Archive for February, 2008
February 21 2008
American Airlines launched service between Flint and LaGuardia last August and, surprise surprise, shortly thereafter Northwest announced the same flights. Incredible! As you are probably thinking, Northwest didn’t want that route, they just didn’t want anyone encroaching on their lucrative New York to Detroit market (Flint is about an hour north of Detroit). Well, if that’s what you were thinking, you were probably right: American announced that they are dropping the route after seeing their planes flying about 40% full.
This was also the first time I’ve seen airport officials (in this case, Flint’s airport officials) complain about new competition. Even they knew that Northwest was only coming in to drive American out. Which is, as I noted 45 words ago, exactly what they did. To be fair, Northwest says they are “committed” to the route, which means that they’ll wait about 60 days before they cancel it.
American Airlines and Northwest Airlines | No Comments » 
Print This Post
February 20 2008
(Via Today in the Sky):
A go! flight from Honolulu to Hilo, Hawaii, overshot the airport by about 15 minutes last Wednesday leading to speculation that the pilot fell asleep during the 45 minute journey. Mesa owns go! and has had its share of complaints by pilots of fatigue. Falling asleep on a 45 minute flight is impressive, to say the least, considering you climb for the first 10 minutes.
Air traffic controllers tried to contact the pilot repeatedly, but received no response when the airplane passed over Hilo at 21,000 feet. The plane later landed without incident.
Uncategorized | No Comments » Print This Post
February 20 2008
Say what you will about whether it’s gotten better over in Iraq, but this is certainly a positive sign of some sort: Iraq has agreed to purchase $5 billion worth of airplanes from Bombardier and Boeing in the coming years. The smaller Bombardier planes will arrive next year, while the 40 Boeing aircraft will show up in 2015. The airline hopes to launch flights to India, China and Europe with the new airplanes.
Uncategorized | No Comments » Print This Post
February 20 2008
Delta announced that it will launch nonstop flights from JFK to Georgetown, Guyana, beginning in July - fares are about $600 round trip for the 4x weekly service. Much has been made of Delta’s international expansion, and I’ll give them a ton of credit for trying some of the more obscure visiting-friends-and-relatives (ie, VFR) markets like this one.
But I haven’t really seen anyone mention that Delta has basically looked at tiny North American Airlines’ route map and copied it. The small carrier flew from New York to Georgetown, Accra, and Lagos — all markets served (or to be served) by Delta. It is perhaps, then, coincidence that NAA announced they are pulling out of those markets entirely and redeploying the planes on charter routes. They blame rising fuel costs, but Delta’s appearance couldn’t have helped.
Delta Air Lines | 2 Comments » Print This Post
February 19 2008
(Thanks to View from the Wing):
Continental has eliminated what has been considered their best OnePass reward: the 135,000 first class ticket to Australia on Qantas. (Their 105,000 mile business class ticket was also a great deal.) These tickets now cost 285,000 and 190,000 miles, respectively. You used to have to call 330 days before you wanted to fly to secure one of these, so they were hardly easy to get, but they were a steal. Now, not so much.
Continental Airlines | No Comments » Print This Post
February 19 2008
The NY Times is reporting that Delta and Northwest are close to announcing a merger, an announcement of which will supposedly be shortly followed by Continental and United joining forces.
You’ll read plenty of commentary about these mergers elsewhere, so you don’t need me to analyze the minutia, but let me say this: if you thought flying last summer was rough, just wait until 4 of the country’s largest airlines are trying to jam themselves together during the summer travel season. We will be in a level of disaster that we’ve never even considered. Ask your friends who fly US Airways how well their merger went. Now envision that on a much larger scale. Plus thunderstorms.
One word for your summer travel plans: drive.
Continental Airlines and Delta Air Lines and Northwest Airlines and United Airlines | No Comments » Print This Post
February 19 2008
Joe Sharkey has an interesting column in the NY Times today about a couple traveling with an infant who was not permitted to bring extra formula and baby food through security because you’re only allowed “a reasonable quantity” of foodstuffs for your child. As Sharkey points out, in an age of 9 hour delays, what constitutes “reasonable” is up for debate.
