Northwest and Delta airlines get hitched

Two airlines serving Fort Wayne International Airport are now one.  Northwest and Delta are merging.

Northwest sent this message to its customers:

We are excited to announce that Northwest Airlines is now a part of Delta!

For you, this means it's business as usual right now, as we combine to create a premier global airline with a leading presence in the world's major markets and a best-in-class loyalty program.

Don't expect it to remain business as usual for long.  This may result in reduction of passenger flight options at Fort Wayne International.

Comments

[Zachary McConnell]

I've been following this merger for a while.

As for flight and city cuts: Delta's been shrinking their Cincinnati hub for a while (with about 22% of capacity cut recently). This was probably in anticipation that this merger was going to happen, as Northwest has a much stronger hub up the road in Detroit. Don't be surprised to see Cincinnati service eliminated from FWA... but don't be surprised if Delta cuts a lot of cities from Cincinnati, or relocates them to Detroit.

However, don't be surprised if you see upgraded Detroit, Minneapolis, and Atlanta service from Fort Wayne on larger planes, either. Detroit will probably go all-jet as some of the turboprops from Detroit are moved to Atlanta for short-distance flights within the South (right now, 3 out of the 5 daily Detroit flights are on jets, and the rest are on turboprops). Minneapolis is a good-performing route, so it might see an additional daily flight. And for Atlanta, Delta could use the larger 76-seat CRJ-900s of Delta Connection partner Pinnacle Airlines (who operates for both Delta and Northwest and has a maintenance base at Fort Wayne International) as opposed to the smaller 50-seat CRJ-200s that Delta Connection partner ASA currently uses to FWA.