Archive for November, 2006
November 17 2006
The fight between Go! Airlines and incumbent carriers in Hawaii is getting personal. CEO Jonathan Ornstein received a t-shirt from workers at rival airlines that included anti-semitic slurs and "kiss my Hawaiian ass" written on it. A spokesperson for the group who sent the t-shirt (from an Island Air Fedex account, so it was obvious where it came from), said "emotions are running high," which is a nice way of saying, "we’re anti-semitic, but we shouldn’t have written it on a t-shirt." As Ornstein said, that’s the Aloha spirit.
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November 17 2006
21 passengers were injured when their Far Eastern Air Transport 757 had to quickly change course to avoid another plane before landing in Cheju, Korea. 16 passengers and 5 crew members suffered broken bones and other injuries when the plane was forced to avoid a Thai Aiways aircraft. THIS is why you keep your seatbelt fastened when you’re seated.
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November 16 2006
A woman is suing Delta Airlines and a regional affiliate after she was removed from a flight from Burlington, Vermont, to New York because, she says, she was breast feeding on the plane. The airline, for its part, says she was not removed for breast feeding, but because she was asked to be a bit more discreet and use a blanket to cover herself and that she refused. Mostly I feel bad for Paul Skellon, a spokesman for the airline, whom I’ve met several times and used to do communications for Air New Zealand and is now answering questions about why his employer hates mothers. Ugh.
When it comes time for Mother’s Day everyone out there thinks of Mother’s Day candies or jewelry, and many moms have already gotten at least a couple Mother’s day gift baskets in their times. Sometimes though finding an idea online for an unusual Mother’s Day gift can make the holiday particularly memorable.
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November 16 2006
Hoping to capitalize on the success Icelandair has had, Air Greenland will launch nonstop flights from Baltimore to Kangerlussuaq on the west coast of Greenland in May. It will be the first nonstop commercial flights from the US to Greenland (since Greenland was a refueling stop to Europe a long time ago). Fares are expected to be about $1,000 (not a bargain, but not much more than Icelandair’s summer fares).
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November 15 2006
OK, I’ve thought about this a bit, and I think this is probably a great purchase. Or a terrible one. For full disclosure, I own a bit of US Airways stock. But it’s not like anyone listens to me, so it doesn’t matter what I think. But here’s what I think. US Airways basically thinks that Delta is a great company that is clouded in a sea of bad management, bad decisions and high costs. If you fire the management (done), stop making terrible pricing decisions (done), and eliminate the costs (done, as Delta is non-union), that you will end up with a more giant version of the so-far-successful merger between US Airways and America West. Bravo.
Or they can end up trying to integrate the extraordinary mess that is Delta, which will in turn drag down the nice job they’ve done combining the 1st two airlines. That would be ugly and horrible.
But (and I’ve said this before), the executive team at US Airways is probably the best of all the network carriers (Continental, perhaps, excluded). They’ve made a long string of great decisions, and they run their airline by the numbers, not by irrational competition. Who ever thought you’d be able to use your America West miles to fly to Senegal. Crazy.
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November 15 2006
Air France, Continental, Delta, Emirates, KLM, and United will add a feature to their seatback video that will allow you to dock and watch video from your iPod on the plane. This is cool. But not as cool as if airlines would install in-seat power for laptop computers, which are used by business travelers, who pay the highest fares.
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November 15 2006
A California couple was arrested after a Southwest Airlines flight from Phoenix to Raleigh after they refused to stop their, uh, romantic behavior on the aircraft. Flight attendants repeatedly asked the two people to, basically, get the hell off each other, but, for God knows what reason, they declined. Did I mention they were drunk? No? I should mention they were drunk. The worst part of this is that is happened in the close confines of a daylight flight on a 737. Gross. We can debate whether this activity is gross on an empty 747 in the middle of the night, but there is no question it’s just wrong on a Southwest plane. Free nuts, indeed.
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November 14 2006
India’s legacy carriers have long had a policy of charging foreigners and non-resident Indians (NRIs) fares in dollars, which work out to about 50% more than Indian nationals paid for the same tickets. India’s low fare carriers did away with this policy, offering the same (unprofitable) low fares to everyone. Now, in a huge change in policy, Jet Airways, Indian Airlines, and Air Sahara have all announced that they will drop the dual-pricing strategy. Jet Airways has already implemented the new fares, while the other 2 carriers will do so soon. A welcome change if you’re flying within India.
(As always, for great deals on Indian travel, visit our sister site at tripmela.com)
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November 14 2006
The NY Times has an interesting article about the science of boarding an airplane as efficiently as possible. US Airways is at the forefront, with a complicated "reverse pyramid" approach that I’m not going to bother to explain. Read the article, it’s good for you.
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November 14 2006
When airlines announce a sale, it’s often a load of crap. But AirTran has a real sale for flights through March 1 if you book by tomorrow (November 15th). Flights start at $19 each way (Chicago to Minneapolis), but there are other great deals ($39 from New York to Akron, $59 from Boston to Florida). Fares are good every day except Sunday.
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It Keeps Getting Uglier in Hawaii
