Travel still safe to Hawaii and U.S. West coast

by Chris Owen on
Despite fears over effects of the recent Japanese nuclear power plant disaster, authorities pronounced travel still safe to Hawaii and the U.S. west coast. Stories of a giant cloud of nuclear waste on the way to cripple the United States and an e-mail predicting acid rain turned out to be a hoax. It is almost business-as-usual for travelers, with a few exceptions to be aware of.

“We get a lot of calls from people about possible dangers,” Cathy Brooks of CruiseOne told times-georgian.com. “We try to assure them it’s safe to travel.”

The U.S Department of State advised U.S. citizens within 50 miles of the plant in Japan to evacuate the area or to take shelter indoors, if safe evacuation was not practical. The U.S. Government also made available potassium iodide (KI) pills as a precautionary measure for American personnel and dependents residing in Japan at the time of the incident.

Earlier this month the Los Angeles Times reported that a small amount of radiation was headed for California but that health risks were not a concern. To help Americans understand their radiation-related health risks, the American Association of Clinical Endocrinologists (AACE), the American Thyroid Association (ATA), The Endocrine Society and the Society of Nuclear Medicine (SNM) issued a joint statement which noted that “current estimates indicate there will not be a hazardous level of radiation reaching the United States from this accident” and added “there is not a radiation emergency in the United States or its territories”.

Indeed, nuclear authorities gave the U.S. West coast and Hawaii a clean bill of health, clearing away the concerns of travelers.

“I want to reassure residents and visitors that the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, the highest authority on radiation in the nation, has indicated Japan’s nuclear emergency presents no danger to Hawaii.” Hawaii Governor Neil Abercrombie told the Hawaii Reporter.

That’s not to say everything is operating normally in Hawaii though. Several resorts and tourist destinations were damaged by the tsunami event but most are open.

Two resorts that remain closed are Four Seasons Resort Hualālai, which plans to reopen on April 30, and iconic Kona Village Resort which will remain closed for an extended period of time due to the significant structural and property damage it sustained

Kailua Pier was deemed structurally sound after the event, and all charters are operating as usual. Norwegian Cruise Lines Pride of America, the year-round cruise ship servicing Hawaii, stopped in Kona last week as planned.

King Kamehameha’s Kona Beach Hotel is also open, and guest rooms were not damaged. However, the lu’au area, ground floor public areas including the lobby and Kona Beach Restaurant, were flooded by seawater, sand and debris. Cleanup efforts are well underway, and several retail stores have reopened.

“Our state and county monitoring systems have not detected any increase in radiation levels, and based on all available information, state and federal experts do not anticipate any risk of harmful radiation exposure to our islands. We are open for business. Hawai’i continues to be the world’s paradise.” added Governor Abercrombie.

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Flickr photo by Merfarm


Killer whale devours great white shark

by Elizabeth Seward on

As if to show the world which ocean predator is actually in charge, a killer whale annihilated a great white shark–in front of a boat-load of people. Just off the coast of San Francisco, the surprise killing caught whale-watchers off guard. According to National Geographic, the whale came to the water’s surface with a great white shark hanging from its mouth.

The interesting part? The whale is said to have held the shark in its mouth for about 15 minutes. And, to thicken the already unlikely plot, biologist Peter Pyle was in the area and able to get underwater footage, which revealed two whales feeding on the shark.

This unbelievable twist of nature was dubbed ‘The Whale That Ate Jaws’ by National Geographic and the footage was aired on the National Geographic channel for the Nature Untamed series. Check out the original story here.




[Thanks, National Geographic ‘Nature Untamed’]

Online travel company lawsuits heat up, cool off

by Chris Owen on

Going back more than 10 years, U.S. city and state governments have been suing online travel sites for underpaying general excise and hotel taxes. Now, lawsuits filed years ago are being heard and the story continues as mixed verdicts come in.

First, here’s the beef. Online travel companies purchase unused hotel room inventory and then sell those rooms to consumers at a marked-up price. The online travel company pays the hotel occupancy tax on the discounted rate that it purchased from hotels and not on the rate charged to its consumers.

