All flights to and from ORD between 21JAN and 31MAR no more bookable on wow-air.us and GDS.



Link in the bookingsystem: https://booking.wowair.com/search?fromC ... lang=en_US

In addition, all flights to/from ORD are highly priced from the beginning of April. I think that ORD is completely discontinued.

Presumably, the A330neo will not be accepted by WOW Air. The airline has switched all Delhi flights (from April 2019) to A330ceo. Source: Seatmap in the bookingsystem on wow-air.us.

If ORD is continuing it would have to be on a narrowbody. Who knows what is going on at this point. Suspending routes for Winter is not surprising. The question is whether they come back.

It looks like both of the Icelandic carriers are heavily pruning marginal routes now that their merger is off and they'll have to independently coexist going forward. If WOW air truly wants to be an ULCC, perhaps serving Chicagoland via MKE is a more logical move. WW's insistence on serving costly primary airports like BOS, CLE, EWR, JFK, LAX and ORD rather than cheaper nearby alternatives like CAK, MKE, ONT, PVD and SWF truly surprised me. Another thing on my mind - could an A321neo or A320neo make it from MDW to KEF with a viable payload?

SurfandSnow wrote:

It looks like both of the Icelandic carriers are heavily pruning marginal routes now that their merger is off and they'll have to independently coexist going forward. If WOW air truly wants to be an ULCC, perhaps serving Chicagoland via MKE is a more logical move. WW's insistence on serving costly primary airports like BOS, CLE, EWR, JFK, LAX and ORD rather than cheaper nearby alternatives like CAK, MKE, ONT, PVD and SWF truly surprised me. Another thing on my mind - could an A321neo or A320neo make it from MDW to KEF with a viable payload?

Why would WW ever serve CAK?

SurfandSnow wrote:

It looks like both of the Icelandic carriers are heavily pruning marginal routes now that their merger is off and they'll have to independently coexist going forward. If WOW air truly wants to be an ULCC, perhaps serving Chicagoland via MKE is a more logical move. WW's insistence on serving costly primary airports like BOS, CLE, EWR, JFK, LAX and ORD rather than cheaper nearby alternatives like CAK, MKE, ONT, PVD and SWF truly surprised me. Another thing on my mind - could an A321neo or A320neo make it from MDW to KEF with a viable payload?

Yes, it can absolutely make it.

I think you've actually seen the opposite from most of their route prunings. They need a big city to get passengers in Winter. Winter in MKE will not be better than Winter in ORD. All the other smaller markets are now gone. ORD is surprising in some respects, but the question is whether it comes back. They are clearly hunkered down trying to survive to the cash infusion from Indigo.

Where is WW not pulling out?

SWF would be a great option for WOW. Not head to head against Icelandic and they can capture a lot of connecting European tourists headed to NY if they package it with a bus the way Norwegian does. DY doesn't have the connections on the European end, so there is plenty of market to co exist for both.

stl07 wrote:

Where is WW not pulling out?

So far, Boston.

chrisnh wrote:

stl07 wrote:

Where is WW not pulling out?

So far, Boston.

Newark and Baltimore still around or did I miss that?

FI as well as WW are trimming the waste. They are shrinking as fast as they expanded.

lavalampluva wrote:

FI as well as WW are trimming the waste. They are shrinking as fast as they expanded.

Icelandair is growing quite considerably between years. They've just increased ORD to double daily next summer, this week.

WW will be gone soon. I really don’t understand their rapid expansion. Pretty unprecedented for such a young unproven LCC. Reminds me a little of the collapse of Skybus.

lavalampluva wrote:

FI as well as WW are trimming the waste. They are shrinking as fast as they expanded.

Icelandair? Not even close.

Why not try MDW? There is a full customs facility and should be able to handle an a321.

Guys as a sidenote, does anyone know why the take over of Wow by Icelandair didnt go through?

LoftleidirDC8 wrote:

Why not try MDW? There is a full customs facility and should be able to handle an a321.

MDW brings nothing to TATL travel that ORD lacks.

LoftleidirDC8 wrote:

Why not try MDW? There is a full customs facility and should be able to handle an a321.

Too short runways.

eaa3 wrote:

lavalampluva wrote:

FI as well as WW are trimming the waste. They are shrinking as fast as they expanded.

Icelandair is growing quite considerably between years. They've just increased ORD to double daily next summer, this week.

