Re: Re: Distinguished Order of Miserabilists Update

[Jim Devine <jdevine@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Eugene wrote:
> Today I was on a flight from Memphis to San Francisco.  An Airbus 320,
> must hold 180
> people or more. -- only 24 people in coach.  Everybody in coach could have
> had a
> sleep with a  three seat row each!!  I've taken this same flight -- a year
> or so ago
> --when every seat was filled and people were turned away.  I haven't seen
> an empty
> plane like this in years and years -- maybe 10 years.  I knew the airlines
> were
> hurting but this shocked me.

what airline? if it's Southwest, this seems a symptom of recession... (If
it's Spirit, the faith-based airline, maybe not.)

Doug writes: >Last month, every leg of the New York-Tokyo and Tokyo-Sydney
route was (miserably) packed to the gills. I'd be wrong to conclude from
that that the Pacific Rim is booming.<

I think there's an asymmetry here, since the airlines work hard to
over-book or do whatever else fills the plane up. But they don't try to
under-book.

but the following question is quite relevant, since anecdotes can easily
deceive: >What are the industry load factors looking like?<

Jim Devine jdevine@xxxxxxx & http://bellarmine.lmu.edu/~JDevine