I have small children as well, and I rarely discuss traveling with them here, as nobody cares about the difficulties of traveling with kids (unless you have them yourself). However, I’ll share this little story along the same lines: Returning from a trip last month, we were stopped at airport security because we brought along an ice pack to keep food cold for our twin 20-month olds. We have traveled quite a bit with the ice packs, so we were surprised when we were stopped. We had this ridiculous conversation with the TSA person:
TSA: You can’t have the ice pack because you cannot bring liquids or gels aboard the plane.
Me: It’s not a liquid or a gel, it’s a solid.
TSA: We consider it to be a gel.
Me: (holding up a bag of cookies): Is this a liquid or a gel?
TSA: That’s a solid.
Me: How would I know that if you consider some solids to be gels.
…and on it went. The world was kept safe from 2 small children with cold turkey.
We hardly need additional examples of the incredibly ridiculous airport security situation, but I needed to pass along given Sharkey’s column…I’d love to hear your ridiculous security stories…
Uncategorized | 1 Comment » Print This Post
February 15 2008
An odd one…
A Singapore Airlines flight attendant is suing a passenger after the passenger slapped her during a flight from Singapore to Tokyo last September. The passenger, who was traveling with her husband - the CEO of Venture Corp, became enraged after the flight attendant served the husband dinner. The wife said, “Why are you talking to my husband,” then slapped her.
The flight attendant is suing for “emotional and mental stress.”
Uncategorized | 2 Comments » Print This Post
February 15 2008
(Via Today in the Sky)
Politicians in Buffalo have been upset when Continental stopped flying nonstop flights from Buffalo to Albany, so the tried to convince another airline to fly the route. Under the category of “be careful what you ask for,” US Airways agreed to fly between the cities once a day. The round trip cost of the 65-minute hop? $1170.50. In fairness, US Airways says their partner Colgan Air sets their own fares, and I’m not one to say that you can’t charge what you want. Good luck with that flight…
US Airways | No Comments » Print This Post
February 14 2008
(Thanks to View from the Wing)
US Airways is really sticking it to the man — and, in this case, you’re the man: The airline has eliminated 500 mile frequent flyer minimums for short flights so you now only earn actual miles flown. If you’re flying a bunch of connections on US Airways, you’ll be wasting your time, getting only the 82 miles between New York and Philadelphia. Bleh.
Gary over at View from the Wing also adds that this does not mean that it’s all over for frequent flyer programs, and I couldn’t agree with him more. The best pieces of advice I can give about trying to use your frequent flyer miles are to:
1) Do your homework first, then call the airline, especially for international trips. Know which partners fly between your two cities, and know where they make connections. I helped a friend book tickets to Hawaii recently and, using Delta miles, there are dozens and dozens of possible ways of going (nonstop on CO, from LAX on Continental, through Detroit or Minneapolis or Seattle on Northwest, a bunch of cities on Delta, Seattle on Alaska. Plus, you need to check all of the various connections TO those departure cities.) Yes, it’s time consuming. But getting a free ticket to Hawaii is worth an hour of your time. International travel is even more complex, but generally offers availability if you are willing to check the myriad connections available to you. I won’t bore you with how I booked my free ticket to Kiev…)
2) Call back tomorrow. Availability changes all the time — daily. More than daily. You have to try again tomorrow. Keep calling. This nearly always results in a ticket for you. You’re not annoying them. For international travel, these calls could take an hour. I know, it’s annoying. But after roughly 25 hours trying to get 2 business class tickets to Sri Lanka a few years back, I felt felt good when I actually got them (beats spending $14,000 on them). Be patient. And persistent.
Good luck…
US Airways | No Comments » Print This Post
« Prev - Next »
American to Drop LaGuardia-Flint; Thanks, Northwest!