Ben Mutzabaugh of Today in the Sky asked whether or not Southwest is trying to change its no-frills image. Now, Southwest’s product has remained consistent since the beginning. It has been consistent quality and customer service…not luxurious, but not what people come to think when they think no frills. For Europeans familiar with the likes…
With the recent Open Skies initiative referring to Fifth and Seventh Freedom rights, we decided it was time to review…courtesy of the Cranky Flier. Six through Nine though, according to him, are mostly unofficial. First Freedom – Airlines from Country A may fly through Country B’s airspace without landing Second Freedom -Â Airlines from Country…
Reuters reports that BA Chairman Martin Broughton said today that the new Open Skies agreement risked ceding benefits to U.S. Airlines in return for only “miniscule concessions” from Washington. We can’t disagree with them, although we hope Open Skies comes to be. European carriers would not be allowed to fly domestically in the U.S., which…
David Neeleman’s flight log reported on Saturday that they are working on producing the revised Contract of Carriage, which will include its revised Customer Bill of Rights. Originally, he intended to have it done by March 2nd, but it has apparently been delayed by weather issues that needed to be addressed first. The new Contract…
The Arizona Republic reports that the hope that the US Airways reservations system transfer would be seamless were dashed this morning. Due to the failure of self check-in kiosks, there were long lines in Charlotte, Philadelphia, and Las Vegas. The Charlotte Observer reported that conditions at Charlotte Airport were improved by the afternoon, but lines…
On Wednesday, an American Airlines employee allowed the former vice president and two aides to circumvent security by taking Gore from the airline’s ticketing counter through a door in the baggage claim area where only “badged employees” can enter. The door led to a tunnel and then a ramp that got them to an American…
The last customer for the freight version of the Airbus 380, the United Parcel Service, has said it planned to cancel an order for 10 Airbus 380 freighters. It had considered waiting until 2012 for the aircraft, but when it learned that Airbus is diverting employees from the freighter version to work on the passenger…
American Eagle launched once-daily roundtrip service from Miami to Cozumel, Mexico yesterday using an ATR72 turboprop. Frontier Airlines launched nonstop service today to Cabo San Lucas from Sacramento(three flights per week) and San Jose(four flights per week) using A319 aircraft. Frontier also launched its new nonstop service from Denver to Hartford last night. It marks…
The European Union and the United States agreed yesterday on the outline for an Open Skies treaty. The provisional agreement will be presented to the EU transport ministers on March 22nd. The first-stage deal, if approved, would go into effect October 28th. The pact would allow European Airlines to fly from any EU city to…
The Coalition for Luggage Security issued a press release today, commenting on RFID baggage tagging. The Coalition believes luggage should be treated as cargo and that it should not be shipped on passenger flights. They fail to truly comment though on RFID though. RFID, as we’ve mentioned in the past, has great potential for improved…
The Chicago Tribune reports that on Saturday, a United flight, UA907, bound from Chicago to San Francisco, was left on the ground for seven hours before the pilots finally cancelled the flight. This comes after the Jetblue meltdown and in the midst of pressure and threat of federal action. At the last minute, the plane…
Reuters reports that Expressjet has reached a two year deal to use operate ten of its aircraft out of Delta’s LAX hub starting in June to and from Western ski markets. Last year former parent Continental Airlines cancelled a capacity purchase agreement that covered 69 of its 274 planes. Expressjet is using 44 of these…
Jetblue announced service from Boston to Charlotte and Washington-Dulles to Orlando beginning May 1st. The Boston flight will be once daily, the Dulles flight twice daily. It will also add once additional flight from Long Beach to Las Vegas, JFK to Portland ME, JFK to Charlotte, and JFK to Raleigh-Durham. Jetblue also announced increases in…
Reuters reported yesterday that the DOT will review this month’s service meltdown at Jetblue and December’s incident at American. The review will include the airlines’ customer service contracts and policies on ground delays and any recommendation could extend to airlines as a whole as well as the air traffic control system, and its operator, the…
The Associated Press reports that beginning tomorrow, coach passengers can use the front lavatory on American Airlines planes. The airline restricted it to first-class fliers on 2003. American had the only such rules. A Boeing 757, for example, has 22 seats in first-class, 160 in coach. It has two bathrooms in the front, and two…
Jetblue cannot seem to catch a break. The Pittsburgh Tribune-Review reports that Jetblue Flight 1050 from Pittsburgh to JFK was diverted to Philadelphia. The pilot was responding to a “Wing Anti-Ice Fault” indicator, which Jetblue procedure requires a plane not to land in locations with icing conditions…at the time, JFK. Fifty-four passengers and four crew…
Reuters reports that IATA, which supplies paper tickets to most airlines outside the U.S., plans to discontinue supplies by the end of this year. Airlines that want to maintain it after this year will be able to, but the supplies will be costly. IATA estimates that 96 percent of tickets issued by U.S. Airlines are…
On April 1st, American Eagle will discontinue service from Boston to Newark Airport, which it operates four times daily. On June 1st, the carrier will end twice-daily service from Chicago O’Hare to Washington-Dulles. With United operating nine flights a day between O’Hare and Dulles, and Continental operating twelve flights from Boston to Newark…it seems that…
Upgrade Travel alerted us to this developing situation in Chicago. Apparently, a group of Chicago’s alderman(city council members), are proposing a bill that would block airlines landing at either of Chicago’s area airports if they fail to have a passenger bill of rights in place. Mark Ashley, who runs Upgrade Travel, happens to be a…
Airtran announced plans to begin service from Portland International Jetport from Baltimore-Washington International and Orlando International Airports in June. The service will begin June 7th with three daily roundtrips to BWI, followed on the ninth by a daily flight to Orlando. While the service is noted as seasonal, there is no note as to when…
Before Jetblue could put into place its new procedures for dealing with winter weather…winter weather once again hit the northeast. Jetblue was forced to cancel some…but not all flights out of all three major NYC area airports, possibly out of Stewart in Newburgh as well, in addition to scattered delays out of Boston, Chicago, Pittsburgh,…
The Cranky Flier
USA Today has a good article on some new products coming out in response to TSA carry-on restrictions. Manufacturers are seeking to profit off of the rules in the best example of market demand spurring innovation. We recommend you have a look at the article, but here is our summary. 02Hide.com offers a line of…
We’re on Day 3 of the Wait for a response to our email to Jetblue about the definition of “Controllable Irregularity.” We decided to check to see if anyone had better luck figuring things out. The Cranky Flier spoke to Jetblue’s Media Relations office and was told a Controllable Irregularity was anything that was under…
American Airlines has announced a major initiative to increase its presence in New York. David Cush, American’s Senior Vice President of Global Sales, put it this way: “We want to make it crystal clear that American Airlines and American Eagle are the airlines of choice for the greater New York area. It’s no secret that…