Please continue your discussion and to post your updates here.

Link to previous thread:

viewtopic.php?f=3&t=604763

I don't know about you guys, but I am still rather upset and disappointed in the new PIT website. It's so cheap and cheesy. I don't get it. They had an RFP to solicit bids, and this is the best they came up with?!?! The developer literally changed a few colors and probably charged thousands!! I could have made the same changes in 5 minutes with HTML/CSS. lol.

I wish they would have picked my proposal. It included developing an interactive iPhone app that users could use to find places to eat/shop, and to help them navigate to their next gate or parking/baggage claim.

Oh well.....

New Onejet destinations were announced. Richmond, VA and Albany, NY.
http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases ... 74602.html

Also came across this while booking a flight. Had we heard anything about Jetblue up-gauging to the A320 on the boston route for the early AM?

"Advance bookings for new service to Reykjavik coming in June on WOW air have been strong!" - according to Twitter and FB posts directly from the ACAA. The fact that they would publicly state this several months before service starts is very encouraging.



UPS has really ramped up the number of flights from PIT for this peak. In addition to the usual SDF and PHL departures, scheduled flights from PIT will include BWI/CLE/LCK/MSP/GSO/MDT/ORD/TYS/SYR. Some of those are only operated a few times, some are more regular. Again, that's just what is scheduled and this will change nightly based on demand and surges. For example this morning PIT had 3 arrivals from SDF. MD-11s will operate to SDF and MSP, and inbound from ONT.

pitbosflyer wrote:

New Onejet destinations were announced. Richmond, VA and Albany, NY.
http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases ... 74602.html

Solid adds IMHO.

I was just thinking about RIC the other day, and People Express's old service to PHF. Their loads for the 3 months the flight operated were 45%, 48%, and 49% using a 737-300. That's not too bad considering the lack of name recognition of the second incarnation, zero advertising, and utilizing a secondary airport. It was all low fare stimulation, so there is definitely a market to that region.

Does anyone know how the new PIT-MDT service on Southern Airways Express is doing?

Looks like the B6 A320 to BOS will operate for one week or so, leading up to the route becoming 5x daily (all E-190). It appears to be an RON, which means B6 will have two A-320s overnight at PIT during that time.

BatonOps wrote:

Does anyone know how the new PIT-MDT service on Southern Airways Express is doing?

So this was just in the news today:
"Southern Airways Express is putting its new route between Harrisburg and Pittsburgh on temporary hold until January, citing an expected decline in demand over the holidays.

"Southern's Harrisburg Pre-December bookings exceeded expectations, but December is traditionally a very light month for short-haul air travel and business travel," said Southern CMO and co-founder Keith Sisson.

"To account for the seasonal dip, Southern has halted Harrisburg flights for the rest of the holidays and will resume with its full schedule on Jan. 16. Those tickets are on sale now," Sisson added.

The service kicked off on Oct. 31, linking Harrisburg International Airport with Pittsburgh International Airport for the first time since US Airways eliminated its route between the two cities in 2008.

The new route has been offering three non-stop flights each weekday and one flight each day on Saturdays and Sundays. The service uses nine-passenger turboprop commuter planes. Officials have said they expect the service to carry 22 people per weekday.

"November was pretty good," Sisson said. "If it's any indication of what traffic is going to be like when the legislature is back in session, we're going to have a winning route."
http://www.cpbj.com/article/20161207/CPBJ01/161209836/hias-pittsburgh-flights-will-take-holiday-hiatus

Seems like mixed signals in that report. The route is doing better than expected.... but they are temporarily suspending it? I guess we can only take it at face value, that the legislative season has a lot to do with it.

Well, that doesn't sound good for MDT. Thanks for the info.

BatonOps wrote:

Well, that doesn't sound good for MDT. Thanks for the info.

Lots of small routes are suspended during December. At CVG, DL is pausing most of its short-haul routes in December, as few business travlers travel during this time. I think the route is fine, I am actually suprised more of their routes are not halted in December!

OneJet claims each of their PIT routes is profitable with an average of 6 out of 7 seats sold per flight. They also state they have 4 planes based at PIT with another 5 coming by summer.
http://www.post-gazette.com/news/transportation/2016/12/07/OneJet-adds-nonstop-service-from-Pittsburgh-to-Albany-Richmond/stories/201612070193

cvgComair wrote:

Lots of small routes are suspended during December. At CVG, DL is pausing most of its short-haul routes in December, as few business travlers travel during this time. I think the route is fine, I am actually suprised more of their routes are not halted in December!

