Will any future airline failures be complete, abrupt shutdowns, ala Eastern, or "melt aways", as with TWA folding and dissolving into American? I find it difficult, after watching US come back time and again, to imagine a major carrier simply ceasing ops one day. Smaller airlines fold almost daily, but could a major? I see the big airlines slowly melting away through mergers (AF and KLM), selling off routes and planes, general cutbacks, etc. The smaller, generally newer airlines seem to be the ones to outright fail, at least in this century.

I'm not interested in particular airlines, nor am I trying to start a "which airline will fail next" thread. Just interested in thoughts on how in general the over-capacity/other problems will shake out and be resolved in the coming years.

Until leasing companies and banks can find a market for reposessed planes, and Governments can find or incent job creation for displaced airline workers, we will not see any failures in my opinion.

I have no doubt that serious consolidation is coming to the industry. It dies need a good "shaking out" and we need serious capacity reduction. Unfortunately most merger do not result in capacity reduction, but id does look like the US/HP merger could result in a slight reductionof 60 aircraft or so. I hope that trend continues.