Calgary International Airport III

[yyc_engineer]

Originally Posted by ace.yyc

The question then becomes whether or not AA would jump in on daily PHL-YYC to defend their turf. That's far less likely than UA's defense of IAD, from my perspective.

Have we ever had PHL-YYC ? (or any PHL-AB/BC ?)

AA always seems to be the weakest of the three at YYC, which is too bad as they have a good onboard product. I wish we could maintain at least 2X daily YYC-DFW year-round, complemented by one of either ORD, PHX or PHL also at 2X daily.

So many fun memories flying on the Mad Dogs sitting at the back by the engines

[hollywoodcory]

Originally Posted by hollywoodcory

Another interesting new addition for S24. WS 787 Service to LAX.

Effective April 28:
WS1510 YYC 09:20 - 11:23 LAX 789 14567
WS1511 LAX 13:25 - 17:18 YYC 789 14567

There is no frequency change to the route, so it still runs up to 3x daily.

Update: appears this was done in error as the schedule has been reversed back to a 737.

[msmariner]

Originally Posted by hollywoodcory

Update: appears this was done in error as the schedule has been reversed back to a 737.

It’s interesting if it’s an error. I’ve read multiple articles about the addition of 787 service to LAX.

[thenoflyzone]

Originally Posted by ace.yyc

Didn't see the LAX 787 coming. Personally, it's pretty much the only place I go... I do everything in my power to never fly WS because they are objectively a bad airline but this lessens the sting of AC cutting LAX.

California is most likely the #1 US feeder state for WS's TATL ops. So even though it came from left field, the LAX upgauge to 787 made a bit of sense.

AC sends widebodies on YUL/YYZ-LAX and YYZ-SFO as well, for the very same reason. Apart from the healthy O&D, there is massive 6th freedom traffic from the LA and San Fran areas to Europe. It's the same with WS now, as I'm sure you know.

I wouldn't be surprised to see the dreamliner rotate through LAX in the future. It probably makes more sense in the winter though, with more slack in the 787 fleet.

[msmariner]

Originally Posted by ace.yyc

Some UA changes are currently bookable.

SFO going 2x daily mainline for summer, up from 1 daily in S23.
DEN to 3x daily from 2x, all mainline (will end up being the typical unpredictable mix of 738/7M8/739/7M9/319/320)
IAH and ORD look the same.

SFO now 5x daily mainline flights most days, 3x WS and 2x UA.

UA also going 2x daily mainline to YEG from DEN, up from E75.

There was a rumour that I heard from AA crew here about a possible third DFW flight on Thursdays and Sundays, leaving around 1800 southbound. I'd be surprised, and as of now does not appear anywhere.

Historically, a ton of people off the UA flights connected on to AC here at YYC so with AC obliterating us it's interesting for UA to be adding and not taking away.

With all of the additions for transborder how many daily flights are there going to be S24? Seems to be a sizeable increase

[hollywoodcory]

Originally Posted by msmariner

With all of the additions for transborder how many daily flights are there going to be S24? Seems to be a sizeable increase

WS has only modified its S24 until the end of June, but here's an approx of Transborder S24:

SEA - 16x weekly WS / 2x daily AS
PDX - 18x weekly WS
SFO - 20x weekly WS / 2x daily UA
LAX - 3x daily WS / 4x weekly Y9
SNA - 3x weekly WS
PSP - 3x weekly WS
SAN - 1x daily WS
LAS - 3x daily WS
PHX - 3x daily WS
DEN - 3x daily UA / 1x daily WS
IAH - 2x daily UA / 2x daily WS
DFW - 2x daily AA
AUS - 2x weekly
ORD - 2x daily UA / 1x daily WS / 1x daily AA
ATL - 2x daily WS
BNA - 1x daily WS
MSP - 2x daily DL
SLC - 2x daily DL
DTW - 1x daily WS
JFK - 1x daily WS
BOS - 4x weekly WS
IAD - 2x weekly WS / 1x daily UA
EWR - 1x daily AC
MCO - 5x weekly WS
HNL - 1x weekly WS (Until June 29)
OGG - 1x weekly WS (Until June 30)
FLL - 1x weekly WS (Until June 15)

Which is approximately 353 weekly departures.

