Delta Air Lines has been cancelling hundreds of flights througout the weekend, while other airlines operate without issue. And weather certainly hasn’t been a unique issue for Delta during this time.
It wasn’t exactly clear what was happening to trigger the meltdown, and Delta hasn’t explained it publicly. However, aviation watchdog JonNYC explained the issue as “crew restrictions” and postulated that Delta’s turnover in scheduling has been a problem when things go sideways – and that there had been a snowball effect from weather at the start of last week.
Unsurprisingly, internally Delta is blaming weather – but not near their hubs. “Scattered thundershowers over Central Florida” of course affect many airlines and don’t leave to cancelling 100, 200, and more flights per day. Again on Sunday Delta cancelled more flights than any other airline in the world.
It’s worth mentioning that internally DL is placing some of the blame on “scattered thundershowers over Central Florida” w/ some ground stops etc, but I’d personally assume that would have impacted others as well.
— JonNYC (@xJonNYC) May 3, 2026
The issue seems to be Delta’s inability to schedule pilots properly, combined with insufficient pilot hiring and turning over in scheduling. This is well-known inside the company. In fact, the pilot issue even came up during the airline’s most recent earnings call – and they do not expect to fix it quickly (which means we can expect mass cancellations to happen again as summer storms roll in).
- During the first quarter earnings call last month, CEO Ed Bastian acknowledged the reliability hit they’ve taken and identified the problem as their pilot contract.
[O]ver the past several months, particularly following severe weather, our reliability and recovery haven’t met consistently enough our high standards. …Teams are taking targeted actions to improve resilience and recovery, as well as addressing challenges that have resulted from contractual changes to our Pilot Working Agreement that came into effect over the past year. While this will take a little bit of time to work through, we’re partnering with our pilots and union leadership to ensure we deliver the reliability that Delta is known for.
- Chief Operating Officer Dan Janki elaborated, saying they expect issues to linger through the summer and that’ll take through the “back half of the year” to address.
As we talked about, we don’t have the resilience that we’re known for related to that… It’ll take us a little bit of time here as we work through it through the summer.
And there’s no doubt, when you’re flying more intensive operation, and as you see with weather, some of that will be highlighted more. But we expect to make progress on it as we progress through the summer and through the back half of the year.
JonNYC tags an explanation for how Delta’s crew assignments keep breaking down when weather rolls in, in a way that’s unique to them and other airlines don’t experience.
Delta’s problem starts when flights need pilots outside the normal schedule, especially after weather or other disruptions create open assignments. The process Delta has backed itself into over a period of years is slow, expensive, and problems cascade, leaving flights uncovered even when there are pilots willing to pick up the trips.
- In the older system, crew schedulers called pilots one by one, in seniority order, until someone accepted the trip. Delta later moved much of that process to an automated calling system, which could contact many eligible pilots at once. ARCOS is the automated crew-callout system Delta uses for open flying.
- That made coverage faster for scheduling, but it created nuisance calls for pilots: a pilot could be awakened for a trip, indicate willingness to fly it, wait, and then lose it to someone more senior. They’d try to go back to sleep, then they’d get another call, accept the trip and lose it.
- To reduce those nuisance calls, Delta and the pilot union created smaller call groups, so pilots would only be contacted when they had a more realistic chance of getting the trip. If Delta contacted too many pilots at once, they’d owe penalties. ARCOS sends automated notifications to eligible pilots for extra flying.
- Increasingly, Delta used an emergency-style coverage method that bypassed the normal seniority sequence. That filled trips faster, but it skipped seniority and Delta had to pay the pilot that got skipped.
23M7 is the provision in the pilot agreement dealing with pay protection when Delta bypasses the normal seniority-based assignment process. Delta uses the emergency-style “inverse assignment” process and skips over the senior pilot who should have had priority, that skipped pilot can be paid for the trip even though another pilot flies it. That payment opportunity is what makes being “in the pool” valuable, even for pilots who may not actually expect or intend to fly the assignment.
- To determine who was getting skipped, a pilot had to have been willing to accept, which created a problem where pilots were auto-accepting trips in order to be eligible. Delta was using an automated system in place of calls, and pilots had a fixed period of time to respond before the sytem moved on to the next person. But too many auto-accepts caused the system to work slowly. A trip can sit with one pilot, then another, then another, with each step adding delay.
- The problem is worse on fleets where Delta does not have enough spare pilots to absorb disruptions without relying heavily on overtime. And understaffed, inexperienced schedules take longer to resolve open trips or make mistakes with downline consequences for other flights.
Delta’s software has issues. Its pilot contract, negotiated to address problems Delta had created, helped built a new inefficient system. And this all becomes a problem when Delta doesn’t hire enough pilots or retain their best schedulers.
