Things in the Sky

The beginning of the month is a great time to look at data. Many of the airlines release their montly traffic results and he DOT releases its montly report on delays, baggage, and complaints.

Yesterday, both WestJet and Air Canada released their traffic reports for August, and both had strong results, as reported by Reuters. Air Canada reported an 85.4% load factor for mainline service in August, up one point from the same month last year. Jazz’s (Air Canada’s regional carrier) load factor went down 4.1 points from 77.3% to 73.2%. Systemwide load factor was up 0.6 points to 84.4%. WestJet’s load factor was good as well. Load factor was up by 0.4 points from 88.0% to 88.4%.

But there’s one important difference. In terms of ASMs, Air Canada cut mainline service by 2% and Jazz service by 4.1%, for a sytemwide 2.2%  decrease. WestJet, on the other hand, greatly increased capacity. Compared to August 2007, ASMs had increased by 21.9%!

For the year, WestJet’s load factor was down 0.6 points compared to the same period last year, but capacity has increased 20.3%. To increase capacity that much and have traffic grow with it that nicely in this environment is incredible, in my opinion.

We will have to see if WestJet can continue to grow, but right now it seems to be in the cards. From a recent article in Airline Business:

No order cancellations. No layoffs. In fact, says Durfy, “we plan no capacity cuts”. This sounds like the defiance of someone who is either oblivious or doesn’t care. WestJet’s capacity growth, measured in available seat miles, will be 16% this year, compared to 19% last year and a projected 8% next year. By 2010 it will be back up to 10-11%. “We plan an average annual growth of around 10%,” says Durfy. “The actual number each year depends on delivery dates.”

I look forward to watching WestJet’s moves in the future, and it will be interesting to see how their new partnership with Southwest will affect their traffic.