What is the true intention for DL in SEA? I know they've added a lot of destinations to/from SEA in the past 2-3 years domestically, and have started to fly SEA-PVG.

Did a quick check on their schedule, I see the following daily flights to Asia from SEA

ICN x2
PEK x1
PVG x1
NRT x1
KIX x1

Will DL ever be successful in making SEA their TPAC hub similar to UA at SFO?

IMHO, DL will have a very difficult time building a true TPAC gateway in SEA similar (or even close) to how UA build SFO to be -
1) I don't think SEA has the infrastructure
2) DL can't even make SEA-HKG work (Will A350 or A339 make it work?)
3) DL is also focusing on TPAC on LAX, diluting connecting traffic (plus TPAC competition out of LAX is tremendous).
4) DL seems to focus all TPAC connections east of the Rockies out of MSP and DTW -

So - for those of you that might be familiar with DL - What is their TPAC strategy when it comes to the west coast? Do they continue to build TPAC in SEA? Or stick with the two gateway solution with SEA and LAX? Any guesses on what TPAC destinations they might add out of SEA?

The trouble is that SEA is too small so DL cant grow as large as they wish

flyinghippo wrote:

4) DL seems to focus all TPAC connections east of the Rockies out of MSP and DTW -

How do you arrive at that assertion? (For some East Coast and Midwest origins, xxx-DTW-Asia is going to be more time/distance-efficient.)

SEA isn't SFO. It doesn't have the volume of Asia O&D traffic of the Bay Area. But SFO isn't LAX either, and PHL isn't JFK. Delta - through push for terminal expansions in both SEA and LAX - has telegraphed what it's going to do. UA deemphazied LAX to grow SFO and dropped to #3 at LAX in passenger count. Financial disclosures don't have the detail to show whether or not that's been a successful strategy.

Nope, not with Alaska there

flyinghippo wrote:

What is the true intention for DL in SEA? I know they've added a lot of destinations to/from SEA in the past 2-3 years domestically, and have started to fly SEA-PVG.

It's been longer than that. They celebrated their 5-year anniversary last month.

https://news.delta.com/delta-grows-seat ... nniversary

Isn't overcrowding at IAF a big problem at SEA?

The expansion, once finished in 2021, should help.

And quite frankly, the only major market that DL failed at is HKG anyway. But HKG itself has a CX fortress that's just not easy to break through.

Other than that, for East/SE Asia UA flies to CTU (3/wk only anyway), TPE (Which is one of those market that are not as big as people make it for US-based carrier to be due to the CI/BR fortress), and 2x SIN (SQ is there...), so essentially, it's not like UA presence is THAT much larger anyway.

Yes, UA also fly to AusNZ from SFO, which DL does out of LAX instead of SEA, thus reducing the TPAC traffic overall.

Ultimately, people talks as if SFO is really that much larger than everything else when it comes to US carrier TPAC hub - it's not. At the end of the day, the amount of destinations from US to East/SE Asia is limited anyway - i.e. it's always TYO, SEL, HKG, PEK, PVG, and TPE; then there's MNL or SIN or CAN or KIX. But that's about it. It's not TATL where in addition to LON, PAR, FRA, and AMS, you still have DUB, MAN, MAD, MXP, FCO, ZRH, etc. (And there are a ton more...)

zakuivcustom wrote:

Ultimately, people talks as if SFO is really that much larger than everything else when it comes to US carrier TPAC hub - it's not. At the end of the day, the amount of destinations from US to East/SE Asia is limited anyway - i.e. it's always TYO, SEL, HKG, PEK, PVG, and TPE; then there's MNL or SIN or CAN or KIX. But that's about it. It's not TATL where in addition to LON, PAR, FRA, and AMS, you still have DUB, MAN, MAD, MXP, FCO, ZRH, etc. (And there are a ton more...)

That’s because it really is. UA is 2x Delta to Asia from SFO in terms of frequency, and growing, with generally larger gauge, and way ahead in ASM. It’s just not reasonable to compare the two.

