Yet another aviation thread.

Quote: Pacomartin

Current destinations are shown in RED on the map
Las Vegas
Hawaiian Airlines Las Vegas
Allegiant Air Las Vegas
Boyd Vacations Hawaii Charter: Las Vegas
Delta Air Lines Seasonal: Las Vegas (begins December 21, 2017)
,

I believe Allegiant has already announced that it is discontinuing LAS-HNL.

Quote: DRich

I believe Allegiant has already announced that it is discontinuing LAS-HNL.

Hawaiian Airlines is the dominant carrier to Las Vegas. It is possible that Southwest will try and take over the route.

Honolulu is outside of the norm for Allegiant, as it is a considerably longer route than most of their airport destinations. In order of importance, you can see that they specialize in small airports. Outside of Honolulu their longest routes is to Knoxville, TN, so they may redeploy the planes to some east coast destinations.


Airport - Miles from LAS
BLI Bellingham, WA 954
SCK Stockton, CA 359
FAT Fresno, CA 259
CVG Cincinnati, OH 1678
OAK Oakland, CA 407
RNO Reno, NV 345
DSM Des Moines, IA 1216
AUS Austin, TX 1090
MFE Mission/McAllen/Edinburg, TX 1210
FSD Sioux Falls, SD 1104
BIS Bismarck/Mandan, ND 1048
FAR Fargo, ND 1205
HNL Honolulu, HI 2762 <----------------------------------------------------------
SMX Santa Maria, CA 310
CID Cedar Rapids/Iowa City, IA 1319
MEM Memphis, TN 1416
AZA Phoenix, AZ 276
BZN Bozeman, MT 701
SAT San Antonio, TX 1069
FCA Kalispell, MT 845
ICT Wichita, KS 986
RFD Rockford, IL 1455
BLV Belleville, IL 1400
OKC Oklahoma City, OK 986
RAP Rapid City, SD 843
SBN South Bend, IN 1594
ATW Appleton, WI 1510
PIA Peoria, IL 1413
MFR Medford, OR 600
MCI Kansas City, MO 1139
GJT Grand Junction, CO 420
GRR Grand Rapids, MI 1642
MRY Monterey, CA 375
TYS Knoxville, TN 1739
COS Colorado Springs, CO 604
LRD Laredo, TX 1092
MOT Minot, ND 1098
SHV Shreveport, LA 1243
PSC Pasco/Kennewick/Richland, WA 732
GTF Great Falls, MT 811
MSO Missoula, MT 750
BIL Billings, MT 754
CPR Casper, WY 661
VPS Valparaiso, FL 1695
MLI Moline, IL 1376
EUG Eugene, OR 700
BOI Boise, ID 519
SGF Springfield, MO 1209
IND Indianapolis, IN 1590
XNA Fayetteville, AR 1163
GRI Grand Island, NE 971
IDA Idaho Falls, ID 538
GFK Grand Forks, ND 1230
ELP El Paso, TX 583
TUL Tulsa, OK 1076
ABQ Albuquerque, NM 486
STS Santa Rosa, CA 454
PVU Provo, UT 341

Quote: Pacomartin

Honolulu is outside of the norm for Allegiant, as it is a considerably longer route than most of their airport destinations. In order of importance, you can see that they specialize in small airports. Outside of Honolulu their longest routes is to Knoxville, TN, so they may redeploy the planes to some east coast destinations.

Did they try smaller airports in Hawaii?

Quote: Nareed

Did they try smaller airports in Hawaii?

Kahului Airport in Maui has fairly good nonstops to the mainland. Maui is more popular with mainlanders, while Honolulu is more popular with Asian visitors. There are no flights from Maui to Las Vegas.

Las Vegas has a big Hawaiian community, but it is more a relationship of people who work in the tourist industry. Hawaii and Las Vegas and Orlando are the hotel capitals of the USA. So the flights are from Vegas to Honolulu only.

