Flying for the rest of the year – fewer seats, higher fares

by Scott Carmichael on

As the financial brainiacs of the world slowly start to see some gradual improvement in the global economy, the worlds airlines are pushing through some far reaching changes to their Q4 2009 schedules.

Because the recession hit the airlines so suddenly, none of them were able to make any major cuts to their schedules (these schedules are set in stone in advance).

Overcapacity has meant that 2009 was actually a very good year for passengers, with some of the lowest airfare we’ve seen in years.

Of course, now the airlines are looking at their new schedules, they are making sure that the overcapacity is a thing of the past, and that means trimming the schedule.

Obviously, fewer seats means more people fighting for the cheapest seats, which will naturally result in higher prices. The schedule cuts will bring airlines back to the levels post 9/11.

According to an AP report, American Airlines will be hit the hardest, with a 10.5% drop in passenger miles on its domestic routes. United Airlines is hit equally hard, with a 9% drop. It isn’t all bad news though – JetBlue expects a modest increase in passenger miles for the rest of the year.

Bottom line is – don’t expect any more amazing fare deals any time soon and think about booking early, because flights are probably going to be filling up pretty quickly.

(Image from Flickr, stevelyon)

Southwest Airlines passenger too big to fly? You be the judge!

by Scott Carmichael on

Southwest Airlines is once again in the news for its claimed mistreatment of a passenger of size.

Trampus Adams and his wife were flying from Las Vegas back home to Portland when an airline staff member requested that his wife get off the plane to purchase a second ticket. The staff member had made the decision that she was unable to safely fit in one seat.

The humiliation drove her to tears and she began hyperventilating. In fact, the course of events were so stressful, that she ended up in hospital the next day.

To be perfectly honest, I’m having a hard time picking any side here – Mrs. Adams is 5-foot-8 and weighs 350 pounds, so there is no denying that she is a “passenger of size”. In a photo taken by her husband, he’s trying to show that his wife had no problem fitting in one seat, and that the demand for purchasing a second seat was wrong.

From the perspective of the airline, a judgment call was made, and assuming the staff didn’t select her just to annoy her, the have every right to pick safety and comfort of their fellow passengers over politeness.

I do think the airline was wrong to have her get off the flight to pay for the second seat – these issues should be resolved before passengers board, to prevent the kind of embarrassing situation Mrs. Adams had to endure. In addition to this, she had been allowed to fly to Las Vegas without any incident, so it is obvious that Southwest Airlines was not applying the rules consistently.

So – dear readers – what do you think? Was Southwest Airlines correct to demand that she pay for a second seat, or did they insult her? To clarify – Mr. Adams is not asking for money, he just wants an apology from the airline.

(Article and photo from KOIN Local 6)

%Poll-34340%

French Aer Lingus passengers told to prepare for emergency landing – non French perfectly safe

by Scott Carmichael on

Passengers aboard an Aer Lingus flight from Dublin to Paris got a bit of a rude awakening on Friday.

The cabin crew announced that the plane was heading towards a spot of turbulence, and made the usual request for everyone to head back to their seats and buckle up.

Right after that announcement, a pre-recorded one was played in French, alerting passengers that the plane was going to make an emergency landing, telling them to pay close attention to their nearest emergency exit, and await instructions from the captain.

Needless to say, the combination of turbulence and the emergency warning message made the French passengers freak out. Some of them were crying, and it took the crew several minutes to realize their “mistake”.

The airline called it a very unusual occurrence, but I’ve actually encountered it myself – on several of my transatlantic flights, the crew started the wrong recording, and on one flight they even played the “brace brace brace” tape.

It shouldn’t be too hard for the crew to pick the correct recording from their list, but obviously, when humans are involved, things can go wrong.

Galley Gossip: 9/11 – We will never forget

by Heather Poole on

Silence has strength. Often times silence is more powerful than words. Today I have decided not to remain silent.

That’s Terry Thames, an American Airlines pilot, hanging out of the cockpit window. This is the first American Airlines flight returning to Washington Dulles after the skies were reopened four days after 9/11. The photo was featured in the book, Reclaiming the Sky, by Tom Murphy.

I can’t stop staring at the photo and thinking about how great it must have felt to have hung that American flag across that airplane when it finally came home. I love that photo. Maybe because it’s one of the few taken at that time depicting strength, not sorrow. Which is exactly what many of my colleagues, as well as our passengers, radiated when they walked on board the airplanes and soldiered on days after our world completely changed.

Last year on this very day I wrote a post, 9/11 – That day, about what had happened to me eight years ago and how it still affects my colleagues and I today. The best part about the post were the readers comments, all so full of hope and strength. I didn’t want to write another 9/11 post. Really, I didn’t. What more could I say? But then how could I not? I’m a flight attendant. If I don’t write about it, who will?

