Fort Worth-based American Airlines anticipates that summer 2024 will be one of the busiest travel seasons in years, with 72 million passengers expected to fly the airline.
Despite delivery delays due to Boeing’s ongoing quality control issues, the airline is ready to handle the boom in passenger travel as many Americans emerge from the COVID-19 pandemic fallout and take to the skies.
“It is easy to cancel flights, but ultimately our promise is to our customer,” said American Airlines operations chief David Seymour, per The Dallas Morning News.
“That’s where the center of our decisions are about the customers. [American] still needs to get customers where they asked to go, where they purchased a ticket, where they wanted to go. Our best bet is to keep those planes operating and get them to the destination,” explained Seymour.
Boeing’s inability to meet contractual agreements to deliver new Boeing 737 Max 9 aircraft has led to cancellations of flight routes and pilot furloughs, which will make some flights busier than usual. However, Seymour stressed that the lack of planes won’t impact travelers in the DFW market, and due to stepped-up inspections of older aircraft, the company will continue to fly.
“The root of what we’ve done to run a safe and reliable airline is focusing on planning [and] executing the recovery,” Seymour said. “That’s the hallmark that [American] continues to stress for the team.”
The summer travel season officially kicked off on May 17 and will continue through September 3. The Federal Aviation Administration anticipates that June 30 will be the busiest day of travel and said that Memorial Day weekend could be the busiest since 2010. The administration told NBC 5 DFW there would be 53,515 flights on Thursday before Memorial Day weekend and an additional 50,129 that Friday.
“The FAA is working every day to make sure you get to your destination safely and on time, especially as more people than ever gear up to fly this summer,” said Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) Administrator Mike Whitaker in a press release.
“While we can’t control the weather – which is the number one reason for delays – we plan for and work around convective conditions. And to improve safety and enhance efficient operations on the runway, we are installing innovative new surface surveillance technologies at airports around the nation,” Whitaker said, per NBC 5.
American Airlines has not been as heavily impacted as other competitors by the production delays caused by issues with the Boeing production lines. Southwest Airlines has canceled routes as a result of the delays.
This year, American has added eight destinations to its slate of flights out of DFW: Albany, NY; Appleton, WI; Manhattan, KA; Redmond, OR; St. George, UT; and Tulum and Veracruz, Mexico. It also offers long-haul service to Barcelona, Spain.