All of Southern's other routes are EAS routes, so there's no way they will suspend those.

flyPIT wrote:

OneJet claims each of their PIT routes is profitable with an average of 6 out of 7 seats sold per flight. They also state they have 4 planes based at PIT with another 5 coming by summer.

The PIT newspaper has cut me off unless I subscribe: So I can't read the citation. Will Corporate Flight Management do all OneJet's flying?

masseybrown wrote:

The PIT newspaper has cut me off unless I subscribe: So I can't read the citation. Will Corporate Flight Management do all OneJet's flying?

I'm not sure who will be providing the lift going forward and the article did not cover that either.

When I get cut off from free P-G articles on my laptop I switch to my phone which never seems to run out of free articles.

Just open the P-G articles in an incognito or private browsing mode window once you hit your limit. This circumvents it. No more problems.

Is anyone out there today to get some pictures of some diversions?

There are a few pics up on PIT's Facebook page. Looks like Ethiopian and Emirates parked between Atlantic and the 911th air base.

No diversion pics but I got some great ice encrusted ones before the sun came up.

No diversion pics but I got some great ice encrusted ones before the sun came up.

So with the new rear rolling around, shall we make predictions?

I'll venture four:

1) SEA and AS finally show up, in some form.
2) OneJet starts PIT-MEM
3) Delta adds back PIT-SLC, with a daily 319.
4) AA comes back (at least summer seasonally) on PIT-LAX

As an aside, am I wrong to think of Condor as crypto-Lufthansa?

Frontier's extended schedule will see PIT-DEN return daily for the summer, but it appears ORD and ATL will not return. But those really didn't make much sense to me considering WN serves both of those cities.

Flaps wrote:

No diversion pics but I got some great ice encrusted ones before the sun came up.

Do what now?

GSP psgr wrote:

So with the new rear rolling around, shall we make predictions?
I'll venture four:

1) SEA and AS finally show up, in some form.
2) OneJet starts PIT-MEM
3) Delta adds back PIT-SLC, with a daily 319.
4) AA comes back (at least summer seasonally) on PIT-LAX

As an aside, am I wrong to think of Condor as crypto-Lufthansa?

My guess on those (and just a guess):
1) I would have thought SEA would have happened by now, so my revised guess is hopefully within two years
2) Yes
3) No
4) No. They still fly the route, for a few more weeks anyway. I doubt they would still drop the route just to announce they are adding the route. PIT-LAX on AA is done for a long long time, whatever the reason is for dropping PIT's 2nd LAX flight while IND and CVG will have 3x daily service.

I don't know about predictions but this is my wish list:
- Continued updates to the website so the statistics and route map are not 6 months out of date (sarcasm font).
- Heavy advertising in NE Ohio to promote the fact that their only practical nonstop service to Europe is via PIT.
- Return the favor to AA and renew of the lease for the mx base by announcing a deal with WN to take that space... at literally the last minute AA's lease ends. Hopefully leading to more WN service down the road.
-Throw everything including the kitchen sink at Norwegian Airlines to get a local base in 2018.
-Double efforts to fill seats on Porter and Condor.
-Unique wintertime only revenue guarantee (at reduced rates due to it being off season) made available to DL for year round PIT-CDG service.
-A tow bar for the A-380 so next time one diverts it does not have to park two miles from the terminal.

flyPIT wrote:

My guess on those (and just a guess):
1) I would have thought SEA would have happened by now, so my revised guess is hopefully within two years
2) Yes
3) No
4) No. They still fly the route, for a few more weeks anyway. I doubt they would still drop the route just to announce they are adding the route. PIT-LAX on AA is done for a long long time, whatever the reason is for dropping PIT's 2nd LAX flight while IND and CVG will have 3x daily service.

I don't know about predictions but this is my wish list:
- Continued updates to the website so the statistics and route map are not 6 months out of date (sarcasm font).
- Heavy advertising in NE Ohio to promote the fact that their only practical nonstop service to Europe is via PIT.
- Return the favor to AA and renew of the lease for the mx base by announcing a deal with WN to take that space... at literally the last minute AA's lease ends. Hopefully leading to more WN service down the road.
-Throw everything including the kitchen sink at Norwegian Airlines to get a local base in 2018.
-Double efforts to fill seats on Porter and Condor.
-Unique wintertime only revenue guarantee (at reduced rates due to it being off season) made available to DL for year round PIT-CDG service.
-A tow bar for the A-380 so next time one diverts it does not have to park two miles from the terminal.

