Arrivals and Departures

It's been a busy week at LAX tower, my home away from home. Besides the first real rain of the season, and the transition off of Daylight Savings Time, we've had several notable comings and goings:


As mentioned in an earlier post, Qantas began scheduled service here with the first of their A380's. So far we get one flight a week each from/to Sidney and Melbourne. The new is starting to wear off now, and the day-to-day reality is that this thing is a royal pain. By sheer luck of the draw, I have yet to actually work the Super, as we have to call it (mere B747's and such are 'heavies'), but I have gotten to observe as various of my coworkers have worked it. 'Worked around it' is closer to the truth - there are a number of airport restrictions that apply to and/or because of the A380 that I'll enumerate some other time.


Emirates began their service to Dubai, UAE, this week, using B777-200's. I think we're getting three flights a week. This has doubled our offerings to the Middle East; previously all we had was El Al's flight to Tel Aviv, Israel, also using B777-200's. So far, whether by plan or chance I can't say, they aren't both here at the same time.



Midwest has started using a regional carrier partner for its LA to Kansas City route - currently the only service they have out of LA. The Midwest 106-seat B-717 (nee MD-95) has been replaced with the 70-seat E-170, operated by Republic Airlines (based in Indianapolis, their callsign is "Brickyard"). During the summer Midwest also went from here to Milwaukee with MD-88's; that went away along with many other flights from many other carriers right after Labor Day. The E-170 is the smallest of Embraer's "E-jet" family; there's also the 100-seat E-190, which we see at LAX in Air Canada colors:

A pair of Air Canada E-190's; the Northwest is an Airbus A319, seating capacity 124.

Aer Lingus, whom we know as 'Shamrock', flew its final flight out of LA yesterday. There was to be a ceremonial send-off water spray from the fire trucks, but as it was already raining, I think they called it off. I've been told that they have plans to resume their LA to Dublin service in the spring. However until then, we've no direct service to Ireland.


The rumor was true - American Eagle flew one of their SF-340's out this afternoon, destination the boneyard in Kingman, Arizona. Hopefully there'll be more. No word yet on if they're being replaced with something else. I heard that DFW's Eagle Flight Saabs were replaced with ATR's, which would be nice - those are much more compatible with the rest of our traffic mix. They're also a good deal bigger than the Saabs though, so unless they're adding capacity (not the prevailing trend in the industry right now) it's not likely.


Notes:

Today (November 2nd) is the anniversary of the first (and only) flight of Howard Hughes' Spruce Goose in Long Beach harbor.

The Republic Airlines mentioned above flying for Midwest is not the Republic of old, which became part of Northwest Airlines in 1986. This Republic Airlines operates or has operated regional flights for flag carriers, including Delta, Continental, US Air, American, Frontier, and United.

Where can we go from here: Props versus jets

Last time I discussed a few of the various destinations for flights out of LAX. This time we'll continue that theme with a look at destinations served by both jets and turboprops. As you might imagine, there are not that many places that have such dual service. JFK, for instance, currently does not have any scheduled turboprop service from LAX. All of these are cities served by one or more of the regional airlines operating at LAX: American Eagle (callsign: Eagle Flight), for American; Horizon, for Alaska; and Skywest, for United (primarily).

Boise, Idaho, can be reached from LA via Horizon's Dash 8, seen here in the foreground, or via Skywest's CRJ-200, in the background. The CRJ, while somewhat faster, also has less seating capacity: 50, versus around 70 for the Dash 8. Ironically, although they have different brand names (Canadair builds the CRJ's and de Havilland the Dash 8, which is officially the DHC-8), they're both built by the same parent company, Bombardier Aerospace of Canada, who also owns Learjet. Bombardier is better known to most Americans as the builder of Ski-Doo snowmobiles; producing snowcats and snowmobiles was how the company got its start in the 1930's. Just as the CRJ series was an outgrowth of the Challenger CL-60 business jet, the Dash 8 was a descendant of the Dash 7, which was in turn preceded by the de Havilland DHC-2 Twin Otter. Bombardier actually calls the turboprop the Q400, but you'll never hear pilots or controllers refer to it that way. The flight plan times are about 1:35 for the Skywest CRJ and 2 hours for the Horizon Dash 8. At LAX, the Horizon gates are a good deal closer to the preferred departure runway than are Skywest's.