It’s easy to blame ‘the pilot contract’ that Delta management agreed to and that was a response to previous issues created by management. But they’re going to have to solve it, they’re going to have to work with their pilot union doing so, and they’re going to have to spend some money to get out from under the operational mess. In the meantime, Delta isn’t as reliable as they used to be. And they seem to have greater challenges than peers climbing out from under problems when they surface.
If they breathing, they lying. The Delta creed. Ask ole Prashithead Sharma and Suman Hairplugs how they calculated their 1% GDP fib for cobrand spend a few years ago. Rounding a number that is barely over half a percent all the way up to a full percent. Classic Delta! My how the mighty fall hard.
Tim
I think Delta’s highly valuable mileage program and its premier international partners such as Saudia and Aeroflot (when allowed) will enable it to ride out this storm
@ Gary — Nice to see the premium on-time machine getting a little overdue karma.Thos would be a perfect time for United to move on that JetBlue takeover and strangle Delta in New York, Chicago and South Florida. Beat ’em while they are down!
Tim Delta Dunn must be melting down. OR finding an angle to blame somebody or something else for Deltas latest of many mess ups.
Third world IT department with a 3rd grade level app lead by a bunch of circus clowns.
Delta is falling behind United and American fast.
This is what happens when a glob of Ed’s hair gel lands inside one of his ancient crew scheduling servers. Not even the usual worthless statement from the public relations machine.
I’m sure American Express is not impressed. Time to short DAL.
Delta has the best premium perception in the US by far along with the best co-brand. That might change over a long period of time, but it’s not going to change overnight, and it’s not going to change at all because of these isolated issues.
The larger point is that the Delta experience, often, is either incrementally better or about on par with UA and AA. But building out both the marketing and the operations to challenge that market leading perception takes a long time.
UA sure talks like they’ve already done it. Spoiler alert… they have not.
I think why so many of us root for AA is that they know they have not done it, they know they have a long road to get there, but maybe if they have a leadership team that can play a better 10 year game than what they did over the last 10 years, they could actually have something worthwhile in 2035.
This is why we need an EU261 equivalent in the US. Delta is screwing over passengers, taking their interest free loans (when we purchase specific flights months in-advance), then cancels them last minute, and either refund or rebooking. Clearly, this isn’t weather; it’s staffing; that’s under their control. Delta should owe more than mere refunds.
I seem to recall this happening last summer as well as a certain someone argued it was nothing more than weather. UA can’t increase its presence in FLL fast enough.
The fall from grace is happening in real time for all of us to watch. So sad.
Premium FAILURE at Delta
What’s next…they gonna take away Clear+ from Diamonds?? Oh…wait… Snacks on my flight from MSP to DLH??? Oh…wait… My ability to get a First Class upgrade ahead of dead heading pilots?? Oh…wait…
I wonder if a group of pilots have figured a way to game the system. Getting paid for not flying is a great incentive.
Just flew Delta LGA to BHM on 5/3/26, was 4 hours late, clear weather, claimed “maintenance issues and paperwork”, never again, no more Delta. Guess was lucky not canceled.
Tim?
Where is your breathless defense?
Tim??
Delta will just further pad their schedule so they can still be “on time” even when they’re late. A shame.
There’s a crisis at Delta? Time for Bastian to leave abruptly on vacation.
@1990 – Spot on!
When delta CAN blame weather it triggers a series of benefits to them in terms of passenger compensation. Whether it’s truly weather related or not they are less obligated to grant mileage bonuses, refunds, accommodations, etc saving them a lot of money, and by blaming something external, they save face.
@Peter — Delta will lose that ‘perception’ if they fail customers by not operating timely.
@Christian — Ed does not deserve $100m… especially when flights don’t operate reliably.
doc
just to be clear,
Delta mainline does not fly LGA to BHM. Delta Connection does (Endeavor specifically).
Endeavor is not having crew scheduling problems. Delta mainline is.
Regional carriers usually have worse on-time and cancellation rates to/from NYC because it is easier to delay a regional jet than mainline flight and affect fewer passengers
that said, UA has the widest gap between RJ and mainline flight on-time performance of the 4 US carriers that use RJs – which just says they “prop up” their mainline performance by taking it out on their RJ flights. The DOT presents the cumulative on-time for all flights and also breaks down mainline vs. regional flights. Given how much larger UA’s RJ operation is compared to UA mainline, it matters a whole lot more if UA regional flights get cancelled at a higher rate than DL mainline. Same is even more true for AA.
@Tim Dunn — Stop pretending “Delta Connection” isn’t Delta. Almost no one cares about the nuances of wholly-owned subsidiary versus mainline, when things go wrong. Delta sells the tickets. Delta is on the livery, the seats, the cups, the napkins. Delta Medallions get complimentary upgrades on Delta Connection; Delta SkyClub members get access to SkyClubs when flying on Delta Connection, etc. It’s Delta.
of course Endeavor is part of the DL brand just as is true for every regional/major brand.
