AC launching daily YVR-SNA on a 319: https://www.newswire.ca/news-release...860564475.html

It was about time AC re-enters SNA. I’d be a perfect A220 route in the future.

https://www.anna.aero/2020/03/02/air...wa-victoria-1/

Moral of the story is, YOW is underserved to some key Canadian and US markets. (Not that we didn't know that already)

YOW-YYJ/SFO/LAX/LAS are all in the top 20 connecting markets for AC. YQB-YVR is also a gaping hole. The A220 would be perfect for all these flights. Some other domestic city pairs that look interesting and feasible on that list as well.

TPE-YYZ and FLL-YQB are already served by other carriers. Most of the long haul (and ULH) flights on that list - baring YUL-BOG which is starting in June - are highly unlikely to start, due to stage length/cost of operation.

YYC-ICN is the only one that is likely, eventually, with WS B787.

Glad to see that DEL-YWG is in the top-20 AC connecting flights.

AC has extended its Asia cuts again.

YVR-PEK Suspended until May 1
YYZ-PEK Suspended until May 1

YVR-PVG Suspended until May 1
YYZ-PVG Suspended until May 1
YUL-PVG Suspended until May 1

YYC-NRT Suspended until May 27

Interesting AC is only reducing Tokyo from YYC, as all flights from YYZ, YUL and YVR remain unaffected so far.

I guess forward bookings to Japan still look decent. YYC-NRT was always the weakest link to Japan, so the first one to go in cases like this.

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Ok, so almost all of North America's busiest airports have published full year 2019 stats, except for ORD of course, yet again.

So here is the official tally for 2019.

North America's busiest international passenger airports, full year 2019 (except otherwise noted)

1. JFK 34,317,281 +2.4%
2. YYZ 32,390,478 +2.5%
3. LAX 25,696,322 -1.4%
4. MIA 22,383,751 +2.3%
5. MEX 17,647,782 +2.6%
6. PTY 16,582,601 +2.1%
7. CUN 16,501,592 +0.5%
8. SFO 15,240,135 +7.2%
9. EWR 14,332,312 +1.4%
10. ORD 13,132,870 (+2.5%) (til November 2019)
11. YVR 13,698,558 +1.5%
12. YUL 13,112,990 +6.8%
13. ATL 12,655,294 +1.2%
14. IAH 11,113,702
15. DFW 9,578,478 +9.5%

Advance bookings for YYC-NRT were relatively strong too. Looks like YVR-NRT is being upped to a 77W to consolidate the two flights into one.

This gives me the impression AC9/10 will possibly just be cut entirely this year.

Since HKG is being hit hard, is there a possibilty to have a shared service from YUL split from YYZ? It's the major destination missing from YUL IMO. (I go to Hong Kong every two years, so it's a personal plea)

I didn't see the upgauge part.. YVR-NRT still showing 789 for me.

And AC just extended the cut to Asia service

Suspended until May 1
YVR-PEK
YYZ-PEK
YVR-PVG
YYZ-PVG
YUL-PVG

Suspended until June 1
YYZ-HKG
YYZ-ICN (from Mar 20)

Suspended until Jul 1
YYC-NRT

Looks like it might only be March. The remainder is still 789. AC9/10 being further suspended until July further drops my confidence it will even fly at all this year.

What a cluster f, and we thought the 737 Max issues were bad, but both together are a nightmare for airline scheduling! Things are changing so often as well, even the domestic and transborder schedules/aircraft are changing a lot from week to week. I don't want to know how traffic numbers will be, but it will be ugly.

AC9/10 is such an oddball, but I wouldn't count it out totally yet. There is still so much tourist travel inbound from Japan in the summer, even if Canadians aren't going there. But if things stay bad with Coronavirus, I guess that could drop off in summer too. I really hope not though. So if AC drops NRT and HU doesn't come back, will YYC have any Asia service? Do they still get ICN charters?

I wonder if Coronavirus will knock Flair out of the sky? The two majors have the fiscal capacity to weather a downturn, not sure the same goes for Flair.

Negative. If both NRT and PEK go, there will no Asian service this year. WS may eventually jump in. They must be so relieved they didn't launch Asia this year.

----

Speaking of HU, they still have both YYC-PEK & YVR-SZX only open in full fare C/Y class reservation from March 31.

WS and AC have been constrained by not having sufficient aircraft due to the MAX grounding. That has let them focus on the the higher margin travels.
Now they are also going to be hungry to just fill seats. They are going to want those flair customers.

I don't think it is question of if Flair goes out of business but how long they can last.

Over in Europe, their largest regional airline, Flybe, is bankrupt. So is Air Italy.

Hainan, Norwegian, Interjet, Flair. These are all airlines that can possibly go under in the next weeks/months.

TS did a good thing, selling to AC before all this crap happened.

FlyBe was the largest operator of the Q400, with a fleet of 54, so this isn’t good news for Viking Air either. BBD sure must be glad they got rid of that program as well.

Being strictly domestic though, means Flair is least exposed to the problem. Porter's not much worse off. Purely anecdotal - flew them yesterday YOW-YTZ and the load was north of 80%.

I don't think domestic travel will take too much of a hit as long as the number of Canadian cases grows at a trickle.

Yup, this is a good example of how the 6th largest airport given its squeeze between fortresses is so often overlooked (i.e. overlooking stimulation opportunities a nonstop would present in the name of pushing pax thru the big hubs). I'm not surprised YOW appears so many times in the top 20. YOW-CDG isn't there solely because of a) so many airlines vs just this list of AC and the huge leakage to YUL where YUL then becomes the origin airport, so YOW doesn't even get counted.

CMA/Central Mountain Air are realigning their ops by adding YXJ-YEG, YXS-YYC (to take on WS), while appearing to run from WS in Dawson Creek:

CMA are wise to drop those tags where they no doubt carried very few pax.

They're also building a mini-hub at YXS:

So does that mean only WS Link will remain in Dawson?

https://www.newswire.ca/news-release...803231964.html

Where is the DH4 manufactured? Are they still made at Downsview? Viking Air owns the rights but I don't believe do the manufacturing of the DH4, this is done by DeHavilland in Toronto AFAIK, so they would be more affected

You are correct. Although Longview does own De Havilland - so it will affect their bottom line, maybe. Regional travel should be the least hit and first to recover compared to overseas/long-haul services - which will get nailed this year.