As it prepares to begin selling tickets to Hawaii later this year, Southwest Airlines continues to develop the largely leisure Mexican and Caribbean route system it inherited from the merger with AirTran in 2011.
Southwest just began nonstop Fort Lauderdale/Hollywood International – Aruba flights, marking the 10th international destination it serves on a daily basis from its new international concourse at FLL.
Come summer and springtime carriers subtly shift some of their aircraft to plying low-frequency leisure routes. Southwest is no exception.
It’s just begun weekly nonstop San Jose, California – Cabo San Lucas/Los Cabos service, nonstop Sacramento – Cabo San Lucas/Los Cabos flights, nonstop Indianapolis – Cancun flights and nonstop San Diego – Puerto Vallarta service.
Domestic leisure routes get a revamp too. There’s now seasonal nonstop service aboard Southwest’s all-Boeing 737 fleet from Detroit and Omaha to Tampa, nonstop Sunday-only seasonal service from Sacramento to New Orleans as well as San Diego to El Paso.
Southwest is the North American launch customer for Boeing’s 737 MAX 8, which the airline plans to use on—among other more prosaic runs—long overwater flights to Hawaii.
Southwest’s version of the MAX is powered by new CFM LEAP 1B engines. The new engines burn fuel 14 percent more efficiently than predecessor powerplants, and they’re significantly quieter.
A Southwest pilot just introduced to the MAX compared the cockpit and cockpit noise levels to that of the venerable MD-80 series aircraft, whose engines were mounted on the tail. All 737s have their power plants attached underwing. Even then the low noise level, he told this AirlineRatings reporter, was nothing short of “amazing.”
Southwest’s all-737 fleet is the planet’s largest all-Boeing affair. The low-cost airline has 200 MAX’s on firm order, a mixture of 737-7 and larger 737-8 versions.
This week thousands of Boeing employees have gathered at the company’s Renton, Wash. factory today to celebrate the 10,000th 737 to come off the production line.
Read: The plane that Boeing didn’t want turns 10,000
With the 737 MAX 8 for Southwest Airlines, the 737 has broken the Guinness World Records title for the most produced commercial jet aircraft model.
