Southwest Airlines Community

When you do a flight search on Southwest, it will mark which flight is the cheapest for the day and which flight is the quickest for the day. Most of the options seem to be one or two stop flights on Saturday, so Fort Lauderdale might be better since there's more options and slightly closer than Miami is to Palm Beach.  " There is not currently a non-stop flight on the flight schedule (between now and January 4, 2023), however, one may be introduced when Southwest releases booking for more travel dates in mid-July." Though it's true that Southwest tends to announce new routes at the time of schedule releases, I find that it would be unlikely they would announce a nonstop route between PHX and PBI. I'd personally say that BNA, HOU, DAL and DEN would all be more likely to see a nonstop to PBI, but we never know with Southwest. I was surprised to see the BNA to HDN route.   -Andrew E DEN Based | Aviation Enthusiast ... View more

@Quillen087 wrote: Why do planes take sudden right & left turns after take off. Sometimes the plane seems to be almost sideways. How is this safe? In addition to what others have said, it also helps for more congested airports to get planes to take off more quickly due to minimum separations. Airplane one will fly straight, next one will turn right and the next turn left. If they were to all fly the same direction after takeoff, fewer planes would be able to get in the air due to the minimum separation requirement.  Sometimes there's obstacles like mountains or buildings that need more altitude in order to clear them. More often than not it's because they might be taking off in the opposite direction of the destination airport because pilots don't choose their runway, they get assigned by air traffic control.  Another reason could be noise abatement regulations to avoid planes flying over certain areas. It's perfectly safe, generally the maximum bank angle is 30 degrees which can feel completely vertical, but it's not.   Andrew E DEN Based | Aviation Enthusiast ... View more

The only airlines I know that fly between LAX and SAN are Delta and United. I don't recall if Southwest ever did it. There's plenty of 1 stop itineraries between LAX and SAN, just doesn't seem logical. I don't know why you'd connect through Vegas, just seems quicker to drive, cost may be similar. Heck, I've flown into LAX and driven down to San Diego. We won't know if they'll offer a nonstop connection until they would announce it, so who knows. It can be requested through the Contact Us link below or by social media.   Andrew E DEN Based | Aviation Enthusiast ... View more

It seems rather small for Southwest, with limited leisure and business traffic. Southwest flies to some pretty small airports (Bellingham, Hayden/Steamboat Springs, Montrose, Fresno, Corpus Christi, Harlingen). All of these are still bigger than Fayetteville, NC because they have either decent leisure or business traffic. If Southwest were to serve Fayetteville, NC, it would likely be to one airport, likely Baltimore or Atlanta. However, I would think that Southwest would just serve these people through RDU.   Andrew E DEN Based | Aviation Enthusiast ... View more

Southwest is doing really well in Hawaii, so I don't see them pulling out all together. Southwest is third in market share at Honolulu/Oahu; second at Kahului/Maui; third at Kona/Big Island; second at Lihue/Kauai. I have also noticed a cutback in flights to/from San Diego, Sacramento, and Phoenix. Hawaii flights take up a sizable portion of an aircrafts flying day, so due to plane and crew shortages, I'd assume Southwest has cut some of their under/lesser performing Hawaii routes to increase flight hours for flying within the lower 48 states. They may return, but they may not or they may return many years from now, we don't know. I've thought about Southwest doing a flight to Honolulu from Ontario since Hawaiian does that, but maybe Burbank would work better. Though it's honestly more likely that Southwest works in flights from Dallas-Love and/or Denver to Hawaii first.   Andrew E DEN Based | Aviation Enthusiast   ... View more

Southwest is resuming nonstop service between LGA and MCO on November 12th, but it will be operating on Saturdays only. My guess is because of crew and aircraft shortages and not being able to compete as well with the airlines that have bases in the NY area. There's daily nonstop flights from Long Island MacArthur Airport (ISP) to MCO. It's likely further away from you though than LGA is.   Andrew E DEN based | Aviation Enthusiast   ... View more

Well it looks like the problem is going out to Nassau as the return is fine and shows a stop in FLL. Going from RDU to NAS, there's one flight from RDU to FLL and from FLL to NAS. You'd arrive in FLL at 6:25pm while the flight to NAS departs at 12:15pm. There's only one one-stop flight that would get you there in time, but because Southwest will book no more than one plane change and no more than two stop, there's no available flights.    My suggestion would be to make three separate bookings: 1. It's a little wonky but one-way RDU to FLL via BWI to arrive in FLL at 11:05am 2. one-way FLL to NAS leaving at 12:15pm 3: the return all as one, NAS-RDU via FLL   Based on what I found this is the best possible/really the only way to get to NAS from RDU on Southwest. The down side is you have to claim and recheck any bags and re-clear security in FLL on the way there all with a tight connection, so you may get a poor seat to Nassau from FLL.. You can also try adjusting days of travel. For example, SW flys nonstop from BWI to NAS on Saturdays. If this doesn't work for you, try a different airline.   Andrew E DEN based | Aviation Enthusiast ... View more

