iQ?t=116 . I hope for the best.
Buttigieg calls for accountability as Southwest cancellation 'meltdown' worsens
@headmold Mayor Pete is very good at debating Fox News hosts but he seems like a very bad and ineffective Secretary of Transportation so far. He needs to decide whether he wants to do his job, or run for President.
yenWhat has he and the DOT done wrong? A few months ago, the DOT was creative and proactive in getting airlines to *voluntarily* up their commitments on compensation if flights were delayed or cancelled due to factors within their control (rather than just waiting around until new regulations are proposed and approved).
And, in this situation, he quickly stepped in and firmly said that, weather notwithstanding, this was clearly a case of Southwest royally messing up those factors that are under their control.
That judgment, together with DOT's earlier action to get those commitments from the airline, now forms the basis for claims, and for action by the DOT.
indriAlso important that SWA didn't object against that assessment and have at least promised to follow up with customer service. Whatever they get done in the end, it will be difficult for their lawyers to later try to weasel out of those commitments.
Does he have the authority to do that, though?That sounds like the job of Congress. (Also, seems to me China has a very different system of government, where power vests at the top, with basically one-party rule, and the same party in power for a long time -- the governance options, and strategies/tactics, are different in such an environment.)
@osyen @indri @headmold I'm well aware of the differences in governance structures between the US and China. I lived in Beijing for 3 years!
The Secretary of Transportation absolutely has the authority to define an agency strategy, and align efforts around that. It's an executive branch agency. Congress controls the budget, that's it. The budget is influenced by the strategy.
Leaders lead. There are no excuses for inaction here, apart from spending too much time on Fox News.
He can have his personal vision of a longterm strategy (and I'm quite sure he does), but Congress can and does set their own priorities both by laws defining what DOT can and can't do and by tying the budget to specific conditions.
And that's before state rights come into play. DOT couldn't even propose that state DOTs maybe think about prioritizing repairing existing roads over building new ones without Republicans having a fit.
He's been using his time in the media, including on Fox, to carefully introduce some new ideas. Like designing roads around all kinds of transportation instead of just cars. Or thinking about equity when planning transportation projects. The reception is decidedly mixed, with some wild attacks not just from the right.
Even if they had the authority, DOT can't just propose a strategy people aren't ready for yet.
The DOT does have a clear vision for transportation. I don't want to sound defensive of him, but that's why many support him. He has clear values, vision and philosophy, which are articulated through conferences, meetings, town halls and interviews, not just with media, but with local leaders, students, apprentices, unions, advocacy groups, business leaders, community leaders, etc. and in congressional oversight sessions (btw, watching these sessions are quite illuminating). And expressed concretely through the directions set for the discretionary funds awarded directly by the DOT. (The DOT can't do much about a huge part of the budget, i.e. the formula funds going to states, except through the power of example, persuasion, education, awareness, reason/evidence.)
What I wanted to say earlier was that concrete, long-term plans of the kind done in some countries are not something that could be done at the executive level. Because the executive does not structurally have that kind of authority. The House has already indicated that they are going to go after the vision and priorities set by the DOT in awarding the discretionary funds. Maybe that scrutiny will allow more people to learn about the work of the DOT beyond the Fox News appearances.
More about the DOT's strategic plan:
https://www.transportation.gov/dot-strategic-plan
More about the DOT's grant programmes:
https://www.transportation.gov/grants
That's a rather misguided attack. He obviously isn't thinking about running for president or anything else at all, despite being constantly asked about it. He's not only been dealing with multiple major crises, in this case without having a FAA administrator for nearly a year, but also implementing dozens of new grant programs and dealing with the additional work created by the IIJA.
DOT has limited authority but he still got more results than anyone else would have.
Humanist EngineerConservatives: "but they'll just pass those expenses along in higher ticket prices!!"
Me: "yeah, fine. Their ticket prices should reflect the actual cost of traveling with Southwest. If their discount practices means I might have unexpected hotels and meals because flights get cancelled, that should be baked in, not a surprise."
