Archive for September, 2005
September 23 2005
You know how when you arrive at the security gate at the airport and there are a few people ahead of you and you start whining to yourself how much it sucks to travel since 9/11? (OK, maybe that’s just me). Well, we’ve got nothing on the poor schmucks who were waiting, get this, 4-5 hours (yes, hours) to get through the security lines at Houston Intercontinental yesterday. A combination of 110 TSA workers not showing up and the mobs of people trying to escape the hurricane caused a miserable scene Thursday morning. On the positive side, the wait was down to less than an hour by the end of the day.
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September 22 2005
Just a quick note: Delta just announced that they will cut 9,000 jobs, cut executive pay by 15% (the CEO will take a 25% cut), cut domestic capacity by 20%, increase international capacity by 25%, and eliminate 80 more aircraft. It’s quite impressive how quickly they’ve pulled this plan together…implementing it will be a different story. That said, they clearly want to reinvent this airline and I’ll give them credit for understanding that small changes won’t help.
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September 22 2005
Stories like this are the reason why I still get up early to write this stupid thing: A chartered Gambian airplane faked an emergency landing so that passengers would not miss a soccer match they wanted to watch. I’ll explain. The Air Rum (?) L-1011 had 289 Gambians onboard on its way to Lima, Peru, to watch its team play in the FIFA Under 17 World Championships (outside of the US, people charter planes to fly halfway around the world to watch 15 year old play soccer). The plane was late, so the pilot radioed the airport in the city where the team was playing (Piura) and said that it was running low on fuel and needed to land there instead of in Lima. So, the plane landed in Piura and the passengers were able to attend the match. Peruvian authorities are still figuring out what penalties (if any) they should impose. Even so, I’m pretty impressed.
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September 22 2005
A JetBlue A320 with its front landing gear rotated 90 degrees landed safely (video available) at LAX after circling the airport for three hours. The flight from Burbank to JFK was diverted nearly immediately after the pilots realized what had happened. Passengers were able to watch their own flight on the news on the in-plane TVs. The pilot made a pretty amazing landing on its back wheels (a la the space shuttle) and all arrived safely. An America West A320 had a similar problem several years ago and landed without incident. JetBlue flies all new planes, so the age of the aircraft is not an issue (actually, the age of the aircraft is rarely an issue, but I thought I’d mention it anyway).
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September 22 2005
You may remember all of the hoopla around the Delta Simplifares program, where they eliminated many restrictions and lowered their top fares. Well, bankruptcy may have killed that program. The Cincinnati Enquirer is reporting that the airline is eliminating many of the lowest fares and requiring 3 day stays and Saturday night stays on others. All good things must come to an end. I’m sure the other majors are thrilled with the move.
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September 21 2005
Sometimes it’s the little things that make a huge difference. Those who fly US Airways have had the small but incredibly useful perk of powerstrips for their laptops (as a Continental guy who runs out of laptop power after 2.5 hours, this is a nice little benefit). WAS a nice little benefit, I should say. The airline announced that it will remove the powerstrips from its planes as a cost cutting measure (though they will remain on its trans-Atlantic A330s). No power for you.
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September 21 2005
After 18 consecutive profitable quarters, JetBlue’s CEO said that the airline will likely post a loss when it announces earnings. JetBlue’s incredibly impressive run was marred by a combo of fuel prices and the hurricane, though its profits had been shrinking significantly over the past several quarters.
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September 20 2005
China Southern Airlines is offer a $499 round trip fare between LA and Guangzhou, China for travel this fall. Not usually a route that sees a ton of fare sales, so if you’ve been waiting, here’s your chance. Taxes and visa fees add a bunch to the total cost.
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September 20 2005
MaxJet Airways, a new all-business class airline, has announced that it will offer $1,600 round trip fares from New York to London Stansted beginning in November. You may be saying to yourself, didn’t upstart EOS just also announced all business class service between those two cities? Yes. Yes they did. Not a good sign. Plus, existing carriers have already shown that they are willing to discount their business class to those levels (Continental had those fares this summer), so expect a nice drop in business class ticket prices to Europe.
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September 20 2005
Do you hate people yammering away on cell phones? Would that drive you completely nuts on an airplane? Then you might want to stay away from TAP Air Portugal and BMI late next year. The two carriers will test in-flight cell phone usage on a handful of intra-European flights late next year. While the $2.50/minute surcharge should keep yapping to a minimum, it’s not enough of a minimum for me.
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Massive Security Delays at Houston Intercontinental