Maria sows devastation
Hurricane Maria, a 175 mph buzzsaw, destroyed the island of Dominica and threatened Puerto Rico with the worst destruction in generations. Airlines have capped fares for those seeking to flee.
Taking a cue from lessons learned during Hurricane Irma, major U.S. airlines are again capping fares for travelers looking to escape Hurricane Maria’s rampage through the eastern Caribbean.
In the run-up to Hurricane Irma’s recent lashing of the Caribbean and South Florida, consumers looking to flee affected areas before the storm accused some airlines of price-gouging when they were charged exorbitant prices for last-minute bookings.
While airlines denied the claims, several capped fares to aid travelers who turned to social media for help in obtaining cheaper flights.
“The airlines learned a powerful lesson during Irma: Greed is not good, especially when social media can affect an airline’s reputation,” said travel industry analyst Henry Harteveldt of Atmosphere Research Group in San Francisco. “It’s smart that airlines [moved] quickly with Maria. It’s good to see them being proactive.”
In preparation for Maria, American said Tuesday it has capped one-way economy fares at $99 one-way and $199 for premium seats to select affected destinations. Delta put its cap at $199 for nonstop flights departing San Juan, Puerto Rico, and from Punta Cana, Santiago and Santo Domingo, the Dominican Republic through Thursday. United capped its one-way economy fares at $384 plus taxes.
JetBlue Airways — the top carrier at Fort LauderdaleHollywood International Airport — said it is limiting fares to $149 for remaining seats on flights to and from San Juan, Aguadilla and Ponce in Puerto Rico, as well as St. Croix, and Antigua for travel through Sept. 25.
The carrier has also added 17 flights to its regular schedule to fly travelers out of cities in Maria’s path.
Southwest said it’s offering every available seat to and from affected destinations at its cheapest fare category until flights are sold out and is matching competitors’ fares that may be lower than its own.
As of Monday afternoon, several major airlines announced their standard rebooking contingencies for travelers. Those remedies included waivers of reservation change fees and/or fare increases as well as refunds for canceled flights that had been booked by a certain date.
Tuesday’s cap announcements follow a letter from U.S. Sen. Bill Nelson of Florida to 10 U.S. carriers requesting that they act earlier than they did with Irma to prevent airfare spikes.
During Irma, Nelson said his office received many complaints about excessive airfares from consumers trying to fly out of affected areas ahead of the massive hurricane.
“As you know, Hurricane Maria is a major hurricane and is threatening Puerto Rico and the Caribbean now and may be a threat to the U.S. coast by next week,” Nelson wrote. “Therefore, I urge you to begin the process now for implementing capped airfares and ensuring that refunds are promptly issued for canceled flights.”
“Individuals and families should not be forced to delay or cancel their evacuation efforts because of confusion over the cost of airfare,” Nelson said.
Nelson, who sits on the Senate Commerce Committee that oversees the nation’s airline industry, sent the letters to the chiefs of American, United, Delta, JetBlue, Southwest, Spirit, Alaska, Hawaiian, Frontier and Allegiant. By Tuesday afternoon, Nelson’s office had received direct responses from American, Delta, Southwest and United touting their respective price cap initiatives relating to Hurricane Maria, which had grown to a Category 5 storm.
During Irma preparations, airlines seemed to have been surprised by the sudden surge in demand, said Seth Kaplan, industry analyst with trade publication Airline Weekly.
“The awful, very recent images of Houston after Hurricane Harvey, combined with the fact that this was the first South Florida hurricane of the social media era, seemed to cause everyone to panic, and you had this mass evacuation,” Kaplan said.
Since then, Kaplan figures the airlines did learn some important lessons, and the pre-Irma situation won’t repeat itself.
To prepare for Maria, airlines also announced several cancellations for flights starting late Tuesday into today for Puerto Rico and other islands along the storm’s current forecasted track.
American canceled 30 flights for Tuesday and another 30 for today.
And all flights to and from San Juan are canceled for today, with plans to resume service Thursday morning, American said. Other flights have been canceled to and from St.Croix, St. Thomas, St. Kitts and St. Lucia.
Southwest also scrubbed flights to and from San Juan and Punta Cana for today.
United plans to suspend operations today at the San Juan and Aquadilla airports in Puerto Rico, but hopes to resume operations Thursday pending infrastructure assessments.