My intention was not to say FI is losing money, but they are beefing up profitable routes and slimming back the losers.

stl07 wrote:

Where is WW not pulling out?

Detroit is still bookable through OCT 2019

MCO not bootable either.

MCO not bookable either.

stlgph wrote:

chrisnh wrote:

stl07 wrote:

Where is WW not pulling out?

So far, Boston.

Newark and Baltimore still around or did I miss that?

BWI is indeed still around, and on peak summer days between FI and WW there are somehow three daily flights. I'm a BWI optimist and I can't imagine those are doing too well. FI is May-January 4x weekly, WW is daily year-round and 11x weekly in the summer.

Amsterdam wrote:

Guys as a sidenote, does anyone know why the take over of Wow by Icelandair didnt go through?

Many factors, the main one being that the due diligence report revealed that WOW’s debt and overall financial situation was worse than previously known. Also, the emergence of Indigo Partners as a willing investor meant that the Icelandic competition authority likely wouldn’t have allowed the takeover, so FI pulled out.

SRQKEF wrote:

Amsterdam wrote:

Guys as a sidenote, does anyone know why the take over of Wow by Icelandair didnt go through?

Many factors, the main one being that the due diligence report revealed that WOW’s debt and overall financial situation was worse than previously known. Also, the emergence of Indigo Partners as a willing investor meant that the Icelandic competition authority likely wouldn’t have allowed the takeover, so FI pulled out.

Actually, pretty much certain that FI had no idea that there was an offer from Indigo on the table. They pulled out thinking WW would immediately shut down after having seen whatever financial data they were allowed to see during due diligence.

Yes, in addition to ORD/Chicago, all remaining flights on KEF-MCO-KEF in April (04/01-04/30) are now cancelled:

I flew STL-DAL-ABQ and return today and saw the WOW A321 sitting out on the ramp nowhere near the gates in STL. I thought they had pulled out already. Weird.

OzarkD9S wrote:

I flew STL-DAL-ABQ and return today and saw the WOW A321 sitting out on the ramp nowhere near the gates in STL. I thought they had pulled out already. Weird.

Pulling out January 7th IIRC.

enilria wrote:

SRQKEF wrote:

Amsterdam wrote:

Guys as a sidenote, does anyone know why the take over of Wow by Icelandair didnt go through?

Many factors, the main one being that the due diligence report revealed that WOW’s debt and overall financial situation was worse than previously known. Also, the emergence of Indigo Partners as a willing investor meant that the Icelandic competition authority likely wouldn’t have allowed the takeover, so FI pulled out.

Actually, pretty much certain that FI had no idea that there was an offer from Indigo on the table. They pulled out thinking WW would immediately shut down after having seen whatever financial data they were allowed to see during due diligence.

Agreed that they didn’t know about Indigo in particular, but there was a big fuss in the Icelandic media a few days before FI pulled out when Skuli sent WOW staff an email saying he was working on securing financing with FI “and other investors”, without naming who they were.

OzarkD9S wrote:

I flew STL-DAL-ABQ and return today and saw the WOW A321 sitting out on the ramp nowhere near the gates in STL. I thought they had pulled out already. Weird.

Actually, I believe that specific aircraft (someone remind me of the reg.) got a chunk of its Sharklet taken out by a Southwest airlines 737.

I have just gone through sabre gds and MCO + ORD have their entire Y class inventory blocked out. FYI MCO (Orlando) shows closed off from 01JAN-19 onwards and not April !

Chicago (ORD) has its entire economy class inventory blacked out from 21JAN-19 indeed.

So I think we all agree they expanded too quickly. I believe their best bet from a North America standpoint, which is what it seems like they're doing, is going back to their original 2016 barebone network, KEF-BWI/BOS/YYZ and maybe one other, and growing more slowly and steadily before they begin adding new cities trying to compete with up to two other carriers. They never stood a chance in DFW and JFK.

SRQKEF wrote:

OzarkD9S wrote:

I flew STL-DAL-ABQ and return today and saw the WOW A321 sitting out on the ramp nowhere near the gates in STL. I thought they had pulled out already. Weird.

Pulling out January 7th IIRC.

This is correct. They keep flying 3x a week til then with a RON.

enilria wrote:

If ORD is continuing it would have to be on a narrowbody. Who knows what is going on at this point. Suspending routes for Winter is not surprising. The question is whether they come back.

