US DoT Ruling on DELTA - Virgin Blue Group tie-up

[Jim Liu]

The US Department of Transportation on 01SEP09 has filed its decision on the proposal of Trans-Pacific joint-venture between DELTA and Virgin Blue Group.

The tie-up in principal is approved, however for the time being, DELTA can only place its "DL" code on Virgin Blue's service as the latter has passed the code-share safety audits by the US FAA.

The audits for DELTA - V Australia, DELTA - Pacific Blue, DELTA - Pacific Blue New Zealand, has not yet conducted, so DELTA can not start codesharing on these carriers although they are part of the Virgin Blue Airlines Group.

For the link of the PDF document ruling: http://www.regulations.gov/search/Regs/home.html#docketDetail?R=DOT-OST-2009-0156 (click on number 6)

[NickN]

Will be good when they codeshare with VA, they will then offer a morning service and an evening service.

[Anthony T]

Good stuff, Game on, If QF think they are loosing $$$$ on Trans-Pacific, they haven't seen nothing yet. :D

Anthony T

[Marty H]

Excellent news.

[Andrew M]

Will be good when they codeshare with VA, they will then offer a morning service and an evening service.

Don't count on it..... Expect more cutbacks

[NickN]

Cutbacks? If the codeshare is put in place there will be the daily Delta flight departing Sydney in the morning and a V Australia flight departing late evening I can't see how that's a cutback.

[lloyd fox]

Nick, i read somewhere recently that VA will only operate 6 a week from Feb 2010 with a wednesday flight being cancelled out of SYD.
VA i believe have not announced this as yet ???

There was some talk on another thread where they needed 5 aircraft when JNB starts but apparently 4 aircraft can do 3 BNE-LAX,6 SYD-LAX,2 MEL-LAX,2 MEL-JNB,1 MEL-HKT and 2 BNE-HKT.Apparently The JNB-MEL service will continue onto LAX and will be a late evening departure from MEL.

Cheers Lloyd

[Andrew M]

Correct no Wed SYD-LAX departures from about Feb next year.

This is already reflected on the booking engine.

While load have improved for VA this is only after big cutbacks to MEL, BNE and SYD also from next year.

Expect more cutbacks if loads don't improve and once the codeshare starts.

There are too many flights AUS-USA at the moment.

[Anthony T]

The ACCC has given the thumbs up to the VA/DL tie-up.

http://www.accc.gov.au/content/trimFile.phtml?trimFileName=D09+179396.pdf&trimFileTitle=D09+179396.pdf&trimFileFromVersionId=900058

Cheers
Anthony T

[Justin L]

The US DOT has reversed its decision on the DL-VA alliance.

http://travel.usatoday.com/flights/post/2011/05/dot-reverses-delta-virgin-blue-decision/169593/1

[BradR]

Don't count on it..... Expect more cutbacks

I don't believe there will be cutbacks as one of the pre-conditions they had to satisy with the DoT was that there would not be a reduction in services as a result of the joint venture.

It will be interesting to see if SFO now figures in VA's plans (SFO is a VX hub) or whether they remain concentrated on LAX which is a DL focus city.

[Montague S]

http://www.ausbt.com.au/approved-virgin-australia-and-delta-alliance-to-challenge-qantas?utm_source=internal&utm_medium=flipper&utm_campaign=home-flipper

deal done.