Yet another aviation thread.

Quote: Pacomartin

Passenger load last month at local airport (Near Bethlehem PA, former Sands Casino | 90 minutes to EWR)
40.4% Allegiant (up to 7 vacation destinations with 4 in Florida)
25.2% American (to 3 hubs)
22.6% Delta (to 2 hubs)
11.4% United (to 1 hub)
0.3% Charters

People complain about Allegiant Air, but without them we wouldn't even have much of an airport. They fly to up to 7 vacation destinations, but not cross country to Vegas. Allegiant plans to base jets here in February and with Southwest pulling out of EWR maybe they will start flights to Vegas.

I have noticed that the farthest east I can fly out of Vegas on Allegiant is Knoxville.

Quote: DRich

Why should the pilot get lunch? I never eat breakfast or lunch.

If the pilot does not make enough money to eat or sleep properly and the airline is forced to deal with maintenance facilities where only palms, not machinery, gets greased, many passengers would be hesitant to board the flight.

Quote: Fleastiff

If the pilot does not make enough money to eat or sleep properly and the airline is forced to deal with maintenance facilities where only palms, not machinery, gets greased, many passengers would be hesitant to board the flight.

I have read that Allegiant pilots make an average of $118,000. That is low by airline standards, but I doubt they are starving. Now, those regional jet pilots are starving.

Quote: DRich

I have read that Allegiant pilots make an average of $118,000.

That is good money in some of these cities where the jets are based. Plus they get to sleep in their own beds every night.

ABE Allentown (starting February 2020)
PIT Pittsburgh
PBG Plattsburgh
CVG Cincinnati
MYR Myrtle Beach (seasonal)
AVL Asheville
GRR Grand Rapids
TYS Knoxville
IND Indianapolis
SAV Savannah
SFB Orlando/Sanford
VPS Destin/Fort Walton Beach
PIE St. Petersburg/Clearwater
PGD Punta Gorda
FLL Fort Lauderdale
AZA Phoenix/Mesa
LAS Las Vegas
BLI Bellingham
LAX Los Angeles
OAK Oakland

Quote: Pacomartin

That is good money in some of these cities where the jets are based. Plus they get to sleep in their own beds every night.

That is a good point that I hadn't thought of. No layovers or multi-day trips.

Quote: DRich

That is a good point that I hadn't thought of. No layovers or multi-day trips.

Allegiant does not sell connecting flights. Every ticket is exactly one segment long. In the most recent month for which data is available, they averaged 250 flights per day, and median air time is 2:05 (2 hours 5 minutes). Only 8.2% of the flights are over 3 hours air time.

You are probably better off living in one of these 6 industrial cities where housing is cheap and Allegiant bases their jets. As an airline employee you can probably frequently catch a ride to a warm city for three-day mini-vacations.

ABE Allentown
PIT Pittsburgh
PBG Plattsburgh
CVG Cincinnati
GRR Grand Rapids
IND Indianapolis

The wife and I were going to go to Ft. Meyers, FL to see family for Thanksgiving but the airline tickets are more than I a willing to spend (About $800 each for the dates we wanted). Since we couldn't do that my wife suggested we go somewhere else. I told her to choose some place that we could do for a reasonable amount. Obviously, being the holiday most places and tickets are in high demand and expensive. She came up with a good alternative. We just booked a trip for Thanksgiving to Vancouver BC. Tickets were reasonable and hotels reasonable since they don't celebrate Thanksgiving at the time we do.

Roundtrip flights were about $220 each and we found a hotel for about $100 a night. Total price on Travelocity was $740 for two airline tickets and three nights hotel.

Seems very reasonable to me.

I just read that Delta has dumped Compass Airlines as one of the Delta Connection partners. Compass flies 36 of their 56 planes for Delta Connection. I am assuming that will be a huge blow to the company and probably make them a likely takeover target. Skywest would be a likely candidate to buy them.

Maybe the aircraft, and the pilots that flew them, will end up at Endeavor Air.
They seem to be a larger regional carrier for Delta.

Wikipedia on Compass says
"In August, 2019, Delta Air lines made the decision to reduce the number of regional carriers that fly as Delta connection and terminated the agreement for regional flying with Compass Airlines. This move will remove 36 aircraft from the airline and reduce the number of aircraft flying for Compass Airlines from 56 to 20"

Endeavor was formerly Pinnacle, which bought Mesaba, who incidentally flew turboprops until late in the life of the company.

The trip I just booked to Vancouver, one of the flights is a Delta Connection operated by Compass. Hopefully the change will not take effect before December.