I still can't figure out the AA cut on LAX. There are three explanations I've heard (all of which make some degree of sense, and I suspect it's a combination of all three):

1) AA has operationally overstretched itself badly at LAX; too much, too quickly, and with too few gates. LAWA hasn't exactly helped things along either. They're having to rejigger things to fix what has become something of an operational mess (see the move of LAX-SFO to all E75s out of the Eagle's nest gates to free up more capacity at T4 as an example). PIT-LAX might have been axed for operational reasons, and since no other legacy flies it, there's no loss of competitive advantage.
2) PIT-LAX was....a marginal performer. United struggled with it even when it had the route all to itself (though UA was gutting LAX the whole time), and the entrance of WN on the route pushed it to be even less profitable.
3) The business split at PIT between the 3 legacy carriers is so perfectly even that no one carrier can support PIT-LAX on it's own; hence the traffic flows over everyone's other main trunk hubs, with no loss of competitive advantage. Unlike Delta at RDU; no legacy seems to want to make a serious play to corner the business traffic.

The reason I think it might come back is #1; maybe AA can smooth things over at LAX enough to make it work. In the summer months, at least, it should be a strong performer.

Interesting tidbit from the Jetblue investors call.

"In terms of margin, Boston-Pittsburgh is one of JetBlue’s top five most profitable routes, said Scott Laurence, senior vice president of planning, during the investor call."

http://www.forbes.com/sites/tedreed/201 ... 45aa18745f

It is pretty crazy they couldn't make JFK work.

I really wish they'd give it another shot. Things should be different as far as FF loyalty these days. Also, it now seems to be general knowledge across PGH on why the fares are so high (because B6 left). We had a taste of the cheap fares, and they were yanked away. Pretty hard to forget that.

GSP psgr wrote:

1) AA has operationally overstretched itself badly at LAX; too much, too quickly, and with too few gates. LAWA hasn't exactly helped things along either. They're having to rejigger things to fix what has become something of an operational mess (see the move of LAX-SFO to all E75s out of the Eagle's nest gates to free up more capacity at T4 as an example). PIT-LAX might have been axed for operational reasons, and since no other legacy flies it, there's no loss of competitive advantage.

Of course there is loss of competitive advantage - they were the only legacy to offer nonstop service. That no legacy will be flying it nonstop, they are not at a competitive disadvantage. Perhaps that is what you meant. But they most certainly gave up the competitive advantage they had. That's assuming WN is not a legacy, but that's another topic.

Why they gave up that advantage is still a mystery to me as I have not read anything of substance other than vague phrases such as "not meeting expectations", etc. I don't buy the operational issue argument at LAX. If they are having logistical space problems there I don't see why it would be a lone flight in a transcon market that gets the axe.

So another comparison with IND (similar market to PIT) to LAX for this week, which has 3 carriers on the route:

Wednesday - PIT oversold both classes, not selling anymore tickets. IND still selling refundable seats for under $500.
Thursday - PIT oversold both classes, not selling anymore tickets. IND wide open both classes, refundable First Class available for under $700.
Friday - PIT oversold both classes, not selling anymore tickets. IND 28 seats open or not selected, refundable economy tickets still available for under $500
Saturday - PIT selling only nonrefundable economy fares for $703, First oversold and not selling anymore. IND has 6 of 8 First Class open or not selected and selling for under $700 refundable.

CMH (with *only* two carriers on the route) is doing better than IND load and fare wise, but still selling seats on the days PIT is not. Yes PIT is a bit longer, but I don't think an extra 45 minutes of high altitude cruise flight is the difference here. Nor do I believe DL not serving PIT-LAX is a factor, or operational issues at LAX for that matter. Just does not add up to me.

pitbosflyer wrote:

Interesting tidbit from the Jetblue investors call.
"In terms of margin, Boston-Pittsburgh is one of JetBlue’s top five most profitable routes, said Scott Laurence, senior vice president of planning, during the investor call."

http://www.forbes.com/sites/tedreed/201 ... 45aa18745f

It is pretty crazy they couldn't make JFK work.