Nemo_bis 🌈@tprophet Any estimate of the carbon emissions saved?
Gregory P. Smith (he/him) 
🚲🦝 
@tprophet Thanks for the summary!
Despite all of this I will still only fly on Southwest in the US when feasible. The typical experience as a passenger is sooo much better than all our other domestic airlines. No pile of extra fees, no uncancellable unchangeable tickets, no sardine treatment, no emphasis on "class" warfare.
I'm genuinely curious how they recover from this mishap and how they ultimately treat those stranded. Past experience suggests they will do the right thing money/credit wise but this... Is gonna cost a fortune. 🍿💸
Icarus #LUV flew too close to the sun.
Southwest has already admitted that the cancellations in the last days were controllable. Given that they updated their customer service plan a few months ago to include hotel vouchers passengers might get more money than they'd have a year ago in the same situation.
Pete Buttigieg Discusses Holiday Travel Chaos
@indri The customer service is a statement of intent, but actions speak louder than words and so far, they're apparently not giving hotel vouchers.
Given the amount of mess there are in and the huge number of passengers affected I'd guess it will take some time to get the compensations out. They'll probably have to build some new process to handle that efficiently and getting people unstuck should have priority.
@indri If I have to guess, the process will be to send a bunch of insurance company letters. You know, the ones that are really nice, talk in circles, and say they're "unable" to pay. Maybe include a $200 expiring airline voucher along with it (that's usually what Southwest does).
Being Southwest, though, they will capitalize things that ordinarily shouldn't be capitalized throughout the letter, in order to sound more like Hunter S. Thompson.
It remains to be seen, but it will probably depend on how often the CEO wants to receive calls not just by DOT staff but by a really pissed Transportation Secretary.
Peter Bindels@tprophet So Southwest is the American version of Ryanair?
Do they have the special 737s and A320s with less legroom and plastic seatbacks too?
@dascandy42 Nope, Southwest is very much not the American version of Ryanair. That would be Spirit. Southwest is its own thing. They bear some similarities to ultra low cost carriers (turning around aircraft fast, no interline agreements, serving secondary airports) but many differences (unlike other major US airlines, two checked bags are free on Southwest).
@tprophet Ah good point, Ryanair squeezes you on every corner and Southwest is then actually better.
Not that that says much, as your thread explains - they still squeeze you on every bit that really matters.
@dascandy42 I think that overall, they're good people trying to run a good airline. It's complicated. Southwest does some things really well. Other things, I don't think they do as well. I worry about the safety culture there--this isn't unwarranted, given repeated incidents. If their IT is this bad, I wonder what (if anything) they could also be missing in security. They need to decide that safe and reliable operations are important, and invest accordingly.
ClipperChip 
@tprophet Insolvency will fix it ;)
MWT@clipperchip @tprophet I once bought tickets from an airline that was in the middle of going bankrupt without my knowledge. By the time that the flight was supposed to occur, the airline didn't exist anymore.
(It was long enough ago that I don't remember how this got resolved, only that it was expensive.)
@mwt @clipperchip In a case like this, the best you can do is charge back with your credit card company. You'll likely get a refund, but you'll have to buy a replacement ticket from another airline at the then-current price, which is probably a lot more expensive than a fire sale fare from a near-bankrupt airline.
@tprophet @clipperchip That sounds plausibly like what probably happened. I remember that we did fly out on a different airline, and we did get to wherever we were going in time for whatever we went there for. (I don't remember which family members were part of the "we" though.)
Carter Baxter@mwt @clipperchip @tprophet this happened to me, too. I was stranded in DFW for a day while my mom sorted it out somehow. We had no idea as we were driving to the airport they were taking down their signage. Just….. gone.
RMS06510@clipperchip @tprophet bankruptcy solves EVERYTHING
แอท-ทริด@tprophet omg that is soooo fucked