Westjet to Hawaii?

Det782 · Post by **Det782** » Tue Feb 01, 2005 9:37 pm

I understand that Aloha is cancelling YVR-HNL in April. they have been using 700s for the Etops. Any chance that Westjet would step in?

LVLChange · Post by **LVLChange** » Tue Feb 01, 2005 11:29 pm

I likadatrumour

twinpratts · Post by **twinpratts** » Wed Feb 02, 2005 9:51 am

I heard WJet is trying to get ETOPS cert... that could mean Hawaii soon. Someone said maybe Europe via YHZ by late summer.

Go Westjet!

-700 · Post by **-700** » Wed Feb 02, 2005 10:25 am

We have been in the process of getting ETOPS certified for the last year. Maintenance is being c/o accordingly, should not be too much longer.
Does anyone know what ALoha's loads were? I can seee us having good loads to Hawaii but we are unkown there. Maybe sone kind of code share if Aloha stays alive?

WJ700 · Post by **WJ700** » Wed Feb 02, 2005 12:02 pm

Pilots are being ETOPS trained in groundschool and sim now. The ETOPS is also being accelerated by TC because we have a lot of people in every department with previous ETOPS experience. However I've still heard with everything moving faster, we're still not going to have ETOPS until fall and it may not even be 180 minutes by then.

EI-EIO · Post by **EI-EIO** » Wed Feb 02, 2005 8:35 pm

Europe via YHZ on a 737-700? Eek. Not any further than the UK or Ireland but even then... that long in a budget config??

I thought AC could look at SNN-YYT as a stopover buster allowing a 767 or 330 to bypass the stopover requirement but YHZ is a lot further still!

Traveler · Post by **Traveler** » Wed Feb 02, 2005 10:45 pm

Aloha has stated it will maintain all of its mainland "high yield" flights while in Ch.11... the YVR service is not being discontinued in April, just reduced like every other April...

can you give us a link or more info regarding your insite?

maxofthenorth · Post by **maxofthenorth** » Thu Feb 03, 2005 12:50 am

Just check out Aloha's web site. All YVR flights stopped as of April 11/05. Also check out HMY's web site and their expanded YVR-HNL service!

WJ700 · Post by **WJ700** » Sat Feb 05, 2005 8:20 am

EI-EIO wrote:Europe via YHZ on a 737-700? Eek. Not any further than the UK or Ireland but even then... that long in a budget config??

I thought AC could look at SNN-YYT as a stopover buster allowing a 767 or 330 to bypass the stopover requirement but YHZ is a lot further still!

I can't quote the seatpitch but WestJet's 700 have a lot of leg room, I'm 6,2 and very comfortable for a 5 hour flight on it. We jdon't have J class but that's not the market we're after.

As for the HNL rumours, that's highly likely, the Europe ability would be charters only I think.

Canus Chinookus · Post by **Canus Chinookus** » Sat Feb 05, 2005 9:13 am

EI-EIO wrote:Europe via YHZ on a 737-700? Eek. Not any further than the UK or Ireland but even then... that long in a budget config??

I thought AC could look at SNN-YYT as a stopover buster allowing a 767 or 330 to bypass the stopover requirement but YHZ is a lot further still!

I don't suppose you could explain to us what a 'budget config' would entail?

complexintentions · Post by **complexintentions** » Sat Feb 05, 2005 11:35 am

I'm going to guess it means a short seat pitch and no meal service for flights a tad longer than YVR-YYC?

Canus Chinookus · Post by **Canus Chinookus** » Sat Feb 05, 2005 12:09 pm

at 6'2 I have no problems with my knees banging the seat in front of me, and I'd be willing to bet the seat pitch is better than some legacy carriers.

While we don't have ovens, we have taken care of any food issues. If you want a hot meal, you can pay alot more money and get your way coddled to an overseas destination.

All our charters are in the 4-6 hour flight range, and I've never heard any complaints either... what's a few more hours?

RB211 · Post by **RB211** » Sat Feb 05, 2005 3:26 pm

WJ700 wrote:Pilots are being ETOPS trained in groundschool and sim now. The ETOPS is also being accelerated by TC because we have a lot of people in every department with previous ETOPS experience. However I've still heard with everything moving faster, we're still not going to have ETOPS until fall and it may not even be 180 minutes by then.

Are you conducting simulated ETOPS flights? If so, which ones and how long have they been doing so?

I would be surprised if initial ETOPS approval was to be 180 mins. I believe it generally comes in stages.

Canus Chinookus · Post by **Canus Chinookus** » Sun Feb 06, 2005 12:11 am

I was part of a simulated etops flight about 5 months ago... yyc-yow.

Snow Monkey · Post by **Snow Monkey** » Sun Feb 06, 2005 9:07 am

Did the first one 6 months ago same routing as above and the last one over new years.

tripleseven · Post by **tripleseven** » Sun Feb 06, 2005 9:27 am

This is going to open a whole can of worms when passengers realize that they have to bring their own lunches from home. You are only allowed to bring two pieces of carry on, so I guess it will be a purse/laptop/bag of gifts and a cooler full of tuna sandwiches. Imagine being a security officer seeing someone's lunch pass through the x-ray machine. What if Joe Security decides that your lunch is a threat to air safety and confiscates your din-din? I'd sooner pay the extra couple of hundred bucks, let they guys with alot more trans-atlantic experience fly the trip and be "coddled" over the pond with not only one, but likely two or three hot meals. Call me nuts, but I thought thats what air travel was about. They don't serve meals on Greyhound either, but the last time I checked, you still can't drive to London from Canada.