Monterey, California, is another destination with turboprop and jet service from LA. In this case, American Eagle E135's and Skywest E120 Brasilias. Both of these aircraft are built by Brazil's Embraer, which has made itself a major player in the regional airliner market. The ERJ series is itself a development of the E120. The E135 is the smallest of the ERJ's, with a seating capacity of about three dozen; the Brasilia seats thirty. The jet is less than 15 minutes faster to Monterey than the turboprop; flight plan times are about 50 minutes and 1:04, respectively.


Another destination that offers a choice of jet or turboprop service also offers an additional choice of carrier: Reno, Nevada, can be reached from LAX via Horizon Dash 8, Skywest CRJ, or Southwest B737. The Skywest flight seems to be the shortest, by a whopping one minute. The CRJ's and 737's average just under an hour, while the Dash 8 takes about an hour and ten minutes.

San Diego and San Luis Obispo, California, offer not just a choice of jets or turboprops, but different models of turboprops as well. Skywest uses the Brasilia for these routes, but American Eagle uses E135's and Saab Fairchild 340's. Flight plan time for the Brasilia is about 25 minutes to San Diego. The jet is only a minute faster, but the Saab is about five minutes slower. I've mentioned before that the SF34 is the doggiest of all the aircraft regularly operating at LAX, and we controllers were encouraged by rumors that the Saabs were going to be phased out. If so, it hasn't happened yet (sigh). The E135 flight plans about a half hour to San Luis Obispo, the Brasilia about five or six minutes more. The Saab needs about forty-five minutes for the same flight.

On all of these routes, the jets are slightly faster, but what's not reflected is the greater fuel and maintenance requirements. That stuff doesn't show up in the flight plans, so I wasn't able to figure it in. Turboprops are generally more fuel efficient than jets, however, and don't have to climb as high to achieve efficiency. This plays in their favor, especially on short routes, as the airspace congestion in southern California often means that certain routes are held to pre-designated altitudes, regardless of what altitude the pilot files for. For instance, the San Diego flights are capped at nine thousand for the turboprops and eleven thousand for the jets. Below ten thousand, all aircraft are limited to 250 knots, and on these shorter routes there's just not much chance for the jets to go any faster.

On the other hand, the flying public has a definite preference for jets, even little ones, over prop-driven aircraft. The perception is that the prop aircraft are smaller, slower, bumpier, noisier, and more dangerous than the jets. I don't have any factual information to hand on whether any of these is in fact the case . . . but then neither does the flying public.

More airline rumors

I went on a tour of the airport last weekend with one of the airport operations guys. We get to do this every now and then for training: It's a chance for us to see the airport from the pilots' perspective. Along the way, I picked up some bits of news:

Our first Airbus 380 flight is expected in September; it'll be a one-time special operated by Emirates. Regular scheduled service is to start in October with Qantas. Singapore is also going to start A380 service later this year. Emirates is expected to start scheduled service this fall.

Air Lingus, callsign "Shamrock', will be pulling out of LAX in September. This will end the only direct service from LAX to Ireland.


Also in September, Delta will discontinue their Delta Connection operations operated by ExpressJet. As far as I know, the Delta Connection flights operated by Skywest will continue. ExpressJet, callsign 'Jetlink', also operates under their own name out of Long Beach and Ontario airports in the LA area. Along with their Delta Connection flights, ExpressJet will shut down its own airline operations on September 2nd, although their corporate charter arm will continue. ExpressJet also operates as Continental Express, although not at LAX, and this part of their operation will continue as well.



Along the same lines, we've heard rumblings that the American Eagle operation here may go away. I can't say that we'll miss their Saabs, as they're the pokiest things on the airport. I've heard that their DFW operation is replacing the Saabs with ATR's, and that would be an improvement here, too. If Eagle stays, they will eventually have to move, as their current terminal facility is slated to be replaced with a new North-South taxiway.


Several airlines are about to move terminals. Virgin America,which is currently at terminal 6, is going to move to terminal 3. Also expected later this year is service by Virgin Blue, out of Australia. They will also be at terminal 3. No word if the Virgin Atlantic operations will move from terminal 2. Several of the airlines currently at terminal 3 will be displaced to terminal 6 by the Virgin move. Among these are Frontier, Midwest, Spirit, and Sun Country.