The point – which you clearly can’t grasp – is that Endeavor is not having pilot staffing issues so someone’s anecdotal delay has nothing to do with the issue being discussed here.
and since other airlines have lower RJ on-time percentages than DL does – in some cases to boost their mainline on-time and cancellation performance – then walking away from DL could backfire.
The only other airline that flies NYC-BHM is B6 and their system on-time is 10% lower than DL connection – which is lower than DL mainline.
sometimes facts and rationality are better ways to make decisions
Well, I know of a bunch of Airbus pilots who just came available.
@Tim Dunn — Oh, no… not the merely ‘anecdotal’ first-hand experience vs. ‘true’ data false dichotomy, yet again. Well, the data shows that Delta has had a rough week. Period.
And, yes, Tim, you know what, United also had a rough week. Can’t hit the lamp post on the way into Newark. However, the top prize, obviously, goes to Spirit. ‘Rough’ takes on new meaning with NK.
The game has changed and you morons don’t see it. They make money increasing system load factor while burning less fuel. Blame the CX on take your pick out of the card deck. It’s a band aid until they can bring down the system by 3% this summer. Optimal NOPE but type don’t have more market cap then AAL + UAL combined by accident.
Spectrum boy tried to do what he does best and find a safe space redirect all the bad recent news about Georgia Klan Air to UA and AA, but with three major bad headlines in a week, and more bad reviews with the major aviation bloggers on YouTube and Insta it is not working. Now the spin is to say something with Delta on the side is not DL (but for Dr Dao the kid claims non UA express is United…hypocrisy anyone…but that is common on the spectrum).
Never meet your heroes kid…
And what is this othe nonsense about market CAP (tell us you know nothing about business without telling us you know nothing about business). Market CAP is meaningless with regards to performance or profit in these spaces. Open AI has a massive market CAP, but never made a dime, or Uber massive CAP and losses, etc. No one buying a ticket cares about market CAP.
This is why you pay the Delta premium – to get cancelled flights and them blaming the weather when it is really their own systems. Hope you’re doing okay there Tim!
1990
the problem w/ social media is that thrives on soundbites to the lack of perspective and also brings out the nut jobs that think that life consists of constantly trying to one up someone else.
Airlines are complex businesses and things go wrong. Dwelling on every little piece of news – whether it is good for bloggers or not – isn’t conducive to a great understanding of what matters in life
Hey Tim, here’s a perspective – I just checked the NYC airport traffic dashboard and for March United was up and Delta down again – a trend that has been going on for awhile – why is Delta losing share in NYC?
I remember you saying with the Newark issues that United would be permanently impacted in NYC and Delta would be the winner. Delta didn’t even win in 2025 (the year of the issues) and are now losing even more in 2026 – I’m sure these cancellations are really going to help them now.
I find it funny that you say “dwelling on every little piece of news isn’t conducive to understanding what happens in life” – you do this every time something happens at UA and AA – maybe you can do it for Delta too.
Also trust me, we all can think of a certain nut job that thinks that life consists of constantly trying to one up someone else
Tim didn’t mind “dwelling on every piece of news” when another airline was struggling a few years back. Here are some of Tim’s musings on this matter in the past:
“Consumers, regardless of the price, buy their tickets with the expectation that their flights will be operated and reasonably close to on-time.”
“The best way to provide accountability fir airline service failures is to either levy fines by the government or to allow customers to book something on their own with another airline at the expense of the first airline if they cannot be protected within x amount off time of their original arrival time and then for the DOT to publish protection information by airline, city, and route. In other words a mandatory rule 240.”
“Over a significant enough period of time – say a year – weather can’t be an excuse.”
Andy,
here is a trend that is characteristic not just of UA but also the entire UA fan base.
1. You pounce on any bit of news – good or bad – to declare victory and yet you refuse to consider context.
2. I have told you and others that DL’s share relative to carriers at LGA and JFK is higher than it has ever been. DL’s focus is not on beating UA in market share in NYC; in fact, UA beats DL in ASMs and a whole lot of metrics and yet DL manages to make money using the same business model that UA uses – DL just does it better.
3. and I have also said that DL will re-add flights to Asia from JFK and when it does THAT will be the real strategic challenge for UA. Not only is the A350 – in either version -a far more capable and efficient plane than anything UA has or will have in its fleet for at least a decade – but the hole in DL’s strategy in NYC is a lack of Asia service; DL already is the largest domestic carrier from NYC and also is larger to deep S. America. It is when DL restarts Asia that UA’s strategic advantage will end – and THAT is what you should be afraid of.
Like a petulant child that has to pound its fists on the table proclaiming victory, you are incapable of understanding the big picture. with 20% more flights than UA and a higher percentage of corporate traffic and loyalty/credit card revenue, the chances are pretty high that DL makes more money from NYC than UA. That TREND would be in line w/ the rest of the system.
for now, you should also be worried as DL focuses on California to Asia and slowly starts eroding UA’s advantage there.
