2010 › May

Travel industry loses $100 billion

by Tom Johansmeyer on

If 2008 was bad for the travel business in the United States, 2009 was worse. With 54.9 million people coming into the country, international visitation was off 5 percent. And, those who came spent far less. Visitors from abroad dropped only $121 billion last year, a 15 percent decline that cost our economy $21 billion. This is the worst year-over-year drop in spending in history, according to the U.S. Department of Commerce.

It wasn’t all bad last year: much of the financial damage was in one place. The $4.6 billion by which UK visitor spending fell was greater than that from Africa and the Asia-Pacific region. Nonetheless, concentrated losses had a global impact. The travel and tourism industry lost 400,000 jobs, eliminating virtually all employment gains for the sector since 2004. And, total travel and tourism spending in the U.S. (not just international) fell by $100 billion from 2008.

Car bomb defused in Times Square

by Sean McLachlan on

A car bomb was discovered shortly after 6pm yesterday in Times Square, the busiest tourist destination in New York City.

A street vendor spotted an SUV parked at the corner of 45th Street and 7th Avenue with its hazard lights on and smoke issuing out of some of its vents. Police evacuated the area and called in a bomb squad. The vehicle contained three propane tanks, two five-gallon containers filled with gas, fireworks, two clocks with batteries, wiring, and a locked metal box. The bomb was defused and forensic experts are studying it.

A large area from 43rd Street to 48th Street, and from Sixth to Eighth Avenues, was evacuated for most of the evening.

Times Square attracts nearly 40 million tourists a year and its hotels alone make $1.6 billion annually. Saturday evenings are one of its busiest times, with tens of thousands of people out for a night on the town or visiting one of the area’s 39 theaters. Even a brief closure for one evening could have an economic impact in the millions of dollars. Numerous businesses and theaters were closed but outside of the evacuation area activity mostly continued as normal.

The Department of Homeland Security has not yet called the incident a terrorist action and has maintained the national threat level at yellow (elevated) while the threat level for domestic and international flights remains at orange (high). In a statement to the press, Mayor Michael Bloomberg said the device “looked amateurish.”

At the time of this writing there have been no arrests and no suspects named. It has yet to be determined whether the bomb would have exploded or how much damage it might have caused.

Gear review: Hydros water bottle

by Amy Chen on

A Gadling reader responded to my earlier 3 Innovative Reusable Water Bottles round-up by suggesting that I check out the Hydros water bottle. Here’s how this reusable bottle measures up.

Hydros
This hefty water bottle is no lightweight. When comparing empty containers, the Hydros easily feels twice as heavy as the Bobble that I tested. That said, this BPA-free bottle is something that I could see keeping around much longer because it feels more like a mini Brita than a typical water bottle. In fact, unlike the Bobble’s built-in filter that cleans as you drink, the Hydros design resembles a Brita filter — you pour water directly through the filtering device first. To drink, the Hydros resembles a Sigg or Nalgene bottle in that you have to unscrew the lid and sip from the mouth of the bottle. When screwed tightly, flipped upside down, and shaken vigorously, not a single drop escaped.

Due to its bulkiness, however, the 24 oz. Hydros seems better suited to road trips or vacations that don’t stray from more than one location (a weeklong vacation rental could be ideal). For times when you’re on the go, there are better reusable water bottles on the market. But for trips where you can leave the water bottle in the car or in the fridge, the Hydros is worth considering.

Price: $29.99; replacement filters are $6.99 each. Add $4.99 for shipping.

Where to Buy: The Hydros, which debuted in February, is currently only available from www.hydrosbottle.com.

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Photo of the Day (05.01.10)

by Mike Barish on

Who doesn’t want to have a big back yard? Everyone loves a place of their own with a nice lawn, room to play ball with the kids and barbecue when you invite your friends over. And don’t even get me started on the perks of privacy. I, like many of you, enjoy suntanning in the nude. So, you know, it’s nice when your closest neighbors are nowhere in site. This guanaco is surely the envy of the neighborhood with his sprawling yard space. Flickr user fiznatty captured this scene in Patagonia, a pretty epic backyard.

Have a picture that captures the grandeur of wide open spaces? Or is your own backyard just that exotic that it’s worth sharing? Submit your images to Gadling’s Flickr group right now and we might use it for a future Photo of the Day.

Iraqi Airways begins, ends service from Baghdad to London

by Grant Martin on

One of the biggest milestones for a developing country is to have regular commercial traffic in and out of its main airports. It’s even better if part of that traffic is on the nation’s flagship, state-owned carrier — a matter of pride, so to speak. So there’s little doubt that the managers running Iraqi Airways were under a serious amount of pressure to get the airline rolling.

In hindsight, they may have moved too fast. Iraqi Airway’s first flight into London, England ended in disaster this past week when their chartered airplane and their leading man’s papers were detained upon arrival. Behind the seizure? An outstanding suit from Kuwait Airways claiming that the Iraqi government plundered several of their aircraft during the original gulf war. With the Iraqi Airways equipment outside of the middle east, Kuwaiti officials had the authority to seize collateral.

Now, both aircraft and bigwig are stuck in the UK until the entire issue gets sorted out — and Iraqi Airways’ service between Baghdad and London is indefinitely on hold. Perhaps next time they’ll pay their bills.