With the yields UA is getting I've heard on the non-stop SFO-SIN flights (2x daily), I wonder in 2020 if DL will drop MNL and launch SEA-SIN non-stop on the A350/A339neo.

chunhimlai wrote:

The trouble is that SEA is too small so DL cant grow as large as they wish

Seattle is the global headquarters for Amazon, Microsoft, Starbucks, Expedia, Costco, plus many others. It’s not some podunk backwater.

sonicruiser wrote:

Nope, not with Alaska there

Which has what, exactly to do with the question?


Delta is in Seattle for the long haul it seems. With the city growing rapidly, it seems infrastructure is the main constraint.

Aside from Osaka (which seemed like a token offering when they pulled HKG), the network is pretty strong.
Maybe they add SIN, and maybe maybe maybe they add MNL. But with a strong partner in ICN, what else do they need exactly?

I don’t think Delta is interested in building a huge transpacific network at this point. With the glut in capacity offered from all the Chinese Airlines adding capacity to the United States, transpacific yields are not what they once were. Economy class fares aren’t enough to sustain Transpacific flights like they are for Transatlantic summer season. There is far more opportunity with Transatlantic routes including both business and leisure markets.

Transpacific networks from the US airlines require corporate contracts and demand. UA has a strong market in SFO to draw from with companies having manufacturing and other interests in China. It’s hard to find another city in the US to draw from. LAX and JFK are saturated with cheap fares from Chinese Airlines. Competing for connecting traffic isn’t profitable. AA couldn’t make it work. I think DL will fly what is profitable and funnel the rest through ICN.

There's a glut of capacity from Mainland Chinese carriers but UA is seemingly is able to compete so why not DL!? Also certain Asian markets OUTSIDE of Mainland China/HKG are more developed than others. For example SIN/HND/NRT/ICN/TPE are higher yielding than the rest because all those countries are allies in the US Visa Waiver Program. Not all Asian markets are the same. Businesses will pay a premium to go non-stop.

sonicruiser wrote:

Nope, not with Alaska there

And which international destination does AS fly to across the Pacific?

Chugach wrote:

chunhimlai wrote:

The trouble is that SEA is too small so DL cant grow as large as they wish

Seattle is the global headquarters for Amazon, Microsoft, Starbucks, Expedia, Costco, plus many others. It’s not some podunk backwater.

I think he meant the SEA airport, not the city.

zakuivcustom wrote:

And quite frankly, the only major market that DL failed at is HKG anyway. But HKG itself has a CX fortress that's just not easy to break through.

CX is strong and a big challenge for non-OW carrier. However, UA seems to do much better in HKG. They serve HKG from SFO, ORD and EWR and they will even add a second daily SFO-HKG flight soon, while DL pulled out of HKG completely......

DTWLAX wrote:

sonicruiser wrote:

Nope, not with Alaska there

And which international destination does AS fly to across the Pacific?

Alaska doesn’t do any international (Canada and Caribbean aside) flights. But they are big on West Coast - Hawaii runs.

I don’t think DL@SEA needs to be as large as UA@SFO for it to meet the needs of DL’s customers. No one US carrier serves every market perfectly, but if they do it well enough, their customers are usually satisfied.

I think YVR is a bigger trans pacific hub compared to SEA. Some SEA and PDX traffic go through YVR where DL loses traffic to AC. YVR has AKL, SYD, MEL, and BNE non stop. SEA has none of those destinations so AC takes the pacific northwest traffic away.

Delta will never have anything close to UA at SFO because of their reliance on the KE JV. They would much rather connect a passenger through ICN from SEA instead of flying their own metal.

I would be very surprised to see the SEA-HKG flight returning

zakuivcustom wrote:

But HKG itself has a CX fortress

HKG isn't a "fortress" for anyone... in fact, it's one of the most competitive gateways in the world.

Sure CX can manipulate some markets with HK point of sale, but they're by no means an unassailable front, such as the likes of the US domestic carriers at their hubs, for example.

DL doesn't need to be as big as UA at SFO in order to be successful at SEA.

Besides the larger O&D at SFO, there are real facility constraints at SEA that prevent DL from ever becoming as big as UA at SFO and DL was well aware of that when they decided to turn SEA into a hub five years ago.