---

Just noticed WS added a third SEA on Mon / Tue with outbound departures at 12:00 / 16:30 & 19:30.

[msmariner]

Originally Posted by hollywoodcory

WS has only modified its S24 until the end of June, but here's an approx of Transborder S24:

SEA - 16x weekly WS / 2x daily AS
PDX - 18x weekly WS
SFO - 20x weekly WS / 2x daily UA
LAX - 3x daily WS / 4x weekly Y9
SNA - 3x weekly WS
PSP - 3x weekly WS
SAN - 1x daily WS
LAS - 3x daily WS
PHX - 3x daily WS
DEN - 3x daily UA / 1x daily WS
IAH - 2x daily UA / 2x daily WS
DFW - 2x daily AA
AUS - 2x weekly
ORD - 2x daily UA / 1x daily WS / 1x daily AA
ATL - 2x daily WS
BNA - 1x daily WS
MSP - 2x daily DL
SLC - 2x daily DL
DTW - 1x daily WS
JFK - 1x daily WS
BOS - 4x weekly WS
IAD - 2x weekly WS / 1x daily UA
EWR - 1x daily AC
MCO - 5x weekly WS
HNL - 1x weekly WS (Until June 29)
OGG - 1x weekly WS (Until June 30)
FLL - 1x weekly WS (Until June 15)

Which is approximately 353 weekly departures.

---

Just noticed WS added a third SEA on Mon / Tue with outbound departures at 12:00 / 16:30 & 19:30.

Thank you for putting that together. #of flights and seats must have surpassed 2019 levels. 50+ flights daily plus all the other international flights. Gates D & E will be hopping!!

[hollywoodcory]

Originally Posted by msmariner

Thank you for putting that together. #of flights and seats must have surpassed 2019 levels. 50+ flights daily plus all the other international flights. Gates D & E will be hopping!!

And here's the non-US international for S24 too:

LHR - 1x daily WS / 1x daily AC
FRA - 12x weekly 4Y / 2x weekly DE
AMS - 1x daily KL
CDG - 1x daily WS
NRT - 1x daily WS
PVR - 1x daily WS / 1x weekly F8
FCO - 6x weekly WS
CUN - 6x weekly WS
BCN - 4x weekly WS
EDI - 4x weekly WS
KEF - 4x weekly WS
ZRH - 3x weekly WK
SJD - 3x weekly WS
VRA - 1x weekly WS (Until June 29)
PUJ - 1x weekly WS (Until June 29)

MBJ & LIR both have scheduled flights until the end of May

[EdmontonTraveller]

Originally Posted by ace.yyc

From what I'm hearing, the additional slack in the WS 787 fleet vs S23 is largely because of how shitty their ground crew is and how many delays they're taking as a result.

One anecdote does not prove any point, but perhaps illustrates the real-life impact of any WS challenges:

10/9 - WS needed a change of metal for a YYC-YVR flight, leading to a delay from the scheduled departure as the (new) plane was coming from YVR. The revised dep. time placed it close to an F8 departure also going to YVR, also (originally) scheduled for the plane to arrive from YVR.

Departing YVR: WS flight 5 minutes behind F8 leaving the gate
Arriving YYC: WS flight 6 minutes behind F8 arriving at the gate
Departing YYC: WS flight 25 minutes behind F8
Arriving YVR: WS flight 27 minutes behind F8

And note that the F8 flight was running on-time, not rushing in any way. You'd like to hope that a 100 minute delayed WS flight had some urgency around its ops. Perhaps a 65 minute turn of a 737-8 is as fast as WS goes in Calgary these days?

[hollywoodcory]

WS has now loaded the Sunday FCO, increasing it to daily in S24.

Not sure if it came at the expense of anything.

[cyeg66]

Originally Posted by ace.yyc

The Calgary ground crew for WS is incomprehensibly bad. There aren't enough adjectives in the English language to describe their incompetence.

WS eliminated their own crew at Calgary, one of the best preforming ground crews in North America on a per flight basis among large stations, to replace them with a horrific contracted operation. It is catastrophic.

