Texans aren’t the only ones feeling the summer heat, as carriers like American Airlines are making trying to improve operations during severe hot weather.
On Thursday, American Airlines CEO Robert Isom reiterated to investors during a quarterly financial results call that hot weather is hard on employees and aircraft. Meteorologists said Thursday’s heat was dangerous in the Dallas-Fort Worth area, and issued an excessive heat warning for all of North Texas that expires at 8 p.m. The forecast for the DFW International Airport shows a highs of 105 for the temperature and 111 for the heat index.
“The heat that we’re facing this year in the country, these are records,” Isom told investors. “It is something that impacts certainly our aircraft, any machinery.”
He identified hot-weather hubs such as Phoenix, Miami, Dallas-Fort Worth and Charlotte.
Isom said the carrier has put a “heck of a lot more work” into summer preparedness for things like air conditioning in jet bridges and monitoring the auxiliary power units, or the smaller engines that are able to power the systems when the larger engines are off. He also said American is making sure team members get a break from the heat when working outside.
Summer has been off to a successful start for American and Southwest Airlines, as both reported successful kick offs into Memorial Day weekend and strong Independence Day weekends for travel. Demand kicked up this year, as pandemic related restrictions have eased and international travel restored.
The weather in Dallas isn’t expected to break any more records this week, with high temperatures at DFW Airport forecasted to stay as much as 4 to 14 degrees below the daily maximum temperature record for the next few days.
©2023 The Dallas Morning News. Visit dallasnews.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.