I flew out of ORD on 26 November 2018 (the day of that nasty blizzard) and saw a WOW A321N parked near Terminal 5 at the far southeast corner.

Interesting considering the ongoing discussions with Indigo Partners. ORD is one of the few WOW destinations in the US where F9 has a significant presence.

According to this news article (in Dutch) WOW air is retiring it's last remaining A330 and a 4 A321s. Along with the already retired aircraft their fleet will shrink from 20 to 11 aircraft. A number of destinations will be cut and it seems like Chicago is one of them.

https://www.luchtvaartnieuws.nl/nieuws/ ... en-draadje

SurfandSnow wrote:

It looks like both of the Icelandic carriers are heavily pruning marginal routes now that their merger is off and they'll have to independently coexist going forward. If WOW air truly wants to be an ULCC, perhaps serving Chicagoland via MKE is a more logical move. WW's insistence on serving costly primary airports like BOS, CLE, EWR, JFK, LAX and ORD rather than cheaper nearby alternatives like CAK, MKE, ONT, PVD and SWF truly surprised me. Another thing on my mind - could an A321neo or A320neo make it from MDW to KEF with a viable payload?

I think this is against the strategy of their future owners, Indigo Partners, as well. I think if Indigo Partners are going to buy WOW Air (and it looks like they will), they'll turn it into some kind of "Wizzair Iceland" product. Knowing the airports Wizzair serves in Europe (the smaller cheaper ones, often shared with Ryanair) they'll be moving WOW Air over to those same airports and find similar airports in the USA.

I doubt they will fly to small airports in the USA. They already failed at that and the really small airports have no CBP.

The CEO said they will “announce a new schedule in January” FWIW.

enilria wrote:

I doubt they will fly to small airports in the USA. They already failed at that and the really small airports have no CBP.

The CEO said they will “announce a new schedule in January” FWIW.

When did they fail at that? They never tried, so they never failed either. However Wizzair doesn't fail at the smaller airports, quite the opposite in fact. The larger airports are more expensive and often have longer turnaround times. This makes fares out of the larger airports are always higher than out of the smaller airports, where they can easier negotiate lower landing and handling fees and have quick turnaround times. On top of that, smaller airports are often a bit out of the way which allows for extra ancillary revenue (bus transfer to the city sold by the airline). This is very successful in Europe, so why wouldn't it work in America?

Of course they can't use every small airport in America, but you'd be surprised by the number of airports they can use. They're not limited to the big ones, there are plenty of small alternatives. A number of them has already been mentioned.

PatrickZ80 wrote:

SurfandSnow wrote:

It looks like both of the Icelandic carriers are heavily pruning marginal routes now that their merger is off and they'll have to independently coexist going forward. If WOW air truly wants to be an ULCC, perhaps serving Chicagoland via MKE is a more logical move. WW's insistence on serving costly primary airports like BOS, CLE, EWR, JFK, LAX and ORD rather than cheaper nearby alternatives like CAK, MKE, ONT, PVD and SWF truly surprised me. Another thing on my mind - could an A321neo or A320neo make it from MDW to KEF with a viable payload?

I think this is against the strategy of their future owners, Indigo Partners, as well. I think if Indigo Partners are going to buy WOW Air (and it looks like they will), they'll turn it into some kind of "Wizzair Iceland" product. Knowing the airports Wizzair serves in Europe (the smaller cheaper ones, often shared with Ryanair) they'll be moving WOW Air over to those same airports and find similar airports in the USA.

Indigo Partners owns and controls Frontier and they still fly largely out of the large main airports.

On top of that, smaller airports are often a bit out of the way which allows for extra ancillary revenue (bus transfer to the city sold by the airline). This is very successful in Europe, so why wouldn't it work in America?

Public transportation isn't as robust in the US, especially in smaller markets.

"Of course they can't use every small airport in America, but you'd be surprised by the number of airports they can use. They're not limited to the big ones, there are plenty of small alternatives. A number of them has already been mentioned."

The big problem in the US as someone already mentioned is that most small airports don't have CPB, even some of the medium size ones struggle to keep it properly staffed. No CPB, no flights from KEF. Now if KEF put in PreClearance that would be a huge advantage.....

LightChop2Chop wrote:

"Of course they can't use every small airport in America, but you'd be surprised by the number of airports they can use. They're not limited to the big ones, there are plenty of small alternatives. A number of them has already been mentioned."