There’s nothing quite like walking down the stairs in the morning, smelling the Christmas tree, looking at its pretty twinkling lights, then sitting down with a hot cup of coffee, petting my dog laid across my lap, and reading your comment, oozing with bountiful Christmas cheer.

[LO 044]

Originally Posted by cyeg66

There’s nothing quite like walking down the stairs in the morning, smelling the Christmas tree, looking at its pretty twinkling lights, then sitting down with a hot cup of coffee, petting my dog laid across my lap, and reading your comment, oozing with bountiful Christmas cheer.

Here I'll cheer you up with a another cliche lol. One company's loss is another company's gain. Look at Acey's comment as making Air Canada, Flair, Porter and the WS Union happy. Merry Christmas!

[hollywoodcory]

Originally Posted by ace.yyc

There was room for it. Utilization now pretty much the same as S23.

Indeed, the other 787 changes were:

-BCN op days days changed from 2346 to 2456. (Wed moved to a Fri flight)
-They added a Sat flight on May 11 for CDG, effectively making it daily from April 27-Oct. 6

Additionally a whack of OGG flights got downguaged from the 789 to a 7M8.

Aeroroutes picked up NRT's extension into November. It briefly showed right through until April, but is now only showing until late Nov. I still believe it will end up going year round.

[msmariner]

Originally Posted by ace.yyc

From what I'm hearing, the additional slack in the WS 787 fleet vs S23 is largely because of how shitty their ground crew is and how many delays they're taking as a result.

This comment and the additional one down below make me laugh. You basically go from flights had to be cut because of all the delays from the ground crews. Too adding one more frequency to S24 and with that they are back to s23 levels. I guess the delays weren’t that dramatic

[msmariner]

Originally Posted by ace.yyc

Frame utilization is roughly the same. The way the frames are scheduled is more favourable for ground crews in S24 vs S23. If you think the catastrophic delays being taken by the ground crews here are not at the forefront of every ops meeting, you're sorely mistaken.

I flew Westjet probably 15 times in the past year, including twice to Europe. Never had any issues except minor delays. If they have crewing issues it’s probably no different than any other airline. I’ve faced hours long delays on Delta flights in the US in the same period of time. Just the sign of the time that we might have delays. As customers we want to pay the very least amount for our airfares. So we can’t expect the best and highest paid staff unloading and servicing our planes. The old saying… You only get what you pay for!

[msmariner]

Originally Posted by ace.yyc

I mean it's part of my job to monitor WS' delays in their 100+ daily flights so I feel like I the hundreds of thousands of data points I observe and analyze are more representative of the operation than the 15 times per year that you fly.

Fair enough. If you analyze data on WS’s on time performance’s great. It can bother you that they are late for various reasons. I’m just saying the average Joe doesn’t lose too much sleep if his/her flight is late ( unless tight connections are involved). Like I said most airlines are facing the same delays and for the same reasons. I put up with WS issues because I’m super happy we have an airline basing most of its operations out of YYC and we get to do many places directly from our home airport. Not many cities our size have that.

[msmariner]

Heard rumours something big coming for Westjet. I’m pumped!!

[msmariner]

YYC to Seoul starting in May

https://www.travelweek.ca/news/airlines/...-new-flights-from-yyc-starting-may-2024/

[Cage]

Confirmed, WS YYC-ICN starting in May.

https://www.westjet.com/en-ca/best-of-travel/asia/seoul

Will be interesting if YYC-LAX stays on the 789 or if there are additional changes to the 789 schedule. I didn't see the WS 789 S24 schedule being able to accommodate YYC-ICN.

Interesting times indeed.

[hollywoodcory]

Originally Posted by Cage

Confirmed, WS YYC-ICN starting in May.

https://www.westjet.com/en-ca/best-of-travel/asia/seoul

Will be interesting if YYC-LAX stays on the 789 or if there are additional changes to the 789 schedule. I didn't see the WS 789 S24 schedule being able to accommodate YYC-ICN.

Interesting times indeed.

The LAX turns have already been removed. Seems like it was loaded in error. I also suspect the YYZ turns will also get dropped to accommodate this.

Brings total 787 schedule to 44x weekly. 34 to Europe and 10 to Asia.