American Airlines plans to start booking flights to full capacity starting next week

Beginning next week, American Airlines will resume fully booking flights after having reserved half its middle seats in economy since April to better enforce social distancing, USA Today reports. "As more people continue to travel, customers may notice that flights are booked to capacity starting July 1," the airline said in a statement. "American will continue to notify customers and allow them to move to more open flights when available, all without incurring any cost."

The move, counterintuitively, comes after the United States experienced back-to-back record-high caseloads of coronavirus this week. American Airlines, though, will join United and Spirit, which are already booking flights to capacity. Southwest, Delta, and JetBlue, meanwhile, are still restricting the number of seats for sale, and Southwest committed to do so through at least Sept. 30.

On Friday, Vice President Mike Pence is set to meet with the CEOs of American, Delta, United, JetBlue, and Southwest, apparently to discuss travel restrictions being considered for U.S. travelers by the European Union, as well as the effects of the pandemic on the industry at large, The Street reports.

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