The new International Arrivals Facility (IAF) that opens next year will allow DL to significantly better handle incoming connections from international arrivals due to more dependable and consistent connection times, but this will not solve the real capacity constraints that prevent any massive increase in number of flights due to a lack of gates.

Due to a lack of gates, many Delta Connection Embraer 175 flights are arriving and departing from remote hard stands with passengers being bussed to/from the terminal. Any growth from Delta will mean more remote hardstand use.

Can DL Pacific gateway in SEA work? Hmmm... it IS working. Cutting SEA/HKG means one city-pair wasn't working. Impediment to growth at SEA is infrastructure, not AS or UA at SFO.

A better barometer would be JV (not alliance) totals TPAC from the West Coast. SEA is factor in total JV TPAC. An alliance is a pax-facing marketing scheme. A JV is about revenue.

LAX772LR wrote:

zakuivcustom wrote:

But HKG itself has a CX fortress

HKG isn't a "fortress" for anyone... in fact, it's one of the most competitive gateways in the world.

Sure CX can manipulate some markets with HK point of sale, but they're by no means an unassailable front, such as the likes of the US domestic carriers at their hubs, for example.

I should be more clear - CX pretty much have a monopoly on TPAC out of HKG.

Of course, there's the "pax paying a premium for nonstop" factor also. HKers just doesn't like to connect in general, unless you're talking about being 50% cheaper like ME3 is to/from Europe. When you want HK-base pax to connect at SEA (i.e. DL) to the like of SFO/LAX, when your competition has 3x daily non-stop to each (CX), or, for UA, a flight (or soon, 2) to SFO (Largest market in US ex-HKG), it's just hard to make money.

But yes, at the end of the day, HKG so far is DL's sole failure to/from SEA, and that's due to multiple factors. Everywhere else DL has been fairly successful. Yes, now that I looked back, their gauge are definitely a joke compare to UA@SFO. But maybe the ability to use something like a 763 to fly across the larger pond is what will ultimately make DL's TPAC gateway at SEA work.

zakuivcustom wrote:

LAX772LR wrote:

zakuivcustom wrote:

But HKG itself has a CX fortress

HKG isn't a "fortress" for anyone... in fact, it's one of the most competitive gateways in the world.

Sure CX can manipulate some markets with HK point of sale, but they're by no means an unassailable front, such as the likes of the US domestic carriers at their hubs, for example.

I should be more clear - CX pretty much have a monopoly on TPAC out of HKG.

Granted, I understand that "monopoly" is likely the most misused word in all of A.net diction.... but how exactly does one have a monopoly, with 8 different competitors flying to 13 TPAC destinations ex-HKG?

CX itself only serves 17 TPAC destinations, and that includes Australia/New Zealand + seasonal.

I think Delta's interest in Seattle primarily about the economic geography of the U.S. Capital is flowing toward major metropolitan areas, especially those with strong technology and financial economies. There has been immense growth in high paying jobs, and Delta saw a great opportunity to get in on the demand for air travel that comes with such growth. The most lucrative part of it is within North America. The Pacific is ultra competitive right now. I think they have zero interest in fighting it out in SIN or TPE or anywhere else until the Pacific market rationalizes a bit more. But I bet they are doing very well up and down the west coast and to points further east, and will do even better once the A220 gets more prevalent. There is more than enough room for both AS and DL.

It will be interesting to see what happens to DL at SEA during the next economic recession. I don't think they will do so hot on their regional jets against Alaska's mainline fleet.

Chugach wrote:

chunhimlai wrote:

The trouble is that SEA is too small so DL cant grow as large as they wish

Seattle is the global headquarters for Amazon, Microsoft, Starbucks, Expedia, Costco, plus many others. It’s not some podunk backwater.

One quick stop from Nike and Portland too

Weatherwatcher1 wrote:

I think DL will fly what is profitable and funnel the rest through ICN.

I think this pretty much sums it up.

I think that DL needs to strengthen its domestic network in SEA before adding new TPAC flights. It only has 1x daily flight to CVG, AUS and RDU, which are DL's focus cities. Not to mention that there is no DL metal flight from SEA to many big metros such as DFW, TPA, STL, PHL, and MIA/FLL. A strong domestic/short haul foundation will help feed more traffic international/long haul flights through SEA. And I don't think it will come close to the size of UA's hub in SFO for the following reasons.

