this video was made possible by clear
the first 200 people to sign up at clear
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months of speeding through airport
security with clear airlines are
notoriously difficult businesses to run
each and every flight operated is a
multi-thousand dollar gamble on whether
or not passengers will buy tickets
aside from cost the strongest factor for
customers on which flight they will take
is often the overall travel time so
airlines put enormous effort into
properly assembling their puzzle of
flight so they can offer the shortest
connection time possible with so many
destinations all across the world it's
just natural that most routes require
connections so airlines need to attract
connecting passengers in order to stay
in business
now most flight connections for
traditional airlines happen out of their
hub airports American Airlines for
example has 10 across the United States
and every single one of their flights
either begins or ends at these airports
but not all hubs are created equal
Charlotte Douglas Reagan national and
LaGuardia are largely built for
north-south traffic and terminating
traffic Miami is for connecting North
American travelers to flights to the
Caribbean and South America Philadelphia
is a bit of a hybrid hub connecting both
north-south traffic and North American
traffic on two flights to Europe JFK is
the major hub for connecting North
American traffic to European flights and
the Los Angeles hubs main purpose is to
connect North American traffic to Asia
and Oceania bound flights but then there
are these three Chicago O'Hare
dallas-fort Worth and Phoenix Sky Harbor
airports these three airports are the
truly important connection airports
since they lie between the coats and
their schedules reflect this the
east-west routes are the most
competitive in the United States so
American has to offer short connections
in order to dominate the market so what
American Airlines has done is that
they've banked their hubs what this
means is that for the most part all
their flights arrive in two part at
roughly the same time for example on any
given Wednesday in the fall the
Philadelphia flight will arrive at 11:14
a.m. than the Atlanta flight at 11:17
a.m. the DC one at 11:29 and the
Nashville flight at 11:45 then at 12:40
the flight to Denver leaves then at
12:45 the one in Las Vegas at 1:00 the
one to San Francisco and
10 the flight to Los Angeles this way
nobody has to wait for longer than two
hours to connect almost every flight
American operates in and out of DFW
falls into one of their 10 daily banks
this is how the airline gets those
connecting passengers by offering
shorter connection times nearby Dallas
Love Field is Southwest Airlines main
hub but it operates in an entirely
different way
it just has planes arriving and leaving
at a consistent average of about 8 to 12
flights per hour all day long and
there's a good reason for this Southwest
is a budget airline bank tubs are
significantly more expensive to run
because they require more resources the
airline needs to have enough equipment
people and gates to turn around all
their planes at the same time if the
planes came in at a smooth paste all the
people and equipment could be used
continuously but at a bank tub the
airline still needs to pay for the
people and equipment during the downtime
between the banks if a plane leaves
Philadelphia bound for DC at 9:30 with a
9:00 to 10:00 a.m. pink it will arrive
around 10 a.m. but it will have to wait
to leave until about 11:15 to time its
arrival with the 11:45 to 12:45 Bank
planes cost money whether they're in the
air or sitting on the ground
so having planes wait around a time with
banks cost money too this is why a
budget airline will never schedule their
planes to sit on the ground during the
day for more than an hour once a plane
lands it immediately loads up and takes
off again as soon as possible for this
reason the planes of a budget airline
like Spirit Airlines are in the air for
an average of 11 hours per day while
American Airlines only uses their planes
for an average of 8.5 hours per day
banked hubs can also make delays more
probable when there are so many planes
going out at once an airport might just
not be able to cope with a surge in
activity if a thunderstorm hits an
airport for example a whole Bank of
flights might be delayed or cancelled
which would create a knock-on effect all
across the country these banking systems
are essentially a higher risk higher
award in terms of delays but some
airlines have taken the bank tub concept
to an extreme at the odd Airways as hub
in Abu Dhabi essentially operates with
just two
big banks a day almost all their flights
from the West arrive between 7:00 and
8:30 p.m.
then eastbound flights depart between
9:30 and 10:30 p.m. flights coming in
from the East land between about 11:30
p.m. and 12:30 a.m. and then the final
bank of westbound flights departs
between 2:00 and 3:30 a.m. with this
system
almost every flight from Europe or the
u.s. can connect to a flight to Asia or
Australia in no more than two hours the
whole operation also takes about eight
and a half hours perfectly timed for one
work shift but of course
however this leads to a lot of planes
sitting around their flight to Hong Kong
for example departs at 9:50 p.m. Abu
Dhabi time and arrives at 10:05 a.m.
