Winging It

What's the world's largest airline in domestic passengers carried? The answer is a surprise to many people: It's Southwest. Yes, the so-called no-frills discounter that few PHL fliers had ever used until it landed here in 2004 has become firmly entrenched in the No. 1 spot for the nation in the first four months of the year, compared with 2006. American Airlines continues to have more total passengers because of it also has international service, and along with several other major carriers, is ahead of Southwest in revenue and total passenger miles. But with Southwest carriying so much short-haul traffic, it has a big lead in domestic passengers. And the airline led the world in domestic traffic last year as well. That's a function of the U.S. air-travel market representing close to half the world's traffic, and seven out of the top 10 airlines in domestic passengers are all U.S. carriers.

For those who can't get enough of this kind of data, here's a link to the source of U.S. numbers, the Department of Transportation's Bureau of Transportation Statistcs. bts.gov. And another one to the International Air Transport Association stats for world rankings.