The big problem in the US as someone already mentioned is that most small airports don't have CPB, even some of the medium size ones struggle to keep it properly staffed. No CPB, no flights from KEF. Now if KEF put in PreClearance that would be a huge advantage.....

Even with Preclearance there needs to be CPB, in case the flight needs to be recleared for whatever reason.

LightChop2Chop wrote:

"Of course they can't use every small airport in America, but you'd be surprised by the number of airports they can use. They're not limited to the big ones, there are plenty of small alternatives. A number of them has already been mentioned."

The big problem in the US as someone already mentioned is that most small airports don't have CPB, even some of the medium size ones struggle to keep it properly staffed. No CPB, no flights from KEF. Now if KEF put in PreClearance that would be a huge advantage.....

It would be a big disadvantage to the connecting model of WOW, and especially FI, though. It was considered in the 2000s but FI lobbied against it as it would severely hurt their connection times, which are usually 40-120 minutes max. That enables them to offer very short trip times across the Atlantic which wouldn't be possible with pre-clearance in KEF.

LightChop2Chop wrote:

"Of course they can't use every small airport in America, but you'd be surprised by the number of airports they can use. They're not limited to the big ones, there are plenty of small alternatives. A number of them has already been mentioned."

The big problem in the US as someone already mentioned is that most small airports don't have CPB, even some of the medium size ones struggle to keep it properly staffed. No CPB, no flights from KEF. Now if KEF put in PreClearance that would be a huge advantage.....

I believe this may be in the works! Given the success of preclearance at DUB, I think it would be a boon for KEF.

https://www.usatoday.com/story/travel/2 ... /93284600/

Polot wrote:

Public transportation isn't as robust in the US, especially in smaller markets.

This isn't public transport, these are private companies providing cheap shuttle services. The most famous one is PlusAirportLine, they're all over Europe. They have to be booked in advance, which can be done through the airline.

Is Indigo still acquiring Wow? It’s gone very quiet, and wow seem to be in surgery mode at the moment.

If they are pulling out of Chicago, it seems that their U.S. experiment is likely over. Pulling out of STL or CVG is one thing. Chicago is the third biggest biggest city in the country. Last winter I made a self connection in Chicago to grab a $150 flight to Dublin, and a friend took a Greyhound bus from Iowa to Chicago to get a $300 or $400 round trip to KEF. With Amtrak, Greyhound, Megabus, and cheap flights on WN, I’d think that ORD should be able to bring in budget conscious passengers from all over the Midwest.

SurfandSnow wrote:

LightChop2Chop wrote:

"Of course they can't use every small airport in America, but you'd be surprised by the number of airports they can use. They're not limited to the big ones, there are plenty of small alternatives. A number of them has already been mentioned."

The big problem in the US as someone already mentioned is that most small airports don't have CPB, even some of the medium size ones struggle to keep it properly staffed. No CPB, no flights from KEF. Now if KEF put in PreClearance that would be a huge advantage.....

I believe this may be in the works! Given the success of preclearance at DUB, I think it would be a boon for KEF.

https://www.usatoday.com/story/travel/2 ... /93284600/

If KEF would get pre-clearance, I wouldn't rule FI actually building their own terminal just to get around it. The time and hassle pre-clearance adds to a connection would ruin the entire business model of FI. It's already running on thin enough margins with the crowded passport control. Besides, many of FI's N-American gateways are pretty good when it comes to immigration times. It's only the traditional bottlenecks of JFK T7, MCO, ORD, IAD and BOS I've had to wait for considerable amounts of time. In only the last year I've been less than 5 minutes into the US in several FI destinations including MSP, TPA, DEN, SEA, SFO and PDX.

PatrickZ80 wrote:

I think this is against the strategy of their future owners, Indigo Partners, as well. I think if Indigo Partners are going to buy WOW Air (and it looks like they will), they'll turn it into some kind of "Wizzair Iceland" product. Knowing the airports Wizzair serves in Europe (the smaller cheaper ones, often shared with Ryanair) they'll be moving WOW Air over to those same airports and find similar airports in the USA.

Begs the question, why would Indigo have to buy WOW, an airline which soon will be down to 11 planes and considerable debt after last two years? Why wouldn't they just move 11 planes to Iceland or better yet, rotate some trough Iceland, throw some money at advertisements focused to the market for 6-12 months and be done with it? What is there to buy?