“Many airlines are awakening and seeing that people want healthy food choices,” says Platkin, an assistant professor at CUNY School of Public Health at Hunter College in New York who has assessed airline food’s nutritional value in five annual surveys as editor of DietDetective.com.

In his latest this year, he ranks United Airlines No. 1 for healthy food, followed by JetBlue Airways and American Airlines.

For this year’s survey, Platkin contacted eight U.S. airlines, analyzed their menus for coach passengers on domestic flights and gave each airline a health score on a one- to five-star scale — with one star representing the lowest score and five stars the highest. The score was based on variety of food served, number of healthy offerings, number of fruit and vegetable offerings, an airline’s cooperation in providing nutritional information and nutritional improvement of food offerings since last year’s survey.

He also thinks highly of United’s Lite snack box, which has only 430 calories and includes lemon-pepper tuna, pita chips, unsweetened apple sauce and a chocolate pretzel.

For flights longer than three hours, a turkey sandwich with sundried-tomato aioli and potato chips contains 600 calories and is a wise nutritional choice, Platkin says.

The nutritional expert awarded JetBlue 3¼ stars.

US Airways received the lowest score — 1¾ stars. The airline offers “poor overall food choices” and not much variety, Platkin says. US Airways’ breakfast box — which includes cinnamon French toast, fruit salad, smoked turkey breast and other items — is very high in calories (705) and “offers little in terms of nutrition,” he says.

US Airways Vice President James Olson says the airline offers “a mix of tasty and healthy choices,” including fruit, cheese and yogurt.

Platkin says it’s important for airlines to provide nutritional information, because it shows how much they care about their passengers and public health. And some airlines are better than others at making it available.

Healthy airline food may seem like a contradiction, but it is possible to eat nutritiously at 35,000 feet, says self-described diet detective Charles Stuart Platkin. ” (via usatoday.com ) by Gary Stoller

Pointswizard.com Spin: Click here to read the rest of Nutritionist combs airlines’ menus for best food choices

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Luna is suing American Airlines for $15 million, saying that her delicious airline chicken dinner contained a lizard, which she bit into, and then became sick and dizzy. The airline denies that—American’s lawyer told the New York Post “there may have been some feathers, or what looked like feathers… but there was no lizard.”

So what happens when you find yourself locked in a legal battle with an airline for putting a lizard in your dinner? (After eight years, the trial is finally underway in Manhattan federal court.)

For one thing, you get to sit through a deposition with the airline’s lawyer—a very small portion of which we’ve included below—in which you are absolutely grilled over issues such as:

• The exact size of the bit-size chicken pieces in your chicken dinner, and what, if any, flavorings were included on those chicken pieces.
• The exact size of the green beans in your chicken dinner.
• The reasons behind your allergy to pepper.” (via  gawker.com) by Hamilton Nolan

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Here’s How to Win

• Follow @continental on Twitter.
• Tweet #justlanded and your flight number when you land.

They’ll notify the winner with a direct message each week. Make sure you follow@continental to get their latest specials, important info and travel updates.

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Week 6, Dec. 27, 2010-Jan. 2, 2011
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Drain a glass of water before your flight takes off. Dry air in an airplane cabin generally aggravates cold symptoms. Fight this problem by drinking a lot of non-caffeinated and non-alcoholic beverages while on board, too. Yes, staying hydrated on a flight can be inconvenient. But when you’re congested, changes in cabin pressure can spark intense pain in your sinuses, and the resulting discomfort can last for days afterward. You won’t regret the hassle of drinking up.

-Don’t overeat. Sorry to break the bad news, but there’s no scientific support to grandma’s saying, “Feed a cold and starve a fever.”

-Don’t assume your local pharmacy knows what Tylenol is. Pack an emergency stash of medicine for your trip. If you have to seek help at a local pharmacy, try to do some Internet research about the names of medicines in advance. Tip: In Europe, the generic pain reliever acetaminophen goes by the name of paracetamol.” (via  current.newsweek.com) by Sean O’Neill

Pointswizard.com Spin: Click here to read the rest of  How to fight a cold on the fly

by ROB GOLDSTONE -nytimes.com

“AS soon as I board an aircraft, the first thing I do is make a beeline for the flight attendant and begin a routine that has changed little in 20 years:

Discreetly, I point toward my stomach, offer a half-smile and wait for a nod. Once I’m in my seat, I prepare for the “handoff.” Without making eye contact, the flight attendant approaches, and, like a player in a secret drug deal, quickly slips a small package into my palm: a seat belt extender.

At 285 pounds and 5 feet 7 inches, I may not be the tallest, but I am almost always one of the biggest passengers on a plane. That’s “one of”: as anyone with even the most tangential relationship with news headlines over the last several years knows, Americans are getting fatter and fatter. And as the well-proportioned gird themselves for the hassles of holiday travel, plus-size travelers like me prepare for a plus-sized ordeal.