I don't think it is a matter of not being able to make JFK work, but they just wanted to use those slots for a better market. Some will say the schedule was not business traveler friendly, but that is nonsense as they started the route with 4x daily service.



Atlas Air sent a 763 last week:





We know PIT has had talks with Qatar Airways at the highest levels; Here's a snippet about Ms. Cassotis and a Senior VP at Emirates regarding data sharing:
"Pittsburgh International Airport in Pennsylvania suggests it has to beg and plead and fight for every little bit of data they can get about anybody. Do you encounter the same?

NC: I must say, I was talking to Christina [of Pittsburgh International Airport]; people think it is much, much simpler [in Dubai] than perhaps in other places. That’s not the case. What ties us together is a mission and a purpose, but there are the normal day-to-day operation headaches that we have to deal with."
https://www.runwaygirlnetwork.com/2016/12/22/emirates-cio-on-why-data-is-the-new-oil-for-the-airline/

flyPIT wrote:

We know PIT has had talks with Qatar Airways at the highest levels; Here's a snippet about Ms. Cassotis and a Senior VP at Emirates regarding data sharing:
"Pittsburgh International Airport in Pennsylvania suggests it has to beg and plead and fight for every little bit of data they can get about anybody. Do you encounter the same?

NC: I must say, I was talking to Christina [of Pittsburgh International Airport]; people think it is much, much simpler [in Dubai] than perhaps in other places. That’s not the case. What ties us together is a mission and a purpose, but there are the normal day-to-day operation headaches that we have to deal with."
https://www.runwaygirlnetwork.com/2016/12/22/emirates-cio-on-why-data-is-the-new-oil-for-the-airline/

I don't know how PIT would land an ME3 carrier (considering other US markets have the population for it) when you have cities that don't have an ME3 that could really use one. Maybe it would be the same scenario where a city that needs it will get beat out because of incentives.

iFlyDTW wrote:

flyPIT wrote:

I don't know how PIT would land an ME3 carrier (considering other US markets have the population for it) when you have cities that don't have an ME3 that could really use one. Maybe it would be the same scenario where a city that needs it will get beat out because of incentives.

No one is suggesting PIT will land an ME3 carrier anytime soon or before other cities that need it more. For PIT this is a 5-10 year process that began a couple years ago. In the meantime the ME3 will expand to other markets accordingly. But there will come a day when all the large markets are served and the ME3 will be looking at mid sized markets in the US. PIT is laying the groundwork to be competitive for when that day arrives.

flyPIT wrote:

iFlyDTW wrote:

flyPIT wrote:

I don't know how PIT would land an ME3 carrier (considering other US markets have the population for it) when you have cities that don't have an ME3 that could really use one. Maybe it would be the same scenario where a city that needs it will get beat out because of incentives.

No one is suggesting PIT will land an ME3 carrier anytime soon or before other cities that need it more. For PIT this is a 5-10 year process that began a couple years ago. In the meantime the ME3 will expand to other markets accordingly. But there will come a day when all the large markets are served and the ME3 will be looking at mid sized markets in the US. PIT is laying the groundwork to be competitive for when that day arrives.

I never thought of it that way, that's actually a pretty smart idea.

Sept traffic is up a nice 6.8%:
http://www.flypittsburgh.com/FlyPitt/media/Documents/September-2016-Long-E-Mail-Report.pdf

Oct growth slowed but up 1.8%
http://www.flypittsburgh.com/FlyPitt/media/Documents/October-2016-Long-E-Mail-Report.pdf

The new website has been rolled out, including much more detailed statistics linked above. Sensory overload. Yet it seems like they omitted international passenger stats? The route map needs work too with the cursor hover feature and long standing errors (SFO is technically seasonal, CUN and PUJ are year round).

Transplanted Pittsburger, I grew up 5 miles east of the airport, beneath 28L. Many memories of seeing lines of planes 7-8 long lining up to land, parallel to another 7 going for 28R.

Also, memories of swinging by Resurrection Road and parking beneath 32 getting blown away by lines of planes coming in.

Last several times I flew back home (I'm in MN now) I've noticed 32 has been shut down. I found that it was being fixed / improved. The last time I was home (June of this year) we stopped at our new viewing spot (Ewing Road), from which you get a full view of the airport, and the closest you can get to planes landing on 28L. But I saw a big lighted "X" at the end of 32.