It's definitely because of timing of flights. Southwest serves two airports in Costa Rica, San Jose and Liberia. San Jose is served year round from both Houston and Baltimore but I'm pretty sure Baltimore is Saturday only. Liberia is served year round from Houston, Denver (Saturday only) and seasonally from Baltimore (Saturday only).    Considering Southwest currently doesn't have nonstop flight from Seattle or Spokane to either Houston or Baltimore, you're going to have to have a stop or connection to either of those Costa Rica gateways. With Denver, the flight still leaves early enough that you can't get there in time for the departure to Liberia.   I would say if you want to fly into San Jose then Houston is your best bet because you can just fly in on a late arrival to Houston and take the flight out the next day (you would have to book separate tickets requiring baggage claim and needing to check-in 24 hours before for both tickets going to Costa Rica. If you want to fly into Liberia, Houston is probably still the best option because I believe it is daily operations. Denver is viable, but it is Saturday only. You'd still need to book two separate tickets going there (one to Houston/Denver and one to Liberia). Again this would require baggage claim and check-in online for both to ensure good boarding positions.    The return for both San Jose and Liberia to Seattle/Spokane can be bough separately as one ticket. It is pain to do all the separate bookings, but that's what you have to do until hopefully more nonstops are added from Seattle.    -Andrew E. DEN based | Aviation Enthusiast ... View more

One important lingo think that I learned recently too. Nonstop vs Direct flights:   "Non-stop flights behave exactly as they sound; you'll fly straight from one airport to another, with no stops along the way. Direct flights, on the other hand, aren't quite as convenient. While the flight number doesn't change, the term “direct” means the plane may make one or more stops along its route."   There are very likely flights that are direct in the sense that it's the same plane and flight number going from Seattle to San Diego with a stop in Oakland or San Jose. You're obviously looking for the nonstop option. There were a number of routes that were removed during the pandemic or just before to accommodate their Hawaii expansion due to the MAX groundings.    I'm sure it's on their lists since they've said their focus right now is to restore their pre-pandemic network on top of their recent expansion in the last two years. I know in September, they're planning to resume service between Portland and both San Diego and Los Angeles. That said, you should still follow the instructions of TheMiddleSeat.   -Andrew E DEN based | Aviation Enthusiast ... View more

I definitely understand the frustration. My biggest issue would be that of price because it doesn't seem to reflect that of a low cost airline. Now a lot of that is due to higher fuel costs right now, so I can give a little slack. As far as the delays and cancelations, all airlines are being affected by weather, pilot/staff shortages, among other things. So, Southwest isn't the only one affected here. Don't forget we're still on our way out of a pandemic. People are still getting sick, so there's going to be callouts.    As far as " Other airlines offer a wider range of nonstop flights and red eye flights! " I will definitely agree with you on the redeye flights and hopefully they're in Southwest's future. As for the nonstop flights, that is true to a degree, but really only if you include long-haul and the regionals (SkyWest, Envoy Air, ExpressJet, etc). Comparing just the domestic mainline networks, Southwest has more airports with more service than most of the legacy carriers. American has the most number of hubs at 10, which means for the most part, on a legacy carrier, you're not going to have service to more than 10 airports unless it's from their hub (American - 10 hubs; Delta - 9 hubs; United - 7 hubs). On Southwest, you can get service to at least 10 airports from a whopping 50 airports! Now some of these are on a more seasonal basis, but that's still a lot of airports with at least 10 nonstop destinations on Southwest. And there's even a lot with service to 8 or 9 airports, not to mention, Southwest has the most nonstop service to Cancun and San Jose del Cabo in Mexico. ... View more

Airlines, like Southwest, don't always maintain the same flight numbers throughout the year. So your flight number next month or a few months from now may be operating different flights currently.  I just looked up a flight on Southwest from DEN to OAK on July 17 and chose a random flight number from a nonstop and just as for you, that flight number was not operating that flight currently. These may change because of new routes, route resumptions, or even aircraft scheduling. Your flights should happen, but in the event that they don't, you have one free flight change if Southwest ends up changing your flight.   -Andrew E DEN based | Aviation Enthusiast ... View more

