9/03/03 - AirTran Airways Reports Record August Traffic

[haze]

ORLANDO, Fla., Sep 3, 2003 (BUSINESS WIRE) -- AirTran Airways, a subsidiary of AirTran Holdings, Inc. (NYSE:AAI), today reported that passenger traffic, or revenue passenger miles (RPMs), represents a record high for the month of August.

Based on RPMs, traffic grew by 32.6 percent, to 689,094 million RPMs, on an increase of 19.2 percent in capacity, based on available seat miles (ASMs). August's load factor reached 77.8 percent compared to 70.0 percent in August 2002. Year-to-date load factor was 72.6 percent, versus 69.3 percent for the same period last year.

[haze]

...seems that a couple of you AirTran mechanics that post here hit the nail on the head: the negative propaganda and blatant misinformation campaign that dbaker has been spewing is not having the desired effect. What was it they told me on another one of these forums, "Keep fighting those windmills, Haze!" ? It's become painfully obvious who's fighting the windmills

[haze]

As many of you already know, AirTran's main hub is Hartsfield International in Atlanta, also home to Delta Airlines. I've always been a big fan of Delta because they're the home team, they're a big part of the Georgia economy, and I flew with them exclusively since I was a todler until I switched to AirTran in 1997 (no, I was NEVER a fan and/or passenger of ValuJet). While AirTran had record August traffic, Delta's traffic was down:

[ The Atlanta Journal-Constitution: 9/4/03 ]

Delta's ridership down, but subsidiaries' grows

Staff report


Delta Air Lines filled 80.1 percent of its seats in August, but overall ridership dipped from a year earlier.

Atlanta-based Delta said traffic as measured by revenue passenger miles fell 3.7 percent, while seat capacity, or available seat miles, declined 7.2 percent from August 2002.

I suspect the same thing will probably happen to American Airlines at DFW if AirTran can manage 40-50 flights a day there, albeit on a smaller scale than is the case with Delta at Hartsfield...