Southwest CEO Hints 47-Year Love Affair With 737 May End One Day
- Carrier is biggest U.S. operator of Boeing’s grounded Max jet
- Grounding ‘is not anything that’s been happy for us:’ Kelly
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Southwest Airlines Co. built its low-cost model on the efficiencies of flying a single plane, the Boeing Co. 737. Now the carrier’s chief executive officer is cracking open the door to the idea that nothing lasts forever.
In the aftermath of the second deadly crash of the new Max model and a global grounding of the plane, Southwest CEO Gary Kelly keeps getting asked whether the airline will remain true to the 737, which the company has relied on exclusively since beginning operations in June 1971. And he keeps saying there’s no long-term guarantee.