That sounds interesting. I know a great deal of airport codes already considering I use them in my excel wishlist sheets for various airlines and airports.    -Andrew E DEN Based | Aviation Enthusiast ... View more

Southwest's booking system currently isn't set up to handle foreign currency transactions, so they rely on flights where the demand is largely from the US and with people paying in USD. So if the demand leans towards arriving in Monterey, Mexico rather than departing from, then it could be possible for Southwest to consider it, especially if the demand is large enough. Otherwise, it might have to wait until Southwest has the ability to process foreign transactions.    -Andrew E DEN Based | Aviation Enthusiast ... View more

Southwest offers service from Nassau to Baltimore (BWI) and Fort Lauderdale (FLL).  NAS-FLL is daily; arriving in FLL at 3:30 pm NAS-BWI is seasonal and only on Saturdays; arriving in BWI at 4:05 pm Unfortunately the nonstop Saturday flight from BWI to LAX is at 4:05pm There is no nonstop from FLL to LAX, but there are some connections in both FLL and BWI, which probably all involve a plane change, and with a plane change in FLL/BWI, Southwest won't book a flight with more than one plane change. You can still do a manual multi-city reservation, but make sure you have enough time for every connection. ... View more

One reason could be because Southwest doesn't allow overnight connections. So if there is a flight that departs the next day, it has to be bought as a separate ticket. Another reason could be that Southwest just doesn't offer any connecting two stop itineraries between those two airports. Have you tried doing it with Las Vegas as the first airport rather than Oakland? Also make sure when selecting the flights that the next departing flight is at least 30 minutes after the scheduled arrival time of the previous flight since I believe that is the minimum connection time allowed.   If you do multi-city there are several options you could try: BLI-OAK OAK-HRL (One-stop)   BLI-LAS LAS-HRL (One-stop)   BLI-HOU (One-stop) HOU-HRL   Andrew E DEN Based | Aviation Enthusiast ... View more

Southwest did say that they were going to be focusing on rebuilding their pre-pandemic network rather than adding new destinations for awhile. That said, I cannot say if or when routes will resume. You can send them a message via any social media platform through comments or direct messages or you can send them a message through the contact us below.   Andrew E DEN Based | Aviation Enthusiast ... View more

Yes, the city of Rapid City is bigger than Bozeman, but if you look at passenger traffic which is what really matters for airlines, Bozeman is bigger. Pre-pandemic, Rapid City had  705,429 passengers while Bozeman had 1,573,860 passengers. In terms of the airport, Bozeman is twice as busy. So while there are many unserved cities by Southwest, I don't believe Rapid City is super high on the list. ... View more

There are plenty of airports that Southwest doesn't serve that are larger than Rapid City. Even with the tourism, I'd say most of the people going to those things are doing a road trip, especially Sturgis. Southwest is currently focused on rebuilding the network they had before the pandemic, so they won't be adding new destinations for awhile. Either comment on any of Southwest's social media posts or send them a message by using the contact us button below. Hopefully they'll put your request on their potentially long wishlist of their own.   Andrew E DEN Based | Aviation Enthusiast ... View more

Just to be clear. That's just my own analysis, so don't take my word for it 😄 ... View more

Burlington currently has around 165 weekly departures, that's larger than both Montrose (Telluride) and Hayden/Steamboat Springs as well as Bellingham and similar in size to Eugene, OR which are all recent additions to Southwest's network. There are several areas that I think are more likely to get Southwest service such as Harrisburg, PA and Knoxville, TN among several others. If Southwest did serve Burlington, I would guess it would be from Baltimore and Orlando with potential additional service to Chicago and Tampa.   You can request it by commenting on any Southwest social media post or below by clicking contact us. Route development usually takes years, so they might already be working on it. They have said that they're focusing on rebuilding their network prior to the pandemic and putting new cities on hold for awhile, so it might be 5 or more years.   Andrew E DEN based | Aviation Enthusiast ... View more

This is a seasonal (winter) flight that operates on Saturday only, so any other day will have a longer travel time. You can submit a request for more frequent operations by clicking Contact Us at the bottom of the page.   Andrew E DEN Based | Aviation Enthusiast ... View more

This route is a seasonal (winter) route that operates on Saturdays only, so any other day is going to have a lot longer of a travel time. Unless demand increases to justify daily or more frequent options, Southwest will keep it as Saturday only and may even opt to add more frequencies on Saturdays only. You can submit a request to Southwest below under Contact Us below.   Andrew E DEN Based | Aviation Enthusiast ... View more