American Airlines Dallas/Fort Worth, Los Angeles, Phoenix–Sky Harbor
Delta Air Lines Los Angeles, Salt Lake City (begins December 21, 2017), Seattle/Tacoma
United Airlines Chicago-O'Hare, Denver, Los Angeles, San Francisco
Alaska Airlines Oakland, Portland (OR), Sacramento, San Diego, San Jose, Seattle/Tacoma Seasonal: Anchorage, Bellingham
Hawaiian Airlines Los Angeles,Oakland, Portland (OR) (resumes January 18, 2018), San Francisco, San Jose (CA), Seattle/Tacoma
Virgin America Los Angeles, San Francisco
...
Air Canada Rouge Vancouver Seasonal: Calgary
WestJet Vancouver Seasonal: Calgary, Edmonton


Southwest has yet to announce their routes, but I don't think they can make it to Dallas. I know I mentioned it as a possibility, but I think the headwinds can be too strong. The thing about Pacific headwinds is that they are very variable. You might be able to make the flight 97% of the time, but that 3% will be a real headache.

Quote: Pacomartin

You might be able to make the flight 97% of the time, but that 3% will be a real headache.

I think the real problem is there isn't as much as a speck of land between the West Coast and Hawaii. And 737s have a hell of a time catching the 3 wire on a carrier.

Quote: Nareed

I think the real problem is there isn't as much as a speck of land between the West Coast and Hawaii. And 737s have a hell of a time catching the 3 wire on a carrier.

Range nm
737 MAX 7 3,825
737 MAX 8 3,515
737 MAX 9 3,515
737 MAX 10 3,215

See, I think with headwind allowance only the longest range 3,825 nm MAX 7 can handle the distance. The MAX 7 is the one that I wondered if would ever be produced since there are so few orders, and it goes head to head with the CS300.

The headwinds are for westbound direction, so you would end up taking off from Dallas Love Field and probably landing in Phoenix or Albuquerque to refuel. That will irritate the passengers even more than usual since they just took off.

Still air ranges 3,825 - 3,515 - 3,215 nm

Quote: Pacomartin

The headwinds are for westbound direction, so you would end up taking off from Dallas Love Field and probably landing in Phoenix or Albuquerque to refuel. That will irritate the passengers even more than usual since they just took off.

IMO, it would be easier to sell the flight from Dallas to Honolulu with a connection at Phoenix or LA, or Long Beach.

Though from the map, it seems they could stop at Tijuana to refuel.

Quote: Nareed

Though from the map, it seems they could stop at Tijuana to refuel.

Yes, TIJ is right under the great circle. I don't know how viable it is as an emergency fuel stop.


Twenty years ago the flight from LAX to HKG was 6,309 nm. I think United used B747-200B which had a still air range of 6,560 nmi.
I remember at the office, people would always plan for a fuel stop in TPE in the winter (was 400 nmi closer). At the time Shanghai wasn't an option.

Quote: Pacomartin

Yes, TIJ is right under the great circle. I don't know how viable it is as an emergency fuel stop.

Or at San Diego to make their traffic problem worse :)

How about a Boeing 7007 narrow body with extensive use of composites and super-efficient engines? That should beat the 3% headwind problem.

I expect it sometime next century.

recently another Air Canada Airbus A320 had a mishap at SFO. A near-fatal one, too.

The plane was instructed to go around, because ATC was unsure whether a plane had cleared the runway (it had, but that's not the point). Not only did the crew not go around, they didn't even reply on the radio. Some reports say the flight was sent a visual signal to go around (I'm not clear on that), and either they failed to see it or ignored it.

After landing safely, they reported problems with their radio.

I wonder about visual signals. In many of his novels, former Naval combat pilot Steven Coonts details carrier operations. I recall that the Landing Signals Officer controls the runway lights. Flashing the lights is a wave-off, similar to a go around in civilian ops. On a carrier, a wave-off often happens when the plane's trajectory is such it won't be able to land safely on deck. Such as it's coming in too high, so it will hit the deck too far along to stop. Or too low and will crash into the carrier's stern.

It's often reported that in the Vietnam war, naval pilots experienced higher levels of stress when landing on carriers, especially at night, than during combat missions when they were being shot at. I don't know whether that's true.