DL doesn’t intend to compete for size with UA – not in NYC or anywhere else. But UA does have advantages because it serves markets that DL does not.
As those disappear – and are not replaced by comparable markets on UA’s part – the balance between DL and UA will increasingly shift EVEN MORE in DL’s favor, no matter how much you and UA tout size as all that matters.
and Jim,
you can’t quite grasp that other airlines fix their problems and DL will too.
You and others love to pounce on every mistake that DL makes while forgetting that the TREND line is still very much in DL’s favor on a wide variety of statistics.
You are precisely the kind of person that explains why other people pounce on every failure at other companies including UA
when you are ready to admit that UA is a distant #2 even with their labor cost advantage and AA and WN – which overlap far more with UA than DL – are showing great progress in fixing what has ailed them
@Tim Dunn — “you can’t quite grasp that other airlines fix their problems and Delta will too” — the irony is that your comments that I quoted were about an airline that had been pretty high on its own supply for much of the 2010s, but recently failed.
And on that same point, I’ll also note that practically every time someone notes on one of these blogs that United or American are improving, you remind us that Delta has a superior fleet of 757s or running an underperforming hub in Seattle doesn’t matter or there’s no reason you would want to have a decent Pacific network. You’re not exactly credible on the concept of “other airlines fix their problems” because often when someone notes that one of them did, you manipulate some obscure statistic to make it look like a Delta win.
Also, you somehow managed to drag UA being No. 2, AA, WN, labor costs and network dynamics into our conversation. That’s probably the 471,253rd time you’ve tried to deflect a conversation. I didn’t mention any of those topics and your comments about them are just reheated Tim slop with an elementary school insult mixed in.
You always try to make this personal Tim. I actually have high status on Delta and am well aware of Delta’s strengths and weaknesses. I just find your schtick to be tiresome.
One request — when you reply, please don’t try to condescend by calling me “son.” If you do, I might have to get off the Internet for a few days.
@ Tim — Who do you try to pass blame to a captive subsidiary? Delta controls the decisions as to who operates their flights. Therefore, it s Delta’s failure when their regional operators fail to deliver timely service. 99% of the customers don’t even understand the difference.
Jim
not one thing I wrote is any different w/ this situation.
Problem is that you and a whole lot of people want to make it a much bigger deal than it is.
UA’s cancellation rate for January – the data that Jon cited as part of starting this whole discussion about DL’s pilot staffing issues – was barely 1% better. AA was far worse than DL.
you know who continues to run an operation w/ low cancellation rates? WN – and I have said that for many months.
Of course, they have a very small operation (relatively speaking) north of BWI so are less exposed to serious IROPS but let’s not pretend that even if UA dethrones DL in cancellation rates, they will beat DL in totality operationally and esp. in baggage handling where UA has sat at the bottom of the industry; DL hasn’t had a single metric – even for 1 month- that has been at the bottom of the industry for a very long time.
and, no, it isn’t personal. It is about facts
I find the incessant need of a loud but very vocal subset of UA internet fans who can’t accept that UA is a solid #2 and is nowhere near taking a leadership position in the industry.
A whole lot of them just can’t stand to admit that UA might be the most improved over the past five years but they are not in totality anywhere close to #1.
I participate in social media to post facts.
DL needs to fix their pilot staffing issue but they still run a better operation than most of the industry and, in totality, probably will still be at the top of the industry.
If anyone outperforms DL, it will be WN but they sacrifice on-time and do not have operations in as many operationally challenging airports.
I specifically looked for the word “son” on this page and you are the only one that used it
@Tim Dunn — What does ‘what matters in life’ then? I’d think reliable operations matters.
@timdunn
Doc didn’t say he flew on the direct LGA-BHM flight or connected through ATL. Seems like you’ve made a possibly erroneous assumption in your irrational headlong rush to defend DL
of course operational reliability matters.
but operational reliability isn’t determined by a weekend of single digit percentage of cancellations.
No one has bothered to note that this has been going on and off for months. it doesn’t seem to happen in the middle of the week.
Don’t ask me to explain it but when there was just 1% difference in cancellation rate between DL and UA in January when this was going on, it just doesn’t amount to near as big of a deal as the “all of a sudden” bunch of discussion about it would make one think
@Tim Dunn — Maybe so. Well, I’ve got some itineraries coming up soon, and so far so good. Picked my meals! Hope I get to actually enjoy that freakin’ ravioli. Bah…
@Tim Dunn — gee, more cherry-picked statements about … <> WN’s cancellation rate and DL’s baggage handling, neither of which we were talking about.
“I participate in social media to post facts.” Yeah but a lot of what you post is opinion too. You excel at telling others to post facts and then wedging in your opinion at the same time. I’ve got receipts if you want them. In the same post where you said you post facts, you also wrote at least three opinions, including that Delta “probably will still be at the top” and United is “not … anywhere close to #1.”
