Southwest Airlines will not take out seats or block middle seats: CEO

Southwest Airlines CEO Gary Kelly said the airline will "have work to do to convince customers...that it is safe to come to the airport", but noted the carrier is "certainly not going to take out seats and nor would we go to the effort to block a middle seat" or prevent people from sitting in the middle seat (Seeking Alpha, 28-Apr-2020). "We would simply manage it from a bookings standpoint", he said, commenting the carrier will "perhaps" not "take bookings that would fill up an airplane". He noted this idea "would be a logical way to address a concern about social distancing getting on the airplane", affirming that this is "an idea" and not yet announced or implemented.