1. AS is a much bigger force in SEA than it is in SFO.
2. Population wise, the Bay Area is still significantly larger than SeaTac, when it comes to O&D. And its probably gonna stay that way for most of of our lifetime.

I don’t think crowding is why they didn’t expand—three airlines start operation this year(CX, JL, SQ). If they wanted to they would already done that.

YYZORD wrote:

I think YVR is a bigger trans pacific hub compared to SEA. Some SEA and PDX traffic go through YVR where DL loses traffic to AC. YVR has AKL, SYD, MEL, and BNE non stop. SEA has none of those destinations so AC takes the pacific northwest traffic away.

YVR is secure as a trans-Pac hub because it is Canada's prime trans-Pac hub, serving Canadians who don't want to have to pass through the USA (with U.S. Customs and repeat security, paying U.S. customs user and other fees) to get to Asia, OZ, NZ and S. Pacific. And if it draws from the USA west coast, so much the better. SEA of course draws road traffic from the YVR area for sometimes cheaper fares, so both have advantages. But SEA has more domestic hub competition than YVR, which is why it likely wouldn't be as strong.

Also DL is looking at the long game. The western US is continuing to grow in population (as is SEA). SEA is in the best geographic position to catch any US to TPAC connections in the Pacific or Mountain time zones.

And while SFO/LAX are likely to always have more OD and service for that OD, SEA is becoming the solid number 3 west coast city in that regard. Beyond that, SEA basically offers DL the best west coast connection for pax coming from other markets besides LAX and SFO. And without the SFO fog and LAX’s bad geography (for connecting to East Asian locations), if DL can just get the gate situation and immigration issues at SEA taken care of, they will offer a very competitive connection experience to people in PDX, SLC, LAS, PHX, DEN, etc.

In summary, DLs SEA hub is designed to serve both SEA traffic and pretty much anyone else in the Pacific and Mountain time zones not named LA or SFO. All of which are markets that are growing .

acavpics wrote:

I think that DL needs to strengthen its domestic network in SEA before adding new TPAC flights. It only has 1x daily flight to CVG, AUS and RDU, which are DL's focus cities. Not to mention that there is no DL metal flight from SEA to many big metros such as DFW, TPA, STL, PHL, and MIA/FLL. A strong domestic/short haul foundation will help feed more traffic international/long haul flights through SEA. And I don't think it will come close to the size of UA's hub in SFO for the following reasons.

I agree with your point, especially since ABQ, CLT, DFW, IAH, EWR, OMA, PHL, STL, SAT, and TPA are top domestic destinations traveled to from SEA that DL doesn't currently serve nonstop from SEA.

DL can probably make SEA work as a Pacific gateway if DL adds nonstop service to SEA from more domestic destinations.

jplatts wrote:

acavpics wrote:

I think that DL needs to strengthen its domestic network in SEA before adding new TPAC flights. It only has 1x daily flight to CVG, AUS and RDU, which are DL's focus cities. Not to mention that there is no DL metal flight from SEA to many big metros such as DFW, TPA, STL, PHL, and MIA/FLL. A strong domestic/short haul foundation will help feed more traffic international/long haul flights through SEA. And I don't think it will come close to the size of UA's hub in SFO for the following reasons.

I agree with your point, especially since ABQ, CLT, DFW, IAH, EWR, OMA, PHL, STL, SAT, and TPA are top domestic destinations traveled to from SEA that DL doesn't currently serve nonstop from SEA.

DL can probably make SEA work as a Pacific gateway if DL adds nonstop service to SEA from more domestic destinations.

Do you think airlines, mainly those w/o much premium or connecting traffic, would shift some flights over to Paine Field? In that case, more gate space could be freed up at SEA, allowing for DL to expand service to such key cities.

Just a thought.

jplatts wrote:

ABQ, CLT, DFW, IAH, EWR, OMA, PHL, STL, SAT, and TPA are top domestic destinations traveled to from SEA that DL doesn't currently serve nonstop from SEA.

