Cirium: Radical Shifts in US Flight Schedules This Summer Reveal Why Airlines Need New Planning Tools to Stay Ahead of the Curve

The new Diio^TM Schedule Snapshot offering released by Cirium, the aviation analytics firm, reveals how planning by the major US airlines changed over the summer, with 20% of flights being removed from their schedule for September.

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At the start of May 2021, the plan for what carriers would fly in September was more or less in line with pre-pandemic levels in 2019. By the time they came to fly the September schedule, American Airlines, Delta Air Lines, Southwest and United Airlines had significantly cut back their flights.

Airlines are now making major changes to the way they schedule flights—publishing or removing them much closer to the date of departure as they struggle with the uncertainties brought on by the pandemic.

Prior to the pandemic schedules would remain fairly stable over a season, with few changes—positive or negative—as the plan was refined.

Only 3% of flights were removed from the September schedule in 2019 compared with the plan published in May that year.

The new Diio Schedule Snapshot web-based tool enables airlines and airports to track changes to the flights being scheduled at different points in time. It provides much more detail on schedule changes than has been done in the past.

“In today's environment where travel restrictions and vaccination programs are significantly impacting flight schedules, airlines have had to adapt and issue changes to their schedules frequently and much closer to the day of departure. The traditional methods used to analyze demand need to be more dynamic,” said Kevin O’Toole, Chief Strategy Officer at Cirium.

“Using Diio Schedules Snapshot, airlines and airports can understand schedule changes over time, optimize future schedules, build stronger models for planning and revenue management, and optimize yield through trend analysis.”

The analysis of the major US airlines evidences the radical shift in the summer flight schedule and the impact that the pandemic has had on the variance in airline planning year-over-year.

Understanding and comparing changes to the published flight schedule over time as it gets closer to actual departure, enables analysts to stay ahead of the curve, and provides new insights for planning and revenue management.

Reviewing historical data by publication date also provides insights on airline and airport strategies in an uncertain world.

Diio Schedule Snapshot is part of the unrivaled Cirium Diio suite of products for airline planning. The suite includes Diio Mi, SRS Analyser^TM, Cirium Scenario Planner, and Diio Traffic and Fares.

The new tool integrates with Cirium Diio Mi or SRS Analyser and is the first of many more new tools in the Cirium pipeline to help airlines optimize their schedules and find new revenue opportunities.

More information on Diio Schedule Snapshot can be found at https://cirium.com/products/views/diio-schedule-snapshot

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For further information please visit https://www.cirium.com and follow Cirium updates via LinkedIn and Twitter.

About Cirium

Cirium brings together powerful data and analytics to keep the world moving. Delivering insight, built from decades of experience in the sector, enabling travel companies, aircraft manufacturers, airports, airlines and financial institutions, among others, to make logical and informed decisions which shape the future of travel, growing revenues and enhancing customer experiences. Cirium is part of RELX, a global provider of information-based analytics and decision tools for professional and business customers. The shares of RELX PLC are traded on the London, Amsterdam and New York Stock Exchanges using the following ticker symbols: London: REL; Amsterdam: REN; New York: RELX.

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Contact information

For media enquiries please contact:

Mike Arnot, Juliett Alpha via cirium@juliettalpha.com

or the Cirium media team at media@cirium.com