You’ve called me “son” in the past to try to condescend. It was funny.
“And no it isn’t personal” — but also “you can’t quite grasp that …”, “you and others love to …”, and “when you are ready to admit.” Looks like you couldn’t keep your story straight for 2 hours.
I would bet you money that, at the margin, businesspeople are booking away from Delta right now because they don’t want to run the risk of missing a client event or getting home to their families on a Saturday afternoon instead of a Friday evening. This absolutely matters.
Just wanna say, I like this @Jim guy. Please keep coming back, Jim.
Oh I’ll happily admit United is number 2 for airline profit in the US. But most flyers don’t care about how much profit the airline is making, they care about the experience Tim.
But you also said the hole for UA is their lack of Asia services from NYC – wait there’s literally no US airline flying any routes from NYC to Asia – so it is a hole for everyone? But you raise an interesting point – the lack of russia flying etc has made it difficult to fly those routes. But it does so happen that one airline is launching NYC – ICN in September this year! Hurrah! ICN is a Sky team hub so surely Delta is doing this? Oh wait, it is United launching this route? Care to explain Tim. Actually Delta is considering launching JFK to ICN apparently – so wait United is already launching the exact same route that Delta’s supposed “most superior fleet blah blah” that United can’t match is literally being matched earlier by United. Also isn’t this literal proof of another airline “fixing their problems” and you not acknowledging it or considering it? You seem to act like Delta is the only airline with the capability to fix problems while United is here drastically changing their product, investing in their fleet (and for good reason right, their product and fleet were getting old) – the problem is Delta isn’t and still demands everyone pay an extra 20% to go to the routes. And Yes we know that Delta has ordered 20 A350s with a nicer Delta One that will be delivered sometime in the next 15-20 years and everyone else should be trembling in their boots because Delta decided to invest for once…
@Andy — Totally agreed on financials. But… “there’s literally no US airline flying any routes from NYC to Asia”… umm, what??? Delta flies to TLV (technically, Asia), United (EWR, fine, not technically NYC) to NRT (Tokyo), and American (from JFK, which is in Queens, NYC) to Tokyo, Doha (also, technically, Asia).
yeah, I’m not sure with what Andy said.
I said “but the hole in DL’s strategy in NYC is a lack of Asia service”
UA flies to Tokyo and Seoul; neither fly to TLV right now but have in the past and no US airline is flying anywhere in the Middle East.
and I don’t expect passengers to care about financials – but there are a whole lot of people here that love to tout how well UA is doing – until you point out that sales and leaseback transactions just boost the income statement at the expense of the balance sheet.
clearly, aviation social media involves various groups of people who do care about financials because I am hardly the only one that discusses them.
and UA fans, surprisingly, never seem to discuss UA’s horrific baggage handling performance while touting everything else good that UA does.
are we supposed to pretend that baggage handling doesn’t matter or everything else is supposed to offset such bad baggage performance?
We all have opinions, Jim. I just happen to keep the perspective that doesn’t blow a 1% difference in cancellation rate out of proportion.
If people start booking away because of DL’s performance, then it will become apparent enough in financials.
You do realize that AA’s cancellation rate for Jan was way worse than DL’s and yet AA (and WN) posted very strong revenue numbers and outlook?
My point remains that a whole lot of people blow anecdotes and a few datapoints into far more than they are and never bother to come back and admit they were wrong.
Once again, this went on and off throughout the first quarter and DL still had the best operating margin among US airlines.
It just isn’t the big deal that you and a whole lot of people want to make it out to be.
But that doesn’t change that DL knows they need to fix it and they will just as other airlines have fixed other things that didn’t work at those companies.
and, Andy,
DL’s first A350-1000s will be delivered in a matter of months. It is, once again, your inability to admit that DL made the right call on higher capacity, longer range new generation widebodies that is typical of you and others that can’t admit that there are actually a lot of things about which DL has and will have an advantage
DL waited for the A350 and Airbus simply made a larger and more capable aircraft than the B787 which AA and UA (and later HA/AS) committed to.
UA is in a pi8ng match w/ Airbus and Rolls Royce and could be willing to give up 10 years of operational parity with DL while they wait for the 777-8 or higher performance 777-9
@Tim Dunn — “We all have opinions, Jim.” Yes, but you’re the one who is consistently flooding these comment zones telling other people to stick to facts while sharing your own opinions. There is plenty of room for both. But the way that you lecture everyone on here about facts and then weigh in with your own biased opinions is one of the parts of your schtick that has gotten old.
“You do realize that AA’s cancellation rate for Jan was way worse than DL’s and yet AA (and WN) posted very strong revenue numbers and outlook?” Three points on this, Tim. First — are you satisfied benchmarking DL to AA? Is that what you consider to be success? Second — sometimes you seem to think that AA is on the verge of failure. Now you are calling them out as a quasi-success story? Pick a lane. Third — the effects of annoyed customers who begin to book elsewhere will be felt for quarters to come. Spirit didn’t crumble in a quarter. United didn’t rebuild their program in a quarter. Telling us that the current quarter is fine totally misses the point. This is about the guy who splits his loyalty between Delta and Alaska being delayed coming home this coming Friday and deciding to start checking Alaska first. On the margin, Delta is losing business from this.
