What do Southwest’s flight attendants think about the airline’s recent troubles?

by Aaron Hotfelder on

Leave it to travel guru Christopher Elliott to find out. Over at his blog, Chris recounts a recent flight aboard Southwest from Albuquerque to Orlando, and finds that no one– not flight attendants or passengers– really seem too concerned with the recent safety issues.

Chris quotes one flight attendant who says, ” “We’ve had a lot of cracks [pun intended?] about the whole inspection thing. No serious questions. Most of them are just joking around.”

The general vibe among Southwest employees, unsurprisingly, is that the stories have been blown way out of proportion. Chris tends to agree, and notes that, “There are only a handful of airline reporters in the United States with the depth of knowledge and experience to put an event like this into perspective – to be able to separate the political grandstanding from the PR and get to the core issue.”

He adds: “I would even go as far to say that bloggers have covered the Southwest story more responsibly – more timely, with better sense of perspective and more clear-headed insights than my buddies in the mainstream media have.”

Oh, stop. We’re blushing.

For more on Chris’ reconnaissance mission aboard Southwest, check out the whole article here.

Hanta Virus in American Southwest

by Erik McLaughlin on

The Hanta Virus is a little known problem of those who live and travel in the American Southwest. Unfortunately, Hanta has a reputation for killing people and should be taken seriously. A recent article discusses a case from February, 2008. Knowledge of transmission and prevention are needed to prevent a great “Indiana Jones” style adventure, visiting ghost towns, from making you very sick.

Hanta Virus first got major media attention with an outbreak in New Mexico in the early 1990’s. The “Four Corners” area (Arizona, New Mexico, Utah and Colorado) was the epicenter of infectious disease and epidemiological research. This outbreak allowed researchers to determine that the disease is spread through contact with infected rodent urine and feces. Spread of Hanta between humans, directly, is not common and believed impossible.

Rodents are ubiquitous in the American Southwest and they are the primary vector for disease transmission. People especially vulnerable to this are hikers and backpackers and those who live in more rural areas. Exploration of ghost towns is a popular vacation activity and caution should be taken when doing this. These ghost towns attract the rodents and visitors to these buildings are putting themselves at potential risk through contact with animal urine and feces. However, of more than 100 reported cases, only 2 have come from hikers. The rest are from people cleaning their garages, vacation homes and other areas that include rodents excreta. Bleach solution and rubber gloves are proper protection measures, along with adequate ventilation while cleaning vacation homes or garages.

Hanta Virus symptoms include a flu-like illness with muscle aches and pains, headaches, nausea and vomiting and fatigue being common. There is no cure for Hanta Virus and care is supportive (treating the symptoms only). Worse is the Hanta Pulmonary form that classically appears after the person appears to have recovered from the initial infection. The person;s lungs fill with fluid and progression can be quite rapid, in hours in fact.

There have been 76 cases in New Mexico, since 1993, with 31 deaths.

Southwest’s video response to “Pretty Girls” debacle

by Grant Martin on

Earlier this week, Soutwest Airlines came under fire again in the story about two young women begin escorted off a flight between Florida and California after causing a ruckus. In the public outcry and subsequent debate that followed, many people came to the defense of the embattled airline (check the Digg comments for some of the berating), but many of the facts still weren’t clear. Were the women actually causing problems? Were they really mistreated on the flight?

Well, in an effort to straighten out the matter, Paula Berg, PR from SWA has been in contact with the community including myself and one Mr. Cranky Flier pointing out their stand. Additionally, they’ve now posted a video on Youtube stating their stance. Despite the strange setting and verbage chosen by PR, the message basically confirms what most of us were suspecting: the women were being disruptive and Southwest chose to refund their return trips. Easy enough. Take a look:

[Via The Cranky Flier — although, I beat you to the punch on the first article. Ha!]

Southwest Airlines Imposes Dress Code on Passenger

by Catherine Bodry on

If you’re flying the “family” airline Southwest, you’d best stick to your Sunday church-going clothes rather than your Saturday night clubbing duds.

Kyla Ebbert found this rule out the hard way: she was asked to leave a flight before it departed because the flight attendants felt her attire was too revealing. Ebbert adjusted her outfit to meet the flight attendants’ standards, and was allowed to stay on board. On her return flight, however, she wore the same outfit — and not only did no one ask her to change, but one flight attendant actually complimented her on it.

Ebbert didn’t disclose how much her outfit revealed, but she acknowledged that it was “sexy,” consisting of a low-cut, tight shirt and a short skirt. Nothing was exposed that shouldn’t have been, she claimed.

Southwest Airlines has no formal dress code, and it’s obvious that Ebbert may sue. What do you think should happen?

Read the full article here.

Southwest uses Ant Colonies to Expedite Airport Traffic

by Neil Woodburn on

When Southwest Airlines began experiencing a logjam at Sky Harbor International Airport in Phoenix, they turned to Mother Nature to help them out.

More specifically, they turned to a colony of ants.

According to a fascinating article in National Geographic, the US airliner studied the concept of “swarm behavior” amongst ant colonies to better manage the multitude of planes, runways, and gates at Sky Harbor.

Ants, and other swarming insects, have spent 140 million years developing and honing group behavior to levels of extraordinary efficiency. The basic concept is that the colony acts as a whole, relying upon “countless interactions between individual ants, each of which is following simple rules of thumb.” The collective interaction creates a synergistic organism which functions in a truly organized, effective and economical manner.

To take advantage of such a system, Southwest implemented a computer program in which planes searching for open gates acted in the same manner as ants searching for direction from the colony. The result was much faster gate arrivals and less time on the tarmac.

Now, if only Southwest can figure out a more efficient way to load up their planes. Hmm… I’ll bet there’s something to be learned from dozens of food-bearing ants squeezing through a narrow hole in a perfectly synchronized manner…

(thanks Marilyn)