That's ok, AS and everyone else has 'em covered.

acavpics wrote:

Do you think airlines, mainly those w/o much premium or connecting traffic, would shift some flights over to Paine Field? In that case, more gate space could be freed up at SEA, allowing for DL to expand service to such key cities.

Just a thought.

There isn't currently enough room at PAE to accommodate additional commercial airline service as the passenger terminal at PAE is already maxed out, and WN even cancelled plans to serve PAE.

SEA is also much closer than PAE is to Downtown Seattle and most of the tourist destinations in Greater Seattle, and travelers from outside the Seattle area are also already familiar with SEA.

acavpics wrote:

Do you think airlines, mainly those w/o much premium or connecting traffic, would shift some flights over to Paine Field? In that case, more gate space could be freed up at SEA, allowing for DL to expand service to such key cities

(1) no, there's insufficient pax facilities at PAE to handle that manner of expansion.
(2) why would any of those airlines be interested in doing anything that assists DL?

DL can't expand that much more...not with gate space being at a premium. DL potentially has to "sacrifice" existing service to bring in new ones. The amount of construction at the airport isn't helping them much. But in the future, I'll be curious to see what DL does when some of those gates affected by construction become available again.

One thing I'm a little surprised is that DL hasn't removed the SEA-ICN service to put more on KE. But KE could be holding its own by themselves at SEA.

wedgetail737 wrote:

One thing I'm a little surprised is that DL hasn't removed the SEA-ICN service to put more on KE.

The J/Vs are generally based on reciprocity: if DL dumped a percentage of TPAC flying to KE at SEA, then they'll have to make up for it somewhere else.

Why would they do that though, when they have a decent hub operation at SEA, which has the added advantage of a location where every widebody DL operates could cover the distances if needed?

wedgetail737 wrote:

But KE could be holding its own by themselves at SEA.

There's no "holding its own" there, they revenue-share on all US-Korea operations, and others.

It's probably worth noting that while DL has expanded SEA as a hub, AS has held on to roughly 50% of the market without expanding into international (trans-Pacific) service. Delta's share continues to grow, but they aren't particularly chipping away at Alaska's base. Granted, SEA has seen a pretty absurd surge in passenger numbers in the last decade, but DL has struggled to make some TPAC markets work, most notably HKG and KIX (the latter of which, in all fairness, has never seemed to work for anybody flying it). With CX adding service to HKG and SQ adding service to SIN this coming September, I don't see how DL expands a massive TPAC operation out of SEA that makes money...they're already on the primary (heavily contested) routes like ICN, PEK and NRT, but I don't see any particularly profitable options for new routes going forward. DL has certainly staked their claim at SEA and with the O/D pax, that might be enough. I just don't see where they can make additional East Asia flights work.

For all the comparisons to SFO /SEA, UAL/DAL?? United started Trans-pac flying out of SEA in 1985 with SEA-HKG and SEA-NRT . Later? We got the Pacific Division routes from Pan-AM where we were later forced to surrender the SEA routes. We still wanted to fly those routes but it seems that No other airline has really made the routes work until Delta got them and they're not even flying them too Tough. I distinctly remember Delta flying into NRT with an L1011-500 while I was waiting for a flight to go out to SEL. and Later NRT-HKG. And? they were coming out of LAX at that time. So Delta has and Had all the info they needed to excel in the pacific. They merged with the strongest US Airline IN the Pacific.. so it's NOT like they don't know or have No knowledge of Pacific flying They just really don't have the desire to..
I think it's why they tweak their plans all the time.. Because they Could just slug it out!!

jplatts wrote:

acavpics wrote:

I think that DL needs to strengthen its domestic network in SEA before adding new TPAC flights. It only has 1x daily flight to CVG, AUS and RDU, which are DL's focus cities. Not to mention that there is no DL metal flight from SEA to many big metros such as DFW, TPA, STL, PHL, and MIA/FLL. A strong domestic/short haul foundation will help feed more traffic international/long haul flights through SEA. And I don't think it will come close to the size of UA's hub in SFO for the following reasons.

