AA Marks End of Era...JFK - SJU.

US major American Airlines has confirmed its will end its non-stop flights between New York’s John F Kennedy International Airport and Luis Muñoz Marín International Airport in San Juan, from August 2017, continuing the carrier’s significant cutbacks in Puerto Rico, previously one of its major regional hubs. The formal confirmation of the closure of the route, which it has flown since the early 1970s, followed an exclusive story on Routesonline on April 3, 2017 about the changes to the airline’s booking inventory.

“We have made the difficult decision to cancel our service” between New York JFK and San Juan, an American Airlines spokeswoman said in a statement to USA Today. “We continually evaluate our network, looking at supply and demand for each route we serve. We want to ensure our fleet and crews are serving routes that are profitable, better positioning us for long term success against global competition.”

American started serving the New York JFK – San Juan market from March 1971 after it acquired Trans Caribbean Airlines. San Juan became a key regional hub for the US major providing key regional connections across the Caribbean. However, the airline’s presence has reduced in recent years and it officially closed its hub in San Juan in 2013.
Schedule data from intelligence provider OAG shows the scale of the airline’s cuts in San Juan over the past ten years with annual departures falling from over 35,000 movements offering over 4.5 million seats in 2007 to just over 4,000 departures providing just over 700,000 seats from San Juan in 2014.

Despite the significant cuts as part of the “de-hubbing” process, American has actually boosted its available seats from San Juan in the past two years, growing year-on-year capacity 7.7 per cent in 2015 and 40.2 per cent last year. The 2016 schedules helped surpassed the one million seat level for the first time since 2012, albeit where still significantly below the airline’s previous operational level. :confused::mad::(