Josh Adelson | AFP | Getty Images
American Airlines, United Airlines, Southwest Airlines, Jet Blue Airways and other carriers serving the area waived flight change fees for passengers booked to Los Angeles as the city grapples with power outages, water shortages and protections, as well as more than 10,000 homes and Other structures suffer from total damage.
Area airports were operating as normal Friday, but parts of the city were still engulfed in wildfires, according to flight tracking platform FlightAware. Power outages were reported in Los Angeles County and local residents in the devastated Pacific Palisades area were asked to boil or use bottled water. Parts of the county were also under evacuation orders as firefighters tried to contain the blaze.
American Airlines said on Friday it would charge passengers departing or departing Hollywood Burbank Airport, Los Angeles International Airport, Ontario International Airport and John Wayne Airport, which serves Orange County, for change fees or fare differences. Can be rebooked without payment if they can fly by January. 20.
Southwest said the wildfires may affect service to those airports and that customers can rebook within 14 days of their original travel dates at no additional charge. Customers can also change their itinerary in other California cities: Palm Springs, Santa Barbara and San Diego, it said.
Meanwhile, A Delta Airlines Sales of flights to Los Angeles, one of the carrier’s busiest hubs and a generator of high-value business and leisure travel, declined, executives said on Friday.
“We monitor sales on a daily basis by geographic region, and we’ve seen a decline in sales, not a drop in wholesale or an increase in cancellations, but sales over the period,” said Delta President Glenn Hoenstein. decline” in the earnings call, in which the airline also said that travel demand remained high across its network. “As the period ends, we might put a wrapper on what we thought it was worth. But I don’t think it will be significant for the quarter, hopefully not.”
Havenstein said, however, that demand often increases because of reconstruction after natural disasters.
“Our hearts go out to everyone in Los Angeles affected by this,” he said. “But from a long-term airline perspective, we’ve had hurricanes, we’ve had floods, we’ve had them all. And generally, the impacts are in the early stages, after There is a recovery phase.”