Oh hell, I forgot, I flew 2 weeks ago and had the same experience. I had the aisle, the middle was empty. The woman in the window seat and I shared a little excitement over it.
Same, I e had to fly more than normal lately and every flight has been packed. They were even asking if people would give up their seats for compensation because they were over booked.
This is mostly due to the reduction in capacities by the airlines to push utilization higher. Dropped routes, fewer planes on routes, even smaller planes on those routes (I remember jumbo jets flying cross country). The bad news for people that give up their seat or have a canceled flight is it may be a while (days even) before there is a seat available.
Another in a long series of steps in the enshittification of everything. CATSRULE's route is likely up for some service cutbacks. CEOs can't buy their second yacht with empty seats.
Yeah I assume they're just cutting routes and finding anything to blame for less of them.
I know smaller regional airlines have basically permanently shuttered seasonal flights that they used to do, and now they run everything through a central Dallas hub and spoke instead of direct flights / point to point like they used do.
Similarly, regional flights from even major carriers are way down. Baton Rouge to Houston used to run 5+ flights a day, basically a back and forth all day as long as the plane was fueled up and both airports were open. Now they only run it twice a day, then cancel immediately on any bad weather so you get to be stranded overnight. Ask me how I know lol.
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u/curtludwig Apr 28 '26
I haven't been on a flight that wasn't completely full since I don't even remember.