I talked to a charter pilot who mentioned that he's been landing on 32 because of the location of the charter parking spot over by the old airport.

My question is when did they open 32 back up?

Even if it were open, I would assume its still an undesirable spot to watch planes due to the relatively low volume coming into the airport nowadays.

Luckyleaf6 wrote:

Transplanted Pittsburger, I grew up 5 miles east of the airport, beneath 28L. Many memories of seeing lines of planes 7-8 long lining up to land, parallel to another 7 going for 28R.

Also, memories of swinging by Resurrection Road and parking beneath 32 getting blown away by lines of planes coming in.

Last several times I flew back home (I'm in MN now) I've noticed 32 has been shut down. I found that it was being fixed / improved. The last time I was home (June of this year) we stopped at our new viewing spot (Ewing Road), from which you get a full view of the airport, and the closest you can get to planes landing on 28L. But I saw a big lighted "X" at the end of 32.

I talked to a charter pilot who mentioned that he's been landing on 32 because of the location of the charter parking spot over by the old airport.

My question is when did they open 32 back up?

Even if it were open, I would assume its still an undesirable spot to watch planes due to the relatively low volume coming into the airport nowadays.

32/14 seems to go in and out of service somewhat randomly. Since early December, I have not seen it closed on the few occasions I have driven by on business 376. However, prior to that around Thanksgiving time, it was.

flyPIT wrote:

Of course there is loss of competitive advantage - they were the only legacy to offer nonstop service. That no legacy will be flying it nonstop, they are not at a competitive disadvantage. Perhaps that is what you meant. But they most certainly gave up the competitive advantage they had. That's assuming WN is not a legacy, but that's another topic.

Why they gave up that advantage is still a mystery to me as I have not read anything of substance other than vague phrases such as "not meeting expectations", etc. I don't buy the operational issue argument at LAX. If they are having logistical space problems there I don't see why it would be a lone flight in a transcon market that gets the axe.

That's what I was getting at; AA wasn't putting themselves at a competitive disadvantage by ditching PIT-LAX. Another really bizarre thing: PIT can sustain 5x-ish to DEN, 2-4x to PHX, and 2x daily to LAS. However, just the other side of the Sierra Nevadas, demand to two much larger population markets with significant intercontinental scale hub operations attached to them apparently falls off a complete and total cliff....

PIT is about to have the same level of service (or more) to Europe vs west coast starting June...

The LAX and SFO traffic out of PIT is travelling on those 5X-ish to DEN, 2-4X to PHX, the 2X to LAS and the rest via DTW/ORD/DFW/ATL and IAH among others. The issue is frequency. The traffic is going when it wants to regardless of how it gets there. I see it as kind of a catch 22. In order for nonstop service to be successful there needs to be more than one frequency as one frequency does not provide enough options to be worthwhile. There isn't enough traffic for multiple frequencies (apparently) so there you have it. PIT has so many connecting options that you can literally go the west coast whenever you want. Why wait for the one daily frequency?

Great news for the PIT-CDG flight, all departures from PIT have been rescheduled to depart at 1930 give or take a few minutes instead of the ridiculous 2130 dep times. Isn't it amazing what a little competition can accomplish?

Speaking of the competition both WOW Air and Condor's Friday flight are scheduled to arrive at 1730. DL's CDG at 1801. Condor's Monday departures are scheduled at a very late 2250. Since its a low cost leisure flight I don't think it will have the negative affect it did on Delta; but it will be interesting to see how the business class does with those times. Looks like Friday evenings will be a great time for spotting from the terminal.

Frontier announces they won't bring back Chicago and Atlanta. No big surprise there.

http://www.post-gazette.com/business/de ... 1701040100

GSP psgr wrote:

Frontier announces they won't bring back Chicago and Atlanta. No big surprise there.

http://www.post-gazette.com/business/de ... 1701040100

No surprise here. If they add more flights I would look to see MCO become daily, DEN go from season to a few times a week in the winter, add PHX, add TPA, and maybe even add PHL or MIA.

The lowest hanging fruit for F9 at PIT is the west coast. They seem to be doing well to the west coast from CVG and CLE despite the already larger service (vs PIT) when they started. CLE- SEA/PDX even being upgauged to an A321. So PIT-SFO/SEA/LAX are all fair game.

flyPIT wrote:

The lowest hanging fruit for F9 at PIT is the west coast. They seem to be doing well to the west coast from CVG and CLE despite the already larger service (vs PIT) when they started. CLE- SEA/PDX even being upgauged to an A321. So PIT-SFO/SEA/LAX are all fair game.

