VitalAccurateThinking

It's All About Capacity in Denver

In Denver, the airport re-opened, but that does not mean people are not stranded.

As planes began taking off again at noon Friday, passengers with long-standing reservations filled most of the outbound flights. That was bad news for those waiting to rebook flights canceled during the storm.

Airline officials tried to explain to unhappy travelers at the airport that they cannot simply bring in extra planes to clear the backlog, and those stranded learned it could be Christmas -- or later -- before they can catch a plane at DIA.

"When we get an airplane, we run it 10 hours a day every day," said Frontier spokesman Joe Hodas. "It's not like we can decide Dayton's not important and just pull some planes from there."

There's just not enough capacity in the airline system to handle a 36 hour outage instantaneously. It will take time to clear the backlog. The key is to start flowing airplanes and flight crews into and out of Denver as fast as possible and get people moving. After that, it is just a matter of time.

Me, I am not going to make it to Denver this year until a week later. It is probably better that way. My slight cold has gotten worse and I am under the weather. Hopefully, I will be better by Monday to attend dinner at a friend's house. The worst part is the weather in Houston is pretty darn good and I am trapped inside today. The dogs are restless and could really use a morning at the dog park. We will see how I feel tomorrow, but it does not look good today.

posted by Jim VAT @ 8:48 AM