JetBlue Airways has called on the US Department of Transportation (DOT) to institute a frequency allocation proceeding after four carriers - itself, American Airlines, Southwest Airlines, and Delta Air Lines - individually applied for the Havana International frequencies Frontier Airlines and Spirit Airlines are set to relinquish later this quarter.
As previously reported, Spirit and Frontier have already confirmed their withdrawal from the Cuban capital market citing overcapacity coupled with insufficient loads. With their departures on May 31, 2017, and June 4, 2017 respectively, a total of twenty-one (21) weekly Havana frequencies will become available.
jetBlue applied for seven additional Cuba frequencies for proposed use from November 1, 2017, onwards - a 6x weekly Fort Lauderdale International-Havana service and a single weekly frequency for a Boston-Havana route.
Delta requested one daily US-Havana frequency for use in expanding its current daily Miami International-Havana service to twice-daily while, for its part, American Airlines requested a similar allocation; seven weekly US-Havana frequencies, so that it may operate an additional daily year-round service between Miami and Havana.
Southwest applied for an extra daily Havana frequency to add to its existing double daily return service from Fort Lauderdale Int'l to Havana.
As a total of twenty-eight (28) weekly Havana frequencies were requested, jetBlue has now requested the DOT to institute a proceeding to allocate the available frequencies to the applicant whose proposal best serves the public interest. Naturally, the New York-based LCC has played up its application stating it will maximize public benefits and "is superior to the competing proposals submitted by Delta, American and Southwest."