They have been adding some stuff out of SFO. Those would all be good adds.

PIT nets two flights in the latest Southwest schedule release: -1 BWI; +1 FLL, +1 ATL , and +1 DEN. Not too shabby.

BWI and ATL remain the same. FLL and DEN gain one, but that is just the usual seasonal adjustment. TPA is down one, so it is only a net gain of one flight. Again, this is only comparing with the previous month. A YOY comparison would be much more useful.
https://www.southwestaircommunity.com/htcpi66732/attachments/htcpi66732/stories/46285/1/Summer2017SkedFreqs.pdf

With the growth in many other markets I'd consider this pretty disappointing after the CEO's comments just a few months ago about considering up to 8 new destinations and being the clear dominant carrier at PIT.


On the bright side, most of the new destination announcements about WN at PIT have not coincided these schedule extensions.

flyPIT wrote:

With the growth in many other markets I'd consider this pretty disappointing after the CEO's comments just a few months ago about considering up to 8 new destinations and being the clear dominant carrier at PIT.

On the bright side, most of the new destination announcements about WN at PIT have not coincided these schedule extensions.

This is a disappointing release. When would they announce something new from PIT if they did?

I'm more of a marketing/pr guy than an airline know-it-all, but if I were going to announce something very specific and new for a city, I would separate that announcement from the noise of a larger companywide one. You don't want something like that to drown in the rest of the chatter.

One more thing to consider is job growth in Pittsburgh has slowed to a crawl over the past year. While the city was one of the first to recover from the recession, added record jobs during that time, and had positive momentum by adding the likes of Google, Uber, Apple, and others .... the fact remains Pittsburgh is in Pennsylvania which has some of the slowest growth and highest corporate tax rates in the nation. Airlines pay attention to this stuff.

The good news is the energy industry seems to be making a comeback with rig counts on the rise again and Shell's cracker moving forward. PIT-IAH is 5x E170s when it used to be 5x 739s and 757s just a couple years ago. That right there is a loss of 500 daily seats each way, which in turn is a loss of 222,000 passengers a year when calculated at an 85% load factor, taking in to account only weekdays. It would be great to get that back, and maybe 2x daily to HOU on WN.

Currently being de-iced en route to PIT-PIE. Why do they use the de-icing trucks now instead of the fixed pads. Too much demand on the pads (hard to believe given current vs previous traffic)? Or a more structural operational change?

I was trying to think of what an Alaska schedule at PIT might look like, and will take a stab at it:

-1x daily LAX
-4w SEA
-3w SFO
-1w SAN (weekend svc)

Maybe 4 cities to start with isn't realistic, but two or three might be.

Also, if Delta wanted to play a bit bigger at PIT, I could see them adding something like 2x BOS, 2x RDU, 1x CVG, 1x LAX (maybe they can make it work where everyone else has failed).

Does anyone know why WN doesn't fly direct to any NYC airports from PIT? I assume no available slots for WN? Or is it because of AA's flights? I would think WN could take some business away from AA as the demand is there for NYC.

I travel frequently to NYC and I like WN so I was curious. I usually suck it up and take AA

AA will be sending a B-789 this evening (NFL charter).
http://flightaware.com/live/flight/AAL9428/history/20170107/1919Z/KFLL/KPIT

I believe this will be the first time a 787 visits PIT.

landing at 4:12pm

Crap. I just left airside at 1600. Would have liked to see that one. Terminal or FBO arrival?
.

tooluther wrote:

Currently being de-iced en route to PIT-PIE. Why do they use the de-icing trucks now instead of the fixed pads. Too much demand on the pads (hard to believe given current vs previous traffic)? Or a more structural operational change?

Which pad were you on? The one by the big blue hangars (mid field), the pad by the cargo ramp or were you by Atlantic Aviation (business jets)? I'm assuming southwest and when I deiced at Pit, they used us at IDS, but they could have switched to Atlantic...

The one across from the cargo ramp area is the Charlie deice pad which used to be fixed booms. When it was a boom pad, it only had 3 slots. By going to trucks, they can now fit up to four Narrow Bodies/ RJ's on it.

