Southwest Airlines' bid to fly at Long Beach Airport: Everything you need to know

It was aounced Wednesday that Southwest Airlines is making a bid to fly out of Long Beach Airport.

Here’s everything you need to know about what happened, and what’s to come.

What we know

Long Beach Airport officials had 9 open slots for flights that it had to offer to all commercial airlines.

Here’s how officials dispersed those flights:

• 4 to Southwest

• 3 to JetBlue

• 2 to Delta Airlines

Airport officials will send formal award letters to all three airlines. The airlines will then have 180 days after receiving the notices to take advantage of the new slots, if they choose to do so.

What we don’t know

Southwest Airlines asked for all nine slots, as did JetBlue.

It is not yet clear whether operating four flights out of the local airport will make financial sense for Southwest. JetBlue is by far the largest carrier at LGB, with 32 flight slots (American Airlines has five slots, Delta has two slots, and FedEx and UPS have one each).

It is also not yet known where Southwest plans to fly its Long Beach planes, if indeed it accepts the LGB slots.

Some background

JetBlue has lobbied the city to allow for inteational travel, which the city is now studying. Meanwhile, JetBlue last summer reduced the number of flights it operates out of Long Beach, but did not scale back the number of destinations.

The city’s noise ordinance is one of the strictest in the nation. It limits the number of flights based on the noise decibel levels coming from arriving and departing planes.

Several residents who also spoke before the council this week made it clear that they don’t like the prospect of more flights at the airport.

What’s next

It is now up to the carriers that were awarded flight slots to notify the city that they plan to accept them.

We have calls in to Southwest to answer the question of whether four slots is enough; otherwise the airline has 180 days to decide.

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