It starts with finding a place to sit on the plane. The airline industry has responded to its ever-widening clientele with new rules: a handful of carriers, including United and Southwest, now insist that passengers who cannot fit comfortably into an economy seat (with the armrests down) buy a second seat (something I’ve done for years whenever possible); and three domestic carriers have instituted a policy that bans overweight people from sitting in exit rows. (Our bulk, they reason, could hinder an evacuation in an emergency.)

Yet for large travelers like me, the issues persist long after we have figured out whether to buy one seat or two. Going through airport security, for example, I could set off the metal detector not because I’m smuggling a box cutter or pistol, but because my girth comes too close to the sides of the machine, prompting it to beep. (After years of trial and error, I have a technique to eliminate this embarrassing possibility: I extend my arms forward, lower them with my palms out and twist my torso slightly to one side.)

But for truly novel challenges one must leave America, where being fat, in many ways, has become the new normal.

Having visited more than 50 countries in the last 20 years, I have become extremely adept at remaining calm and unfazed throughout situations that unfold because of my weight. Still, there have been occasions when I’ve been caught off guard.” (via  nytimes.com) by ROB GOLDSTONE

Pointswizard.com Spin: Click here to the the rest of – “The Tricks and Trials of Traveling While Fat “and check out the comments which are over 250 already

“We miss the peanuts too.” -US Airways pilot, South Carolina

What You Don’t Want to Know

“I’m constantly under pressure to carry less fuel than I’m comfortable with. Airlines are always looking at the bottom line, and you burn fuel carrying fuel. Sometimes if you carry just enough fuel and you hit thunderstorms or delays, then suddenly you’re running out of gas and you have to go to an alternate airport.” -Captain at a major airline

“Sometimes the airline won’t give us lunch breaks or even time to eat. We have to delay flights just so we can get food.” -First officer on a regional carrier

“The Department of Transportation has put such an emphasis on on-time performance that we pretty much aren’t allowed to delay a flight anymore, even if there are 20 people on a connecting flight that’s coming in just a little late.” -Commercial pilot, Charlotte, North Carolina

“The truth is, we’re exhausted. Our work rules allow us to be on duty 16 hours without a break. That’s many more hours than a truck driver. And unlike a truck driver, who can pull over at the next rest stop, we can’t pull over at the next cloud.” -Captain at a major airline

What We Want You to Know

“The two worst airports for us: Reagan National in Washington, D.C., and John Wayne in Orange County, California. You’re flying by the seat of your pants trying to get in and out of those airports. John Wayne is especially bad because the rich folks who live near the airport don’t like jet noise, so they have this noise abatement procedure where you basically have to turn the plane into a ballistic missile as soon as you’re airborne.” -Pilot, South Carolina

“Cabin air is not as dirty as people think. A portion of the air is recirculated because that helps to reduce humidity. But it’s run through hospital-quality HEPA filters, and it’s actually cleaner than the air found in most public buildings.” -Patrick Smith, commercial pilot and author, askthepilot.com

” (via  rd.com) by Michelle Crouch

Pointswizard.com Spin: Click here to read the rest of 50 Secrets Your Pilot Won’t Tell You

Secondly, not all stress is bad, because some of the most challenging times in our lives are the most stressful. No risk, no glory—that kind of thing.

Pack everything in the same place every time. On most trips I take the same clothes and the same gear. I also try to put them in the same part of the bags every time. If necessary, I can now pack for a two-week trip in about 20 minutes.

Spend more money. I often get stressed out spending small amounts of money. Overall, this isn’t always bad—it’s led to a healthy paranoia about debt and a lifelong adherence to frugality. However, it has its downsides too, in that I can spend hours walking around trying to decide what to eat, or hours trying to figure out the public transit system somewhere instead of just flagging down a taxi.

It only took me about 100 countries—I’m a slow learner—but I finally created a $10 rule for myself that has been rocking my world. The $10 rule is that when I’m traveling, I deliberately avoid worrying about most things that cost $10 or less.

Carry three copies of your passport in different places. I’ve lost two iPods, one Nintendo DS, and countless other things around the world. Thankfully I haven’t lost my prized passport yet, but just in case, I’ve got multiple copies that would make the replacement process easier if it happened. One goes in one bag, the second goes in the other bag, and the third goes in my wallet.

Know that you’ll probably make the flight. The times that you think you’re going to miss the flight but then make it greatly exceed the number of times you actually miss the flight. Most of the time, you’ll probably make it, so don’t kill yourself if you’re running late.” (via ac360.blogs.cnn.com ) by Chris Guillebeau ( CNN’s Anderson Cooper 360° newsroom)

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