Speaking of coming back and admitting you are wrong, did you ever correct yourself when you told me that share buybacks don’t result in shares being retired? If you want to criticize others for not admitting they were wrong, you need to own your own misstatements too. I’ll gladly list some of them if you want to correct the record.
I have never said someone else can’t share opinions.
I have said and will continue to say that opinions better align w/ reality and facts. Some people love to make up their own facts and then act like surprised when someone shoots them down w/ verifiable facts.
I don’t recall nor do I care whether you or I were right about share buybacks. I’m not even sure that what I said – even if you copy and paste – would be done in the complete context.
You clearly are interested in arguing. I am not.
specific to THIS discussion – about which you yourself offered your own opinion – this can’t be that big of an issue or DL’s finances would have shown it for the 1st quarter. This didn’t just start this past weekend.
Are you going to admit you are trying to blow things way out of proportion and that you have a chip on your shoulder that someone needs to knock off?
@Tim Dunn — “I have never said someone else can’t share opinions.” What about this time — in which you admonished everyone to stick to facts, then proceeded to share plenty of your own opinions. “first of all, let’s deal w facts and not the statements that many make that are not backed up by facts.”
If you’re curious about what you said about buybacks, you can go to Cranky Flier, June 13, 2024, and read your incorrect statements in full context. Your statements demonstrated a complete lack of understanding of how buybacks work (you’re also not very good at special dividends). And you didn’t correct yourself. I’ll invite you to make that correction now. You managed to type the words “as to Nick’s comment, a buyback would not increase the share of Elliott’s holdings because all stock of the same class is changed at the same proportion.” That is such a convoluted statement that I’m truly not sure if it is incorrect or just thoughtless. You do seem interested in the rest of us to task to admit if we were wrong, but you don’t seem to take that same responsibility upon yourself.
“This can’t be that big of an issue or DL’s finances would have shown it for the 1st quarter.” So your analysis is that something that happened in the second quarter should affect the P&L for the first quarter? God help anyone who relies on Seeking Alpha to make an investment decision.
“You clearly are interested in arguing. I am not.” That was you after barfing 1,900 words of comment slop all in the same day in which you do, in fact, argue.
I don’t have a dog in this fight Tim. I have mid-level or better status at two airlines, including Delta. Sometimes I fly Delta, sometimes I fly others (although I’m flying Delta a lot less these days for a long list of reasons). I can fly out of five airports, my company doesn’t care which airline I fly, and there are plenty of options for me to get to the places I need to go. You don’t need to worry about me having a chip on my shoulder. I’m just pointing out the holes in your schtick.
I’ve said it before, I’ll say it again. If you would stick to intellectually honest analysis about aspects of aviation that you actually understand (fleets, networks, performance statistics, etc.) and stay away from concepts that you clearly have no education in (finance, law), you could have some influence around here instead of being the “oh I wonder what kind of pretzels Delta Tim Dunn is going to twist himself into to spin Delta cancelling hundreds of flights as a good strategy” chump.
yes, you do have a dog.
And it has nothing to do with Delta’s flight cancellations.
You like a whole lot of people have tried for years to shut me up and prove me wrong – and have failed.
Anyone that bothers to keep a list of what someone else has said incorrectly so they can bring it up later needs help.
Really.
None of which changes the fact that DL”s crew related cancellations started in December. Surely you remember all of the UA fan brats that were convinced that DL would lose its place at the top of the industry for 2025 – and yet that didn’t happen.
Not once in the discussion of this topic have I said it doesn’t matter. I have said that no other airline does enough better for it to make a difference. The difference between UA and AA in cancellation rates for Jan -the latest month the DOT has reported – was 1%.
AA had a cancellation rate almost 2X higher than DL – and AA managed to boost its unit revenues.
You and others want to make a mountain out of a molehill even as you desperately try to denigrate me.
You said previously that you would have to lay off the internet if I called you “son” again.
So, get going, son. You really haven’t added anything here.
@Tim Dunn, you have done your standard Tim Trick of barfing up thousands of words of comment slop without addressing the core issues. Here’s a summary of our dialogue today:
* I called you on the fact that you noted that customers buy their tickets with the expectation that the airline is going to flight their schedule. It seems like you would rather discuss the Kentucky Derby; I still haven’t seen anywhere that you meaningfully explained the contradiction in how you treat cancellations at Every Other Airline vs. cancellations at Delta.
* You did do your standard Tim Trick of mentioning unrelated facts (baggage handling!!! Southwest!!! BWI irrops!!!) to deflect.