Canus Chinookus · Post by **Canus Chinookus** » Sun Feb 06, 2005 9:53 am

Canus Chinookus wrote:While we don't have ovens, we have taken care of any food issues. If you want a hot meal, you can pay alot more money and get your way coddled to an overseas destination. All our charters are in the 4-6 hour flight range, and I've never heard any complaints either... what's a few more hours?

Triple seven, we do have food available as I quote myself once again... mind you, you're still welcome to bring your own lunch if you really want.

WJ700 · Post by **WJ700** » Sun Feb 06, 2005 9:58 am

tripleseven wrote:This is going to open a whole can of worms when passengers realize that they have to bring their own lunches from home. You are only allowed to bring two pieces of carry on, so I guess it will be a purse/laptop/bag of gifts and a cooler full of tuna sandwiches. Imagine being a security officer seeing someone's lunch pass through the x-ray machine. What if Joe Security decides that your lunch is a threat to air safety and confiscates your din-din? I'd sooner pay the extra couple of hundred bucks, let they guys with alot more trans-atlantic experience fly the trip and be "coddled" over the pond with not only one, but likely two or three hot meals. Call me nuts, but I thought thats what air travel was about. They don't serve meals on Greyhound either, but the last time I checked, you still can't drive to London from Canada.

Time to get informed. No ovens but the cold food has been really good, pasta salads, sandwiches' ect. WS has been doing flights an hour longer than HNL for years... and everybody gets fed. As for experience flying across water, we have plenty of that at WestJet. Lot's of folks from AC/C3/Royal/Cathay to name a few.

tripleseven · Post by **tripleseven** » Sun Feb 06, 2005 2:48 pm

I hate to break it to you, but I highly doubt that a sandwich made at 6 am and a soggy pasta salad in a 2" x 3" container is going to hold someone over for an 8 hour flight. The pretzels may help though. However, if your customers are satisfied with that, why change anything? Point noted with regard to crew experience.

One other thing. I thought the business plan was to have low fares and good service (which is still 100% true) and slow, controlled expansion. Next thing I know, your going to Hawaii and next thing is Europe. That doesn't sound like the original plan. Why the big change? Southwest and Jetblue don't do that. Don't you think you need bigger planes to compete on these types of routes?

tripleseven · Post by **tripleseven** » Sun Feb 06, 2005 3:15 pm

It takes 6:10 to go from Vancouver to Honalulu in a 767. What flight have you been doing for years that is an hour longer than that?

WJ700 · Post by **WJ700** » Sun Feb 06, 2005 8:14 pm

tripleseven wrote:I hate to break it to you, but I highly doubt that a sandwich made at 6 am and a soggy pasta salad in a 2" x 3" container is going to hold someone over for an 8 hour flight. The pretzels may help though. However, if your customers are satisfied with that, why change anything? Point noted with regard to crew experience.

One other thing. I thought the business plan was to have low fares and good service (which is still 100% true) and slow, controlled expansion. Next thing I know, your going to Hawaii and next thing is Europe. That doesn't sound like the original plan. Why the big change? Southwest and Jetblue don't do that. Don't you think you need bigger planes to compete on these types of routes?

Well when you make the food sound like that I don't think I'd eat it either. As for the service, it's "Buy on Board" or bring your own... everyone gets told about it and it's worked fine to date. For the flight time, it won't be from YVR, it will be from smaller points to justify the narrowbody, and the NG has the legs to do YEG-HNL, or YLW-OGG, the destination may not even be one of those points in Hawaii, maybe Kuai? I don't think you'll see anything from YVR; as you stated a larger aircraft would be needed to compete which isn't in the cards from what I know. As for the expansion, I think they are taking a breather, sometime in February we will be anouncing how much of the 200 fleet is getting parked. The replacment aircraft will still be able to fly 30% more as they do not need to be rebuilt after every leg, bringing some growth, just not as much.

NovaBoy · Post by **NovaBoy** » Mon Feb 07, 2005 9:08 am

YHZ to Heathrow is only about 5hrs, about the same as our YHZ direct YYC, no problem in an NG. I did CUN to YXE awhile ago and it was 6hrs.

The buy on board is a big hit, don't see why it won't going across the pond. Plus we have 32" seat pitch with LiveTV

pika · Post by **pika** » Mon Feb 07, 2005 10:03 am

Did the first one 6 months ago same routing as above and the last one over new years.

Which routes are simulated ETOPS and how often are you simulating ETOPS on these routes?

RB211 · Post by **RB211** » Mon Feb 07, 2005 4:32 pm

NovaBoy wrote:YHZ to Heathrow is only about 5hrs, about the same as our YHZ direct YYC, no problem in an NG. I did CUN to YXE awhile ago and it was 6hrs.

The buy on board is a big hit, don't see why it won't going across the pond. Plus we have 32" seat pitch with LiveTV

The length of the flight itself is not what, to my understanding, created problems for Aloha to Hawaii. The problem comes with the extra fuel needed for a diversion, with the most restrictive set of conditions assumed, from the critical ETP.

So out of curiosity, what is the fuel capacity of a -700 and how much fuel (roughly) was needed for a flight CUN-YXE?

Thanks

Pajock · Post by **Pajock** » Mon Feb 07, 2005 6:47 pm

737-700 Fuel about 46000 lbs.
CUN - YXE roughly 28000 - 30000 lbs.