I agree with your point, especially since ABQ, CLT, DFW, IAH, EWR, OMA, PHL, STL, SAT, and TPA are top domestic destinations traveled to from SEA that DL doesn't currently serve nonstop from SEA.

DL can probably make SEA work as a Pacific gateway if DL adds nonstop service to SEA from more domestic destinations.

Why would they want to connect with cities east of MSP/DTW when DL already have a TPAC gateway in those hubs? SEA could serve as a TPAC hub thing west of MSP or the Rockies.

strfyr51 wrote:

For all the comparisons to SFO /SEA, UAL/DAL?? United started Trans-pac flying out of SEA in 1985 with SEA-HKG and SEA-NRT . Later? We got the Pacific Division routes from Pan-AM where we were later forced to surrender the SEA routes. We still wanted to fly those routes but it seems that No other airline has really made the routes work until Delta got them and they're not even flying them too Tough. I distinctly remember Delta flying into NRT with an L1011-500 while I was waiting for a flight to go out to SEL. and Later NRT-HKG. And? they were coming out of LAX at that time. So Delta has and Had all the info they needed to excel in the pacific. They merged with the strongest US Airline IN the Pacific.. so it's NOT like they don't know or have No knowledge of Pacific flying They just really don't have the desire to..
I think it's why they tweak their plans all the time.. Because they Could just slug it out!!

I agree! When they merged with NW they had a perfect opportunity to [continue to] expand the combined company's TPAC presence out of SEA. If DL took delivery of the 787s NW ordered, I think it would've served as a perfect plane to open TPAC cities from SEA and bypass NRT as NW already started to think about.

SEA is a major city that is the HQ for a lot of giant corporations (Microsoft, Costco, Amazon, to name a few), and with the work done on IAF, SEA could be a gold mine for DL.

Now DL has A339s, which one could argue that is [almost] as efficient as 789 to use it for something like SEA-CTU, CKG, TPE, CAN, MNL, DEL, and use A359/77L for SIN, BOM, and restart HKG with their D1 suite to make it more competitive. (As far as I can tell, there are no West Coast cities with a direct flight to DEL/BOM, except for AI's SFO-DEL flight). I think the opportunity is there, it's just if DL is willing and grind it out to really build SEA.

Seattle is my favorite city in the US, the transformation it has seen since my first visit in 2000 is unbelievable. It’s a shame though that lots of the city’s character and history, especially the music scene which I’m a huge fan of, is being lost to condos.

That said Seattle reminds me a lot of Boston, great well educated town but not on the same level as Los Angeles, San Francisco, New York, Chicago and Miami in terms of urbanism.

The trans-Pacific gateway from SEA has been tried many times:

UA in 1985 to NRT and HKG
CO in 1989 to NRT, had plans for more
AA in 1991 to NRT
NWA etc..

No one really made it work, I feel like the problem is that the Asian traffic that is originating in Seattle is very much skewed to the Asian carriers. On both the originating and destination ends for the city.

So the US carriers are getting the Seattle based business traveler and some connections, which is not enough to overcome the Asian carriers lock on VFR traffic.

Also domestically I feel like DL’s growth has been in the traffic to Seattle, while AS is getting the traffic from Seattle. Case in point Kennedy airport to SEA, to me DL has consolidated the JFK originating traffic that was previously shared amongst several
Carriers especially AA without really affecting AS which gets the SEA point of sale.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Pro

I would say it is working, 5 flights a day to Asia on their own metal is right there with any other US Airline hub excluding SFO. Will it grow, when and if it is profitable to do so.

flyinghippo wrote:

jplatts wrote:

acavpics wrote:

I think that DL needs to strengthen its domestic network in SEA before adding new TPAC flights. It only has 1x daily flight to CVG, AUS and RDU, which are DL's focus cities. Not to mention that there is no DL metal flight from SEA to many big metros such as DFW, TPA, STL, PHL, and MIA/FLL. A strong domestic/short haul foundation will help feed more traffic international/long haul flights through SEA. And I don't think it will come close to the size of UA's hub in SFO for the following reasons.

I agree with your point, especially since ABQ, CLT, DFW, IAH, EWR, OMA, PHL, STL, SAT, and TPA are top domestic destinations traveled to from SEA that DL doesn't currently serve nonstop from SEA.

