Southwest Airlines Reports July Traffic

DALLAS, Aug. 2 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Southwest Airlines Co. (NYSE: LUV) announced today that the Company flew 7.0 billion revenue passenger miles (RPMs) in July 2007, an 11.4 percent increase from the 6.3 billion RPMs flown in July 2006. Available seat miles (ASMs) increased 8.7 percent to 8.7 billion from the July 2006 level of 8.0 billion. The load factor for the month was 81.4 percent, compared to 79.5 percent for the same period last year.

For the seven months ended July 31, 2007, Southwest flew 42.2 billion RPMs, compared to the 39.5 billion RPMs recorded for the same period in 2006, an increase of 6.9 percent. Available seat miles increased 8.3 percent to 57.3 billion from the 2006 level of 52.9 billion. The year-to-date load factor was 73.6 percent, compared to 74.5 percent for the same period last year.

This release, as well as past news releases on Southwest, are available online at http://www.southwest.com/?src=IR_080207.

                             SOUTHWEST AIRLINES CO.
                    PRELIMINARY COMPARATIVE TRAFFIC STATISTICS

                                                         JULY

                                              2007          2006      CHANGE

                 Revenue passengers
                  carried                   8,304,392     7,529,907    10.3%

                 Enplaned passengers        9,658,995     8,763,788    10.2%

                 Revenue passenger miles
                  (000)                     7,049,641     6,330,076    11.4%

                 Available seat miles
                  (000)                     8,655,534     7,962,650     8.7%

                 Load factor                     81.4%         79.5%  1.9 pts.

                 Average length of haul           849           841     1.0%

                 Trips flown                  100,276        93,310     7.5%



                                                     YEAR-TO-DATE

                                             2007          2006       CHANGE

                 Revenue passengers
                  carried                 51,707,344    48,728,651     6.1%

                 Enplaned passengers      59,451,492    56,086,130     6.0%

                 Revenue passenger miles
                  (000)                   42,177,481    39,454,421     6.9%

                 Available seat miles
                  (000)                   57,316,586    52,926,092     8.3%

                 Load factor                    73.6%         74.5%  (0.9)pts.

                 Average length of haul          816           810     0.7%

                 Trips flown                 667,823       626,706     6.6%