CONFIRMED: JetBlue & American Connection Deal at JFK and BOS

NYCAviation:

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:arrow: JetBlue and American Airlines Announce Strategic Connection Deal at JFK and Boston: Confirmed

An actual codeshare is out of the cards for now, but the story broken by @flyingwithfish and posted here last night seems to be mostly correct, with additional details. American Airlines has announced a groundbreaking and multi-faceted deal with JetBlue which includes smoothing connections between each carrier’s flights on international and non-competing domestic routes and involves a total of four airports.

The cornerstone of the deal is an interline agreement enabling jetBlue flights at Boston Logan (BOS) and New York Kennedy (JFK) to seamlessly connect with American Airlines flights to a dozen destinations in Europe, Asia and South America. The deal will also give incoming AA passengers connections to 18 of jetBlue’s US destinations on which the carriers do not compete.

Slots will be swapped, as well. The initially reported eight AA slot-pairs at Reagan National (DCA) in Washington will indeed be transferred to JetBlue. In addition, jetBlue will receive one slot-pair at White Plains (HPN), while handing over 12 JFK slot-pairs to American.Full Article]

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They also announced DCA Plans today.

http://news.moneycentral.msn.com/ticker ... ymbol=JBLU

Will this hurt the DL/US Slot Swap Deal?

Very interesting news and totally unexpected. In some way it does make sense for the hookup between the two in order to better compete with Delta's expanding JFK and LGA ops, but this is really an unAA thing to do which is why I'm so shocked. I'll be interested to see how this progresses and if it expands to the point that JB enters One World.

AA also released news about a major expansion of service and upgrades to the NY market. Below is a press release from AA. Lots of good stuff mentioned for both JFK and LGA and JFK will see the two class AE CRJ-700.

http://www.aa.com/i18n/urls/nyc.jsp?anc ... d=16126107

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Originally Posted by JetBlueAirwaysFan

Will this hurt the DL/US Slot Swap Deal?

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Probably not. If anything it might actually help, since the entry of jetBlue into DCA will conceivably promote competition.

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Originally Posted by JetBlueAirwaysFan

They also announced DCA Plans today.

http://news.moneycentral.msn.com/ticker ... ymbol=JBLU

Will this hurt the DL/US Slot Swap Deal?

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Very happy to hear that! I'll be starting college in DC in September, one metro stop away from DCA so hopefully the competition will bring some cheap fares.

I must say I'm a little surprised that Jet Blue partnered with American and not Continental/United/US Airways since they are partners with shareholder Lufthansa.

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Originally Posted by Iberia A340-600

I must say I'm a little surprised that Jet Blue partnered with American and not Continental/United/US Airways since they are partners with shareholder Lufthansa.

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Problem is none of those airlines have much presence at JFK, zero international presence.