Las Vegas Sun

March 29, 2024

Southwest to trim operations nationally after quarterly loss

Southwest Airlines of Dallas, the No. 1 flier of tourists to Las Vegas, today reported a rare quarterly loss and disclosed plans to trim its operations because of soft bookings for flights this year.

The company didn't immediately announce which flights may be cut or what cities may be affected by an anticipated reduction of 4 percent in seat capacity.

Citing high fuel costs, the company lost $56 million or 8 cents per share in the fourth quarter ended Dec. 31 vs. a profit of $111 million or 15 cents in the year-ago quarter.

"We remain intensely focused on maximizing the efficiency and profitability of each published flight schedule. Through our optimization efforts in 2008, we were able to grow key markets like Denver and San Francisco, while simultaneously pruning unpopular, and thus unproductive, flights.

"While we remain cautious about our 2009 growth and currently plan to reduce our available seat miles by approximately four percent versus 2008, we remain well-positioned to respond quickly to favorable market opportunities, such as our launch into Minneapolis-St. Paul beginning March 2009 and our bid to acquire rights to 14 slots at New York's LaGuardia airport," Chief Executive Gary Kelly said in a statement.

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