Southwest memos show growing alarm before storm hit

Bloomberg

As a winter storm bore down on a broad swath of the US, a staffing crisis was brewing for Southwest Airlines Co in Denver.
Chris Johnson, the carrier’s vice president of ground operations, declared a “state of operational emergency” at the airport after “an unusually high number” of employee absences, according to a message to ramp workers seen by Bloomberg News.
It was just the beginning.
The so-called bomb cyclone kicked off a cascade of disruptions that have battered Southwest’s operations over the past week, forcing the carrier to cancel thousands of flights and stranding holiday travelers who now face days of waiting.
The chaos is still unfolding. As of December 27, Southwest had scrapped more than 60% of its schedule, plus about 20% of its trips for Thursday, according to FlightAware data.
And although no airline was spared the storm’s wrath, rivals such as Delta Air Lines Inc, American Airlines Group Inc and United Airlines Holdings Inc largely returned operations to normal this week.
Chief Executive Officer Bob Jordan apologised again in a video posted by Southwest, saying the company reduced its schedule to gain time to reposition aircraft and crews.
“We’re optimistic to be back on track before next week,” Jordan said.
Southwest shares fell 6%, the most since July, to extend their 2022 decline to 21%.
US authorities and lawmakers, meanwhile, are scrutinising the carrier’s response to the storm, which analysts at Citigroup estimate could shave as much as 5% from Southwest’s fourth-quarter profit.
Customers complained on social media of spending hours in line or on hold to book alternate flights, only to find few alternatives. Pilots and flight attendants, meanwhile, faced lengthy waits for work assignments and hotel accommodations as the storm and its subsequent disruption hobbled the carrier’s crew scheduling systems and left the company’s fleet of Boeing 737s out of position across the country.
Management messages to Southwest employees seen by Bloomberg News highlight how the chaos unfolded, and how the carrier struggled as the systems used to coordinate a vast network of airplanes, destinations and flight crews failed to recover.