* You contradicted yourself in a matter of hours by saying that this isn’t personal, then condescending to me. Cute.
* I asked you to explain your statement about AA by explaining whether you think they are winning or losing or a benchmark for Delta (you sort of implied all three). You ignored that — I assume because it’s inconsistent and impossible to defend.
* You griped that other people don’t correct incorrect statements. I called you on one of yours. You ignored that too, beyond telling me that I need help (on the same day that you said you don’t want this to be personal!). Hopefully you at least read up on how stock buybacks work between writing the posts where you contradicted yourself.
* You still haven’t explained how lost revenues from cancellations in Q2 would affect revenues in Q1.
* You said that you’ve never told people to stick to facts. I quoted where you had. You didn’t correct yourself. Instead you flung out more condescending comments.
You’re arguing out of an incessant need and yet I will respond one more time.
The cancellations didn’t just start this past weekend which is why if they mattered they would have affected 1Q revenue.
AA operationally was far worse than DL not just in Jan but the entire Q1 and yet their revenue looked better than it was for them before; operational reliability certainly matters but it simply is not the only or even major determinant of financial success.
I never said that operational reliability didn’t matter or that DL has slipped; you just can’t stick to the actual facts that show that what has happened at DL matters enough to make a difference financially.
I, once again, have never said you or anyone else can’t state opinions but your opinions- if they are related to something factual – better be based on facts.
You, just like the UA crowd, ignore the facts I state and argue I never addressed them when this entire discussion is available for anyone to see and shows that you are the one making up and ignoring facts in pursuit of your agenda.
You clearly have an axe to grind. Emotionally healthy people don’t hold onto something that was said by someone from years ago in order to regurgitate it to prove someone wrong.
The internet is clearly not a safe place for you.
Go get help. Seriously.
You said you would walk away if I called son.
Walk away, son.
@Tim Dunn, @Jim — Top of the mornin’ to you both! Tim, bud, maybe, hear me out, Ed and his team really should get-on with fixin’ those PWA/23M7 and ARCOS issues, so that Jim can’t ‘own you’ on here, dawg. Like, most folks don’t care why the planes aren’t flyin’… just get’em flyin’ again, quick!
1990
happy sunrises to you too.
DL recognizes that they have to fix the pilot staffing problems including the costly overtime it has created. Their execs said so.
Problem that some can’t grasp is that this problem has existed for almost 6 months; they act like it is a new big problem because a bunch of aviation social media sites did massive coverage of it.
DL has had far worse days since the first of the year and they manage to operate their schedule fairly reliably for most of the week – which is why it really isn’t making a big difference in big picture numbers.
and it is DL’s sheer domestic size that allows them to protect passengers fairly well; most of the cancellations involve ATL where DL can pretty easily protect someone on a flight within 2 hours. and these cancellations are not last minute so they start the process hours in advance.
I realize aviation social media is far from big picture focused but I suspect this will be yet another issue that has been blown out of proportion and few if any people can actually prove from large scale data that it made a difference in the industry.
but some people will undoubtedly try
@Tim Dunn — Thank you, sir. Actually a nice day in NYC (a lil windy, up to the 80s today). Oh, no doubt, Delta will recover (and mostly has already), even if there are more hiccups. Again, I’m hopeful my routes this week will go on as-scheduled.
Speaking of coverage (and these blogs), it is wild how the Boarding Area affiliates recycle the same stories. Sure, maybe Gary leads this one; Ben or Matt follows (I think of them as the ‘Big 3’); perhaps the PYOK guy has a scoop, but no one seems to comment over there. And, Brett, cranky as he may be, does not participate in any of the ‘muck’ (which is probably for the best). Meanwhile, Gary can’t get enough of the National Enquirer gossip/rage-bait. Eh, gotta pay the bills!
(Real talk, what’s Delta’s play for Spirit assets? Airbus pilots, slots, gates on-the-cheap?)
1990
we are COMPLETELY on the same page on the competitiveness in trying to all cover the same stories – most of which are anecdotes blown way out of proportion.
Matt is by far the most political while Gary focuses on anecdotes that are not a surprise in industries as large as airlines.
Ben seems to have slowed his focus on hosting DL/UA cage fights
as for NK assets, most are aircraft that would cost too much to reconfigure from NK’s high density configurations.
Boeing is getting close to getting the MAX 7 and 10 certified which decreases demand for aircraft even as fuel prices necessitate pulling capacity out of the system.
I suspect that NK’s planes will sit in the desert for a while.
@Tim Dunn — “You’re arguing out of an incessant need and yet I will respond one more time.” — LOL, you’re still here too, just in your new-and-improved even-more condescending format.
