As the Times Herald Record reports, at 7:30 Tuesday morning, the first Jetblue flight will depart Stewart International Airport in Newburgh, NY. The first inbound flight, at 1:45PM, there will be speeches, coffee, and a ribbon cutting…even a traditional water cannon salute. Self-service kiosks are in full working order and Jetblue has twelve employees at…
The Associated Press reports that a subsidiary of Shanghai based Spring Airlines, the Jinan Spring Holiday Travel Agency sold 400 tickets on flights between Shanghai and Jinan for 1 yuan…about 13 cents. A regular one-way ticket on that flight costs 910 yuan…$116. Chinese airlines are barred from offering discounts of more than forty-five percent of…
American announced today that it would inaugurate once daily service between Austin, Texas and Seattle, WA on an MD80 aircraft with 16 First Class seats and 120 Coach seats. The route will begin April 10, 2007 and adds to American’s west coast offerings out of Austin, TX. They currently offer Austin to Los Angeles and…
South African Airways issued a press release today offering a winter fare of $1350 for two people traveling in between New York-JFK or Washington Dulles to Johannesburg or Capetown. Taxes and fuel surcharges are additional on both tickets(Which is illegal in the US…fuel surcharges must be quoted as an add-on to the fare in any…
Reