Possible error?

FlightAware General
1

I just joined today and must say that this is site is a great addition to the internet/aviation world.

Now onto my question.

I was looking at the KHOU airport activity page and noticed that there are a few Continental Airlines flight. As far as I am aware, Continental Airlines does not operate to/from KHOU, as their main hub is at KIAH.

The flights in question are:

Arrivals
COA1904 B733 San Antonio Int’l (KSAT) 23:31 00:04 (+1)

Departures
COA1936 B733 San Antonio Int’l (KSAT) 00:48 01:20

I have looked up the timetable on Continental’s website and have not been able to find any flights from/to KHOU.

If I made a mistake, I apologize, but I thought I would bring this to your attention to look into.

Thanks and good luck for the future.

2

Hi, starsfan, and welcome to FlightAware.

I haven’t been following their schedule lately, but they’ve been experimenting for several years with a HOU-EWR-HOU route. In fact, our office has one of those “Work Hard, Fly Right” ~9’x5’ banners advertising this route that reads, “THE ONLY DAILY NON-STOP TO NEWARK/NEW YORK” that was originally posted inside a HOU passenger terminal. That said, I don’t see that flight on FlightAware now, so it may not be operating anymore. It was marketed as a convenient way to get from central Houston to New York in the middle of the day. However, they operated it with 737-500s which I consider to be the ugly duckling of the fleet now that they’ve gotten rid of their MD80s. I always chose to fly 777-200ERs out of IAH when going to Newark/New York, even if the drive to IAH was 10 minutes longer.

I think you’re right that the HOU-SAT-HOU flights are not in the schedule; they’re repositioning/maintenance/test flights. I believe that Continental does some kind of maintenance at HOU, which is why the planes are there in the first place. I’ve been seeing COA flights in and out of HOU on FlightAware for some time and can definitely attest to being given a “no delay or hold short please” takeoff clearance at HOU and then hearing, “continental niner niner niner zero, traffic departing prior to your arrival . . .” around midnight.

I believe they reposition aircraft for maintenance around that time as COA999x IAH-HOU and then reposition them afterwards as a similar call sign or COA19xx.

3

Thanks for the prompt reply dbaker.

You may be correct on the assumption that CO does their maintence at HOU, altho I have not been able to find anything to corroborate this on google.

Thanks for the information anyway, you always learn something new.

4

According to this page, Continental has two radio frequencies registered with the FCC at HOU; one for maintenance and one for operations.

5

Thanks for the confirmation.

I never knew CO did their maintence at HOU. But now I do.

6

I don’t think anyone’s saying they do all their maintenance there but definitely I think some of it goes on at Hobby.

Also I saw Continental using COA9* flights to fly their fleet IAH-ELP before hurricane Rita.

7

Just an FYI,

I asked one of the firefighters in the department I volunteer for who works for Continental Airlines and he confirmed that Continental indeed does their maintence at HOU.