The other truck pad for IDS is the Sierra Pad. It is next to the two big blue hangars located midfield. These are the Republic Hangars, having previously been used by USAirways and TWA prior to that. Sierra I believe was never a fixed boom pad, but it very well could have been, I really don't know but I have never seen any pictures of it being booms. It has three slots and each slot can have two or three planes in it, one behind the other depending on the particular slot and the size of the planes coming in.

IDS has a third pad, Echo pad, which still is a fixed boom pad with 3.5 or 4.5 slots available to use, I can't remember which it was. Echo is hardly ever used though as there is no operational need for it except in bad storms and maybe only if we took a bunch of diversions.

The trucks offer more flexibility and probably are cheaper to maintain compared to the booms. If the airline ops required it, we had the ability to go to the gates to deice the planes or to pre-treat them for their overnight if there was an incoming storm. I worked there for little over two months in 2014 before getting a flying job and leaving, and I only remember a truck going to a gate once and that was for the UPS MD-11 at Xmas which we pre treated it while it was still being loaded prior to it coming to the pad for the full deice.

Because they were not fixed, we had the ability to adjust truck to airplane ratios as needed. On frost days we might have only staffed a few trucks and did one or two trucks to a plane per slot, typically on Sierra pad if it was going to be slow... During an event with all the trucks staffed, we might have had two trucks per slot with all slots open on charline and two or three slots on Sierra. I can't remember if they had 12 or 14 trucks to allow all seven to be open.

But we could/would also do 4 truck ops with less slots opened, so there would be two trucks spraying from the nose to wingtip and then two trucks on the tail. Sometimes if trucks needed serviced, it would drop to a 3 truck op, with the two front trucks doing from nose to wingtip and then just one truck for both sides of the tail.

I believe the A310 (could have been A300), is the largest the Charlie pad can handle as anything else is too long and will stick out over the active taxiway. Even then, the 310 would be angled in and would take up 2, if not 2.5 slots. So normally, widebodies would go to the Sierra Pad. That night of the UPS MD-11 noted above, they, along with a Fedex A310/300 came down and were some of if not the last flights out that night and we had most of the trucks down at Sierra for them.

We used 10 trucks between the two planes. I was on the Airbus and we had 6 trucks on it, two for the forward fuselage, two on the wingroot out to the tip and two on the tail, while the four others started on the MD-11. I was primary fuselage (forward fuselage, captain's side), the two wing trucks mainly were there to hit the wings to get them started for the forward guys to finish off and then after about 10 minutes, both wing trucks left the Airbus and went and worked on the MD-11 Wings. After we finished the forward fuselage, me and the secondary fuselage guy finished off the wings.

Both planes took about 40 minutes to deice as they had been sitting all day collecting ice (hence why the Md-11 was pretreated) and between all 10 trucks, I think we sprayed close to 2,000 gallons of fluid.

I came across a few old skool pics taken at PIT of a TWA 707, L-1011, and Concorde (which I assume was taken at PIT since it is lumped together with the others):
http://www.vincetrupianophotography.com/Aviation/Aviation-1/


Also a history of redevelopment efforts of the old terminal site including the proposal for the NASM annex, which we know was built at IAD instead:
https://www.nap.edu/read/14592/chapter/12


And everything you ever wanted to know about the structural design failure and subsequent repairs to the parking garage:
https://failures.wikispaces.com/Pittsburgh+International+Airport+Parking+Garage+Precast+Double+T+Structural+Defects

flightsimer wrote:

The other truck pad for IDS is the Sierra Pad. It is next to the two big blue hangars located midfield. These are the Republic Hangars, having previously been used by USAirways and TWA prior to that. Sierra I believe was never a fixed boom pad, but it very well could have been, I really don't know but I have never seen any pictures of it being booms. It has three slots and each slot can have two or three planes in it, one behind the other depending on the particular slot and the size of the planes coming in.

The Sierra pad never had fixed booms. This pad is a product of the Kent George era in that it was a completely unnecessary expenditure at a time US Airways was not growing at PIT and airport costs were high. It was built to be a widebody deice pad... when PIT only had 2-3 scheduled passenger widebodies. Shortly after it was completed, US axed their PIT-Europe flights. The only widebodies at PIT thereafter were UPS and FedEx, both of whom at the time would taxi down to Atlantic Aviation to get deiced. To this day it seems completely redundant to have a third deice pad.

G4 will launch seasonal service to VPS on May 31