United and merger partner Continental are seeking back-up authority for slots at Tokyo’s Haneda Airport, according to filings with the Department of Transportation. If given such authority, the two airlines would be able to launch service if another carrier ends Haneda services and loses its slot, avoiding another slot proceeding process. The two carriers say they can provide service to the cities that were in their original applications last year – Guam, Newark, and San Francisco.
The Haneda slots were awarded to carriers with dormancy conditions – meaning the slots would be lost if they were not used for 90 days.
The application for back-up authority is not exactly new – at least for Continental. The airline asked last year for back-up authority to fly Guam-Haneda (service would be operated by Continental Micronesia) as well as authority to fly from Newark to Haneda. In its final order, the DOT did not award this authority.
“To avoid any risk to Haneda the Department should act immediately to name Continental and United as back-up carrier in the event that Delta (or any other Haneda-authorized U.S. carrier) decides to abandon service at Haneda,” the carriers say. They also say that if a carrier were to stop serving Haneda, the process to re-allocate the slots would ”loss of much needed Haneda service…that will be particularly harmful to the competitive position of the U.S. carrier industry if reciprocal services by Japanese carriers continue.”
As part of its application, United and Continental note that both American and Delta requested (and received) permission to delay the launch of of Haneda services, and that Delta was suspending service to Haneda. (While not noted by United, American is also suspending Haneda service, but for a shorter time than Delta.)
Delta responded to United and Continental in a DOT filing, saying that it is not “abandoning Haneda service. Delta’s Los Angeles-Haneda flight resumes on June 2, and Delta’s Detroit- Haneda flight resumes on June 16 — both in full compliance with the Department’s 90 day dormancy condition.” The Atlanta-based carrier also points out that “United does not mention the Japanese tsunami or its impact on U.S.-Tokyo air service. Delta’s response of temporarily suspending Haneda service until the immediate effects of the disaster have abated.”
There’s been no word from the DOT yet, but it will be interesting to see what is said. As Delta mentioned, the service is scheduled to resume within 90 days, meaning they are in compliance with the DOT’s ruling. Even if Delta’s service suspension was to last longer, I have to think that an unpredictable and incredibly harsh natural disaster is a pretty good reason to halt service temporarily.
But, with all that in mind…I do think that United and Continental have a very interesting point here that they didn’t bring up (though it wouldn’t affect the dormancy rules). In early March – before the earthquake and tsunami – Delta updated its schedule to reflect a capacity reduction at Haneda, replacing 747s with 777s this summer. As the always-useful Airline Route blog points out, the use of the 747 was a selling point for Delta’s service to Los Angeles and Detroit.
In its tentative order awarding the slots to Delta, the DOT said that Delta’s “significant capacity advantage is particularly compelling at Los Angeles,” and said in its final order that using the 747 on the LAX-HND route would “inject significant capacity into the U.S.-Tokyo market by Delta’s use of B747 aircraft.”
The DOT also said in its tentative order that Delta’s “proposed use of B747 aircraft for its Detroit service would also maximize use of its hub gateway in serving Haneda.” Delta said in its application that it “is proposing its largest aircraft – the Boeing 747-400 for Detroit. The 403 seat capacity of the 747 will help to maximize the value of the scarce Haneda slots that are available to U.S. carriers.”
Why do I bring this up? When objecting to the awards to Delta, both United and Continental (separate at the time) expressed doubts about Delta’s plan to utilize the 747.
“The likelihood that Delta would continue offering two daily B-747 flights between Detroit and Tokyo, one serving Haneda and the other serving Narita, is questionable,” said Continental. “If Delta operates its Haneda flights with smaller aircraft or terminates them altogether the Department’s premise for awarding Delta Haneda authority would evaporate,” the carrier added.
United warned that “the purported capacity advantages of Delta’s proposed Los Angeles and Detroit service may be largely illusory,” noting that Delta “already operates daily non-stop service to NRT from Detroit and Los Angeles using B747 aircraft. It may have considerable difficulty selling twice as many daily seats at Detroit, where the local market is far too small to support a doubling of capacity, and at Los Angeles, where extensive Tokyo service already exists and where Delta’s prospects of generating any significant volume of connecting traffic for its HND service are slim.”
In the case of Newark-Haneda and San Francisco-Haneda, Continental and United would’ve operated the 777-200, obviously much closer in size to what Delta has currently scheduled than the 747-400 service originally proposed.
Interesting stuff.
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