“The cancellations didn’t just start this past weekend which is why if they mattered they would have affected 1Q revenue.” — that is such an clueless statement. To say they didn’t affect revenue is almost certainly incorrect. Revenue may have been strong despite the cancellations. But unless Delta is flying a bunch of empty planes, cancellations are going to affect revenue. And you’re completely ignoring the fact that the problem seems to be getting worse and there isn’t a lot of certainty about when it will get better (which is going to start to cause people to book away). Not to mention the fact that this is increasing costs. Just a clueless understanding of a P&L.
“Emotionally healthy people don’t hold onto something that was said by someone from years ago in order to regurgitate it to prove someone wrong.” You griped about people failing to correct themselves (albeit without really suggesting which statement you disagreed with — if I’m being honest, it felt more like a general gripe to deflect, which is one of your Tim Tricks). I gave you an opportunity to either defend your statement that share buybacks don’t affect the number of shares outstanding. You neither defended or corrected it. Enough said. It would be a lot more useful for you to either defend or correct your statement than to pretend that you’re a psychologist.
“I never said that operational reliability didn’t matter” — this is another one of your tiresome Tim Tricks. You pretend someone else said something that they didn’t say to twist the conversation. Absolutely nowhere did I say or imply that you said that operational reliability didn’t matter. I guess we can agree that operational reliability does matter.
“I, once again, have never said you or anyone else can’t state opinions but your opinions” — I literally quoted your own words showing the exact opposite. You can’t even keep your story straight in the same comment string.
“Go get help. Seriously.” — this is what you do when you can’t defend what you’re saying. Do you have so little confidence in your thousands of words of comment slop that you type that the only reaction you have when someone calls you to account is to get defensive?
@1990 – thanks. 🙂
@Tim Dunn — Depends on my mood, but I do enjoy the occasional cage fight. Bah!
That’s fascinating, so a potential glut of aircraft on horizon, after years and years of limited supply. Yes, fuel is becoming more of an issue, and not just cost, but literal supply, in certain areas, less so in the US, thankfully; however, Europe, Asia, elsewhere may not be so fortunate. I mean, certain airports had shortages even before this (looking at you, JNB…)
1990
I enjoy cage fights too.
Esp. when there are weak people like Jim that regurgitate non-sense as if he has stumbled upon wisdom.
there will be a lot of capacity that will have to leave the airline system in the fall if this issue isn’t resolved – and I don’t think itwill be because there are too many people that benefit from the imbalance that now exists.
Jim,
you desperately want to argue including about things that I have said and you, not me, want to twist into knots just so you can keep arguing.
Get back w/ me when DL demonstrates financial harm from the pilot issue. Airlines regularly take charges when something disrupts their operation. If DL can, they will put a number on it and blame the pilots – but I don’t think they will.
The capacity cuts the industry faces are precisely what is needed to give DL time to get its pilot staffing situation straightened out and for UA to pull back on alot of growth that was never going to work.
there simply is nothing further to discuss.
But by all means hold onto this -bookmark and all rather than your cut and paste jobs – and throw it back in my face if I am wrong.
@Tim Dunn — looks like you’re moving from condescension to name-calling. Adorable.
“you desperately want to argue including about things that I have said” — correct. And you’re not defending them when you’re being held to account. Do stock buybacks reduce shares outstanding? Correct or explain. Put up or shut up. I told you where to find the whole thread so you can refresh yourself and correct me if you think I’m mis-quoting you. If you’re going to talk about finance and then act offended when you’re held to account when your statements are incorrect, you should stop talking about finance.
“you, not me, want to twist into knots” — What did I twist into knots? I quoted your own exact words.
“Get back w/ me when DL demonstrates financial harm from the pilot issue.” — You’re deflecting the argument again. The airline that has built its entire reputation on being the best in the country (and charges a premium on that basis) is cancelling flights for no good reason, with no apparent end in sight. It’s relevant whether you like it or not.
“bookmark and all rather than your cut and paste jobs” — tell me one thing that I took out of context. I’m standing by.
“The capacity cuts the industry faces are precisely what is needed to give DL time to get its pilot staffing situation straightened out” — so you’re admitting that Delta is reliant on the rest of the industry to get their own house in order? That’s quite a fall.
Reading this thread reminds me of that bar scene from The Social Network: “You’re like dating a Stair Master!!” lmao
@Captain Freedom — ‘You don’t have to study… let’s just talk…’
quit arguing, son, I mean, Jim. You haven’t contributed anything in your last 55 posts.
I do take great satisfaction that you are so wound up about me.
Again, seek help
The union would never have agreed to it, but if auto-accepts are causing so many issues I wonder about either (1) compelling pilots to take an accepted flight or (2) penalizing pilots in some way for auto-accepting and then declining (e.g. throwing them out of the pool for a day or blocking them from getting pass-over compensation for a day or two).
Gray,
there clearly are solutions.
DL has to notify in a means that allows pilots to pick up trips; it appears their new system does that. Pilots have to be ready to fly what they accept.
It appears DL is continuing with its hiring despite the slowdown – other big 4 airlines are as well – so the number of uncovered trips should go down