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Southwest Airlines Community

Hurricane Ike

blusk
Aviator C

 As we get updates on the situation in Houston, we will post them in the News section on the front page.  Southwest will begin limited service to/from Houston Hobby between 9:10 am and 6:25 pm (Central Time) on Tuesday and Wednesday.  Volunteers from other stations will be helping man the station so the local Employees who suffered damage can tend to their homes.

 

Hurricane Ike


All week long, groups here at Headquarters and out in the field have been preparing for the arrival of Ike.  Steve’s Red Belly Radio post at the bottom of the home page outlines two of those groups’ efforts, but that really is the “tip of the iceberg” because almost every department is affected.  Some of the special heroes of this preparation are those Employees who volunteered to go to Houston to “hurricanize” the facilities and keep the operation running to allow as many local Employees as possible to prepare their houses and put their personal hurricane plans into action.  As many of you know, we have a sizeable airport operation at Houston Hobby, but we also have a major Maintenance Base, Pilot and Flight Attendant Bases, and a Reservations Center.

Needless to say, our thoughts go out to everyone in the storm’s path.  We have tried to prepare for the worst, but as the weekend progresses, we will be praying for the best!

13 Comments
Anonymous3214
Explorer C
What happens with all the planes that were scheduled to go to Houston when the airport is closed? Do they just sit in Dallas? Also I keep seeing ads on Yahoo for Southwest Airlines but Southwest does not serve Minneapolis where I live. I'm not sure why you would place ads in a city where the nearest airport is a 7 hour drive (Chicago's Midway.) I wish you would come here though.
blusk
Aviator C
Dear anonymous, Some of the aircraft will sit here, but others will be dispersed around our system (primarily at our Maintenance Bases) so they will be ready to resume service as soon as that is possible. Others will continue flying. On some flights that have a stop in Houston, the aircraft will just skip the Houston stop. We buy both local and and national advertising. For example, on the NFL telecasts, you will see Southwest ads in Montana, Georgia, Minnesota, and Wisconsin for example, even though we don't fly to those states...yet. (Here in Texas, we see K-Mart ads on national television even though K-Mart pulled out of the area completely.) The Yahoo ads are national in scope too. Then, of course, we do local ads in cities we do serve, and they usually are city specific.
blusk
Aviator C
Joe, I accidentally deleted your comment. If you will resubmitt, I will post it Brian
joedal
Explorer A
Brian, It is great to hear about how fellow employees selflessly come to the aid of fellow employees who are based in areas of danger. It shows how y'all are more of a community and a family as opposed to just an airline. Best wishes and hopes go out to all the crew members affected by this. Keep the blue side up y'all!

Joseph R. Meyers

Dallas, Texas

Leslie2
Explorer C
I cannot believe SW airlines slapped me with a "change" fee for rerouting my kids to San antoinio b/c the Houston Hobby flight was cancelled due to IKE. These kids work and go to school in Houston and had to be back, they DO have class and work on Monday. I understand that the airport needed and should have been closed. But, wouldn't it have been better to just re-route us on some empty seats? Was the "Fee" really necessary? Next time I'll check w/ continental and just let you refund me my money. Very disappointed in Southwest for sticking it to us during a very stressful time. Shame on you all.
Monika_Musgrove
Explorer C
I just wanted to say Kudos to SWA! We were on a bisness trip -stressing in Cali afraid we would be stranded without our families and small children and the staff was kind enough to change our flights not once but twice because of Ike not being about to make up its mind. We made it HOME Thursday night without a problem! Thanks so much! I love flying with ya'll! I really enjoy the awesome attendents so willing to entertain and assist others! God Bless.
Keith1
Explorer C
Brian, I tried to find an email adress for you on the site, but could'nt find one. I wanted you to take a look at the site I run, www.cruisingwilbert.com. It is a fun travel website run by me, a clever college grad who loves to travel the world. The website is dedicated to a doll named wilbert that travels somewhere new in the world each week and photos are taken of him. Please check out the site and tell me what you think. Perhaps you could dedicate a blog to it? Let me know! Thanks!! Keith
GPM
Explorer C
Does Southwest inted on re-entering the Hawaii market. I had expected to book a trip to Hawaii in Decmeber using my points. When your partner airline went ouit of business I canceled my trip. I enjoy traveling SWA when ever I can and have always found the entire staff helpful and fun to work with.
blusk
Aviator C
GPM, Bill Owen addressed service to Hawaii in an earlier post: http://www.blogsouthwest.com/blog/why-no-southwest-to-hawaii
Kathy31
Explorer C
I have a flight reservation for Friday 9/19 from Tulsa to Houston. This is a pleasure trip to visit my grandson. However, since Ike, the kids are without power therefore my trip is likely to be cancelled. Can I reschedule my reservation at a later date without loosing my money?
scottnearsmf
Adventurer B
kathy, the current (9/16) travel advisory for IKE says that you can rebook at the same rate as long as it is within 14 days (Oct 3rd). If you can't, then you can get back you credit (to be used prior to 1 yr from booking date).
scottnearsmf
Adventurer B
Yes, it would be very nice that if HOU becomes unavailable for an extended time that you could keep your "Wanna Get Away" rate if you move your reservation to AUS or SAT, or if MSY becomes unavailable to move your reservation to JAN or BHM and keep you "Wanna Get Away" rate, or if FLL becomes unavailable to move your reservation to a different Florida airport and keep your "Wanna Get Away" rate. However, this is not realisitic in the Houston case because Austin and San Antonio have LOWER frequencies than Houston and cannot support the 20,000 people per day that were inconvienced. If they would have allowed Houston customers to move to Austin or San Antonio at "Wanna Get Away" rates because of airport unavailability they would have in effect caused both markets to be locked up (full flights for days). In this envirorment, Southwest could not afford just to give away money. They were already losing money ($2 million per full day) each day the Houston airport was completely closed, they are continuing to lose 6 figures per day from their current "limited" schedule because of curfews. So while your situation is bad, having to return to Houston because of children returning to school. We now know this is a peril of traveling during hurricane season.
scottnearsmf
Adventurer B
Happy Friday, it looks like Southwest has resumed full operations at Houston, an incredible recovery given the circumstances. I hope you are able to help those in Galveston "get away" since they can't as yet go back to their properties yet.