WASHINGTON, July 24 The U.S. Transportation Department on Friday began an investigation of possible price gouging by four American airlines in the aftermath of a deadly Amtrak crash in Philadelphia in May.
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American Airlines, Delta Air Lines, JetBlue Airways, Southwest Airlines and United Airlines have each been sent letters requesting details of their ticket prices and practices day-by-day for the period April 28 to May 26.
Among the routes the department asked airlines for price information on were flights to certain Northeast destinations from Dulles global Airport and Reagan National Airport near Washington, Baltimore-Washington worldwide Airport, Philadelphia global Airport, three New York area airports – Newark, John F. Kennedy, and LaGuardia, Logan global Airport in Boston; MacArthur Airport-Long Island in New York, Green Airport in Rhode Island., and Bradley global Airport in Connecticut.
The inquiry is “focused on getting to the bottom of whether unfair practices were involved in setting prices at that time”.
“We have been notified by the DOT that they are conducting an investigation and we will cooperate with that investigation”, Southwest stated. Christopher Murphy, D-Conn., who complained to the Obama administration that some airlines had increased fares to as high as $2,300 following the train crash. “In response to the Amtrak derailment, we added capacity and our fare structure remained the same”, he said. That affected passengers traveling through that region. Full service resumed on May 18.
He said the action is unrelated to an ongoing criminal investigation tied to the crash by the Department of Justice.
The May derailment in Philadelphia left eight dead, injured dozens and interrupted service for almost a week. Now, the Department of Transportation wants to know if airlines took advantage of passengers after the crash.
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For reasons still unknown, the train accelerated to more than double the imposed speed limit of 50 miles per hour before entering a curve.