A few days ago I logged into Twitter and typed, “We will never forget,” and then I pressed send. The message went to @planesofthought, an organization that collects thoughts and turns them into paper airplanes that will cover New York City’s skyline to remember the lives lost on 9/11.

After that I wrote, “I’m looking for interesting 9/11 stories. How it may have changed your life in a positive way.”

No one answered back. Not one person. The silence was deafening.

I tried again on Facebook and this time I got a response – one response. “Positive? That’s a hard one. I guess how New Yorkers found some closeness. American pride came back. Sadly, it’s slipping away again,” wrote Lynne, a fellow flight attendant and friend.

While I couldn’t agree more, I worried that I may not have gotten my message across the way I had intended, so I added, “I’m looking for stories about people who started doing things they always wanted to do, but never did, before 9/11.”

Again, no response. Complete silence

I prayed my question did not offend and decided, once again, not to write this post.

While we’re constantly reminded of 9/11 every single time we go to the airport, take off our shoes,and throw out our bottled water before passing through security, grumbling about it as we do so, it does seem, at times, as if it never happened, that day, eight years ago. But I don’t think we’ve forgotten. In fact, I know we haven’t because I truly believe silence has meaning.

Just as I was about to scratch this post for good, Jeffrey sent a note via Facebook. “I worked for an airline and took a buyout offer on 9/28/01. Hired a career coach. Became one. Used the buyout money to launch a successful executive coaching business. Launched a second entrepreneurial venture in 2008, which is my passion – SAVVY NAVIGATOR.”

Slowly, but surely, the stories began to trickle in. Erin, who described herself as a mother/wife/traveler, wrote, “My whole life is still divided by pre/post 9/11…for better or worse.”

Mark, a frequent flier, wrote, “Heather, you may have seen this story before. It’s about a United Airlines flight attendant who was supposed to be on United Airlines flight 175 that crashed into the Twin Towers. Because of a typo and then later computer problems she couldn’t trade to get her trip back. On the employee bus that day she actually spoke with the flight attendant who “took her trip.”

I clicked the link Mark had attached and wound up on the Boston Globe web site where I read a story, Flight attendant changes course, I’d never heard before about a flight attendant who just barely survived 9/11, a flight attendant who is now a nurse.

Next it was Chris, a pilot, who wrote, “I think I have a real problem with the context. When I was an Air Force pilot, I knew what I was doing could get me killed. That was my job, and I accepted it. And I accepted when every 9 months or so, one of my buds became, as we used to say, a “mort” (mortality), or “a ghost” (as in, “Remember Bugs? Sea of Japan–he’s a ghost”). That was the deal.”
“9/11 was not the deal,” Chris added. “Our colleagues weren’t anything but murdered. They had no chance, and no choice. That’s a breach of faith, and too high a price. I don’t know who to blame, who to accuse, who to hold responsible, who to fight back against. And yet, our management makes us all just cost units, marketable, forgetable commodities. Okay, I’ll shut up now.”

And with that the silence continued…

While this post initially started out as a story about your stories, it quickly turned into a post without a story, which made me a little sad. But that, in itself, is a story – one that should be told. I’m a flight attendant. If I don’t write about it, who will?

Photos courtesy of (American Airlines) Tom Murphy, (flag quilt) Catface3, (9/11 tribute light) PlanetGordon.com

Was 9-9-09 a day for weirdos or what? Think religious Mexican hijacker and numerology

by Jamie Rhein on

Yesterday I wrote a post about travel weirdos who inspire us to think and travel outside the box. After I wrote that post, I heard on the radio about a hijacker in Mexico who threatened an Aeromexico plane with what turned out to be a fake bomb as the plane was traveling between Cancun and Mexico City. As Katie posted, all’s well that end’s well. Passengers weren’t hurt and the hijacker was apprehended after the plane landed.

The news version of the hijacking that I heard is a nod towards the travel weirdness of yesterday. Here’s the scoop about the hijacker, a man named Jose Flores, that might have you glancing suspiciously at passengers boarding your plane …

According to the NPR story I heard, the reason Flores, a “Bible-carrying religious fanatic,” hijacked the plane was to get the attention of Felipe Calderon, Mexico’s President, to tell him about an impending earthquake. The hijacker knows about this earthquake because he saw it in a vision — a “divine revelation,” if you will. The reason he hijacked the plane yesterday was because of yesterday’s date. See? The date was weird. A vision told him so. Plus, it’s upside down 6s, so what do you expect? (Personally, I think the date looks like people dancing, but that’s just me.)

What adds to the weirdness of this story is that most passengers didn’t even know there was a hijacker in their midst until after the plane landed and they saw all the security vehicles and armed people surrounding the plane. The hijacked plane, from what I gather, took off from Cancun and landed in Mexico City as intended.

For an interesting analysis of yesterday’s date, check out this article in the Times of India. Yesterday’s date isn’t the only one that has attracted attention.

**correction. The hijacker was Bolivian, not Mexican.