DL can probably make SEA work as a Pacific gateway if DL adds nonstop service to SEA from more domestic destinations.

Why would they want to connect with cities east of MSP/DTW when DL already have a TPAC gateway in those hubs? SEA could serve as a TPAC hub thing west of MSP or the Rockies.

I meant that DL does not serve those major metropolitan areas which would have significant O&D traffic to/from SEA. My point was that Delta should spend their time and money on having a strong domestic network in its SEA hub before flying to more routes across the pacific. For example, DFW, PHL, HOU, and MIA are among the 10 largest metro areas in the US with a large and increasing amount of corporate growth , and they have yet to receive DL service to SEA.

And yes, maybe it is more efficient for folks on the east to connect via DTW or MSP, but cities all around the country are growing, and flights TPAC flights from midwest are still limited, so there will definitely be more people connecting via west coast hubs like SEA.

zakuivcustom wrote:

But yes, at the end of the day, HKG so far is DL's sole failure to/from SEA, and that's due to multiple factors. Everywhere else DL has been fairly successful. Yes, now that I looked back, their gauge are definitely a joke compare to UA@SFO. But maybe the ability to use something like a 763 to fly across the larger pond is what will ultimately make DL's TPAC gateway at SEA work.

HND-SEA was an early and dramatic failure by DL. They tried to hold onto it by gaming the system and flying the minimally required number of flights during many periods. AFAIK, the DOT took the HND slot away from them and reassigned it, I think to AA, but I could be wrong on that.

Hmmm...bit behind the news. USDOT has tentatively approved DL to switch SEA-NRT to HND.

USAirKid wrote:

zakuivcustom wrote:

But yes, at the end of the day, HKG so far is DL's sole failure to/from SEA, and that's due to multiple factors. Everywhere else DL has been fairly successful. Yes, now that I looked back, their gauge are definitely a joke compare to UA@SFO. But maybe the ability to use something like a 763 to fly across the larger pond is what will ultimately make DL's TPAC gateway at SEA work.

HND-SEA was an early and dramatic failure by DL. They tried to hold onto it by gaming the system and flying the minimally required number of flights during many periods. AFAIK, the DOT took the HND slot away from them and reassigned it, I think to AA, but I could be wrong on that.

USAirKid wrote:

zakuivcustom wrote:

But yes, at the end of the day, HKG so far is DL's sole failure to/from SEA, and that's due to multiple factors. Everywhere else DL has been fairly successful. Yes, now that I looked back, their gauge are definitely a joke compare to UA@SFO. But maybe the ability to use something like a 763 to fly across the larger pond is what will ultimately make DL's TPAC gateway at SEA work.

HND-SEA was an early and dramatic failure by DL. They tried to hold onto it by gaming the system and flying the minimally required number of flights during many periods. AFAIK, the DOT took the HND slot away from them and reassigned it, I think to AA, but I could be wrong on that.

That has everything to do with bad timing, though. Back when DL first flew SEA-HND, HND international slots are limited to late evening (After 2200) to early morning (0600 or so) arrival/departure.

From an article from way back in 2014:
https://airwaysmag.com/industry/delta-m ... -seasonal/

"However, as with other flights between the United States and Tokyo Haneda, the route has suffered from poor demand."

n7371f wrote:

USAirKid wrote:

zakuivcustom wrote:

But yes, at the end of the day, HKG so far is DL's sole failure to/from SEA, and that's due to multiple factors. Everywhere else DL has been fairly successful. Yes, now that I looked back, their gauge are definitely a joke compare to UA@SFO. But maybe the ability to use something like a 763 to fly across the larger pond is what will ultimately make DL's TPAC gateway at SEA work.

HND-SEA was an early and dramatic failure by DL. They tried to hold onto it by gaming the system and flying the minimally required number of flights during many periods. AFAIK, the DOT took the HND slot away from them and reassigned it, I think to AA, but I could be wrong on that.

Hmmm...bit behind the news. USDOT has tentatively approved DL to switch SEA-NRT to HND.

Just because DL is trying again, doesn’t mean the first time was not a failure.