Hong Kong time the plane then has to sit
around until 655 p.m. in order to time
its arrival with the rest of the
westbound bank that's almost nine hours
of waiting but in order to scheduled
flights correctly it's fairly typical
for planes to sit around flights from
north to south america are notoriously
difficult to schedule Salle Paulo Brazil
is only one hour ahead of New York
during daylight saving time so
southbound flights tend to leave in the
evening and arrive 10 hours later in the
morning but the tricky part is when the
flight should return if the flight left
at 7 p.m. and arrive the following
morning at 6 a.m. it could turn around
and fly back at 9 a.m. and arrive at 6
p.m. but the airline doesn't want to do
that the problem is at airline to rely
heavily on connecting traffic to fill
their flights and by the time arriving
travellers got off the plane and made it
through customs it would be 7:30 p.m. at
best by which time the majority of
flights have left for the night Airlines
therefore almost universally decide to
leave their planes on the ground in
South America all day to fly back
overnight so travelers can connect
onwards to our final destination on
morning flights this is likely part of
the reason why flights from north to
south america are so expensive but some
of the airlines have found a way to take
advantage of the time on the ground
labor is significantly cheaper in south
america so airlines have started to
perform maintenance work on planes while
they're waiting around for the evening
flight back american airlines for
example recently started building a
100 million dollar hanger in Sao Paulo
to support their maintenance operations
there
Qantas made a similar move to take
advantage of time on the ground by
opening up an a380 size maintenance
hangar in Los Angeles for their planes
that sometimes sit there for up to 14
hours but that's not the only trick
Qantas has up its sleeves Australia is
just so isolated that no plane can
currently fly nonstop from the country
to the US East Coast the u.s. West Coast
however is close enough that a plane can
make it in a 12 to 14 hour flight
so Qantas has nonstop flight from
Melbourne Sydney and Brisbane to Los
Angeles the trick is that they are all
scheduled to arrive between about 6:00
and 6:30 a.m. then at 8:20 a.m. one of
the planes continues on to New York with
the passengers booked through this is
known as a scissor hub WestJet operates
an even more advanced one in st. john's
Canada they have flights arriving from
Orlando Toronto and Ottawa all around
9:30 to 10:00 p.m. then just past 11
their flights to Dublin and London leaf
this way they can fly six routes with
just three planes and even better for
them since it's only a four and a half
hour flight from st. John's to the
British Isles
they can fly small inexpensive
single-aisle planes transatlantic all of
these schedule patterns and tricks serve
to help an airline achieve its ultimate
goal to maximize revenue in this
industry time truly is money
since planes cost money and people pay
more to fly faster so few aspects of the
business are as important as properly
scheduling flights if you like spending
less time at airports one way is to fly
with shorter connections but perhaps the
easiest way is to use clear I tried them
out for myself on a recent trip and the
footage speaks for itself clear uses
biometrics to replace the TSA ID check
so you always go straight to either the
pre-check or regular screening without
waiting in line as you can see here it
took me exactly one minute and seven
seconds to go from walking in the door
of LaGuardia to getting into security
the x-ray was completely backed up with
a few people in wheelchairs when I went
through but that's actually a good thing
because what I am showing you here is
the absolute worst case scenario the
slowest security with clear will
I put my camera in my back during the
screening so that TSA agents wouldn't
yell at me but the timer is still
running so even with all that backup at
the x-ray
I went from walking through the door to
the gate in seven minutes the good news
is that the first 200 people to sign up
over at clear me comm / Wendover get to
speed through airport security at clears
24 US airports for free for three months
this is not a publicly available trial
so it's worth signing up while it's
available once again that's clear me
comm / wind / for three free months of
faster airport security aside from that
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for watching and I'll see you in two
weeks for another Wendover productions
video