Cities from Honolulu to Houston to Washington D.C say “that’s not right” and want the taxes actually charged to be paid.

Online travel companies like Expedia, Orbitz, Travelocity, Hotwire.com, Hotels.com, Priceline and others say “forget it, we’re not paying.”

Some lose, some win as the issue plays itself out.

In January, Houston, Texas lost it’s battle when a a Texas trial court judge dismissed the allegations. “These claims are not based on law, but on the greed of plaintiffs’ attorneys,” Andrew Weinstein, spokesperson for the Interactive Travel Services Association told the Southeast Texas Record.

It’s a sketchy claim at best and both sides have their share of supporters and valid points.

“If the city’s right, all that means is there’s been an under-collection of taxes, and the city can’t sue us for that,” said Frank Lowrey, an attorney representing the firms to Business Week. “They’re telling us to collect more taxes than we said we would collect.”

Similar lawsuits or complaints have been filed around the country by cities and states including in Oklahoma, Maryland, Texas, New York, Illinois, Pennsylvania and in the California cities of San Diego and San Francisco. While some of the complaints have been dismissed, several are still pending.

Is this just cities and states grasping at any possible income source, however bizzare it may sound? Maybe, but that’s nothing new either. Just last year Gadling reported on how the state of Tennessee wanted to tax complementary hotel breakfasts and before that we reported how taxes are becoming a larger part of travel expenses all the time as cities and states are pumping up their coffers at the expense of visitors.

Those who lay claim to jobs as lawmakers may not have the oldest profession in the world but sometimes they sure act like it.

Flickr photo by Love My Tours

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Travel industry battered by world crises says CNN

by Kraig Becker on

A recent report from CNN says that the spate of world crises that have occurred in the first three months of the year has hit the travel industry especially hard. Natural disasters and political unrest have left many travelers rethinking their plans or cancelling trips altogether as they scramble to avoid a host of issues across the globe.

The earthquake and tsunami in Japan, coupled with fears of radiation and a potential nuclear meltdown in power plants there, has significantly reduced demand for travel to that country. It has gotten so bad that Delta Airlines has announced that they are cutting capacity to Tokyo’s Narita International Airport by as much as 20% through May, and suspending flights to another regional airport altogether.

Similarly, travel to Northern Africa and the Middle East has also dropped significantly as political upheaval has spread across that region. It hasn’t just been the airlines that have felt the pinch however, as disruption in travel to Bahrain, Tunisia, and most importantly Egypt, has put a dent in the cruise industry too. According to Carnival Cruise Lines more than 280 of their cruises have seen a change in their itineraries thanks to issues in the Middle East. They estimate a loss of $44 million so far, and the region hasn’t stabilized just yet.

The Middle East unrest has brought another unwelcome side effect to the travel industry as well. Any threat to the distribution of oil means an increase in prices, which is always passed on to the consumer. Soaring oil prices has led to an increase in the cost of airfares, and the dreaded term “fuel surcharge” has reared its ugly head once again too. With the busy summer travel season still ahead, it seems unlikely that oil prices will be coming down again anytime soon.

2011 is certainly off to a turbulent start. If the first few months are any indication, we could be in for one very memorable, but chaotic, year. Has any of the recent global calamities caused you to change your plans? Are you now going elsewhere because of recent events? Worse yet, have you canceled your plans to travel this year altogether?

Cruise lines hit rough waters, navigate well

by Chris Owen on

While the popularity of cruise vacations has never been higher, earnings at major cruise lines are down. First they adjusted operations in a depressed economy. Then they absorbed high oil prices to hold the line on fares. Now, thanks to the effects of worldwide travel turmoil and a natural evolution of the industry, cruise lines hit rough waters and have a full list of decisions to make. While changes are inevitable, count on cruise lines to not stray far from their proven formula for success.

We start with this week’s announcement by industry leader Carnival Corporation that said turmoil in the Middle East and North Africa could cost about $44 million in lost revenue. From changing itineraries for safety purposes to a lack of interest in traveling to troubled areas, 280 voyages had to be issued new sailing orders.

“We pulled out of just all North African stops, in Tunisia and Morocco and Egypt, and we’ve pulled out of — actually, in some cases, we’ve had to pull out of Israel because we got a lot of resistance,” said Howard Frank, Carnival’s vice chairman and chief operating officer.

Other lines reported a similar effect on operations because of worldwide turmoil too and timing could not have been worse. This just after cruise lines have announced/deployed a record number of ships to the European market. Viewed as a smart move at the time, the more lucrative European markets were to bring greater earnings that came along with higher prices cruise lines could get from under-served Europeans.

But not if they don’t sail.

Here now we see the down side of cruise ships as mobile assets.

On one hand, the ability to move your floating resort to safe waters is a huge factor in favor of a cruise as a vacation option. Most itinerary changes are weather-related and happen with some regularity. Cruise ships can make alterations to itineraries and still provide a good vacation experience to consumers. Land-based vacation options hit by weather events don’t have that option or as cruise travel agents are fond of saying “We can move the ship, we can’t move the island” in defense of cruises over all-inclusive land vacations.

On the other hand, cruise lines really wanted to sail to the Middle East and North Africa among other destinations affected by weather or political unrest events. They can quickly modify an itinerary but can’t quickly sail back across the Atlantic to safe, calm, North American waters. In many cases, they are finding not the full ships of Europeans, eager to sail but less than full ships which at the end of the day are not producing the profits they want.

Then there’s the oil problem. Nobody wants to say the “F” word.

Fuel Surcharge. Cruise lines have for the most part held the line on pricing, not adding on the rabidly unpopular Fuel Surcharge. While they are much better prepared to implement a fuel surcharge and oil prices have risen far above the threshold at which they can, they don’t want to because they know what will happen. Booking levels will fall. Those who hold existing bookings recoil at the mention of the term and will be mad about it. Consumers know the price of oil is up but have little tolerance for an additional charge that really adds up fast.

For example, here is Royal Caribbean’s current policy

Royal Caribbean International reserves the right to impose a fuel supplement on all guests if the price of West Texas Intermediate fuel exceeds $65.00 USD per barrel. The fuel supplement for 1st and 2nd guests would be no more than $10 USD per guest per day, to a maximum of $140 USD per cruise; and for additional guests would be no more than $5 USD per person per day, to a maximum of $70 USD per cruise.


For a typical family of four, the market cruise lines have made such a huge push to get on the ships, that’s an extra $210 on a seven-day cruise. That could force those families off ships and on to land vacations and that is exactly what keeps cruise lines awake at night.

Still, Royal Caribbean announced plans this week for growth in Europe for 2012 adding another ship. The interesting part of the line’s 12-ship 2012 European deployment is adding (politically sound and happy) Amsterdam as a cruise port, handy to get to now with KLM service from Miami to Amsterdam.

Smart.

Smarter yet, passengers can get on and off ships at eight interports, creating 20 choices for embarkation and debarkation when the 12 homeports are included. That’s a lot of flexibility and exactly what they need to shore up confidence in their plan and help navigate what storms may come their way.

The ongoing trick to it all is to keep cruise vacations relatively convenient and affordable compared to other options. Cruise lines learned the hard way that in bad economic times travelers cut back on travel…but only for just so long. They may be looking for a greater value now than they once were. They may not be satisfied with just the lowest price now and will look beyond to see what they get for that price. The click-to-book people are probably clicking a whole lot more than they used to or using a travel agent to help insure value.

To get a look at the future, a glimpse at the past tells the story:

“The convenience and affordability of a cruise vacation continues to gain recognition as consumers discover the unrivaled experience cruising offers,” Carnival Chair and CEO Mickey Arison said. “As a result, long-term fundamentals for our business remain attractive in an environment where consumers increasingly value the importance of taking their holidays.”