{"id":9209,"date":"2010-03-11T07:34:17","date_gmt":"2010-03-11T12:34:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/?p=9209"},"modified":"2010-03-11T08:59:27","modified_gmt":"2010-03-11T13:59:27","slug":"airlines-will-cancel-flights-to-avoid-risk-of-fines-for-delays-nbc-dallas-fort-worth","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/?p=9209","title":{"rendered":"Cancelled"},"content":{"rendered":"

As we noted earlier<\/a>, the unintended consequences of a new Obama administration regulation will be worse than the “crisis” it was intended to solve:<\/a><\/p>\n

Several airlines, including Fort Worth<\/a>-based American and Houston<\/a>-based Continental, say they will cancel flights rather than risk paying stiff penalties for delaying passengers on the runway…Under new federal guidelines that take effect next month, airlines can be fined up to $27,500 per passenger if a plane is stuck on the tarmac for longer than three hours.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

With the new fines, a delayed MD-80 could cost American Airlines close to $4 million, and a fine for a full 757 could cost more than $5 million.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

So to avoid the huge hit – which doesn’t discriminate between reasons for plans taking off late – airlines will cancel flights that show even the slightest chance of getting delayed on the ground:<\/p>\n

\u201cIt’s unavoidable that more flights will be canceled to avoid fines,\u201d said American Airlines spokesman Steve Schlachter. \u201cIt’s one of the unintended consequences of a bill that has no flexibility.\u201d<\/p>\n

A spokesman for the U.S. Transportation Department said airlines can avoid fines by doing a better job of scheduling flights and crews.<\/p>\n

“Carriers have it within their power to schedule their flights more realistically, to have spare aircraft and crews available to avoid cancellations” and to rebook passengers when there are cancellations, said Bill Mosley, a department spokesman.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Which is something that could only come from a government bureaucrat (or a libertal tax hike advocate).\u00a0 Weather and its affect on other airports is the main reason for delays; flights are scheduled months in advance (or so Orbitz tells me; check it yourself<\/a>).\u00a0 And at a time when competition, regulation, taxes and fuel costs are already trimming airline margins to the bone, “spare planes and crews” are things that only government can realistically afford.\u00a0 And remember – today, as we noted in my previous post on the subject one flight in 10,000 <\/em>is currently more than three hours late in taking off.\u00a0 Many times more than that will be cancelled, now.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

As we noted earlier, the unintended consequences of a new Obama administration regulation will be worse than the “crisis” it was intended to solve: Several airlines, including Fort Worth-based American and Houston-based Continental, say they will cancel flights rather than risk paying stiff penalties for delaying passengers on the runway…Under new federal guidelines that take […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[104],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9209","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-trains-and-automobiles"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9209","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=9209"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9209\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9221,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9209\/revisions\/9221"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=9209"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=9209"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=9209"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}