American Airlines Slashes 100,000 Flights In December Schedule Due To Low Demand

American Airlines bowed down to low travel demand amid the COVID-19 pandemic and removed as many as 100,000 flights for the upcoming holiday season, which is nearly 50% of its schedule.

Airlines in the U.S. had been optimistic about a rise in demand over the holiday season, which did not materialize.

American Airlines spokeswoman Nichelle Tait told The Dallas Morning News, “We are evaluating our network to match supply and demand and have been making regular schedule adjustments since March. In an effort to match low demand resulting from coronavirus, we continue to operate a reduced schedule.”

The carrier will, however, increase flights in the last two weeks of December to make the most out of possible holiday travel. November and December are usually peak travel months, bringing a lot of business for airlines between the slump in September and October and another slow business period until Spring.

The airline now has 105,619 flights in December, the report said. This is 10,000 more than its November schedule but a steep fall from its schedule in December 2019.

The airline also reduced its schedule by 86% in New York’s JFK and LaGuardia airports, its biggest hubs, along with significant cuts in Chicago, Los Angeles and Philadelphia. This comes as New York and neighboring Connecticut have some of the strictest travel restrictions in the country.

In an earnings call last month, American’s chief revenue officer Vasu Raja had said that the company anticipated good traffic around the Thanksgiving period and the second half of December. “Because we have seen the last several holidays—Columbus Day, Labor Day, July Fourth and Memorial Day—become sequentially stronger,” Raja said.

American Airlines’ peer Southwest Airlines is looking further ahead and cutting its schedules of January by 36%, running only 67,400 flights through the month, the report said.

The airline announced Monday that it upgraded its pre-flight COVID testing for customers. The airline will now offer customers traveling to Belize, St. Lucia, Grenada and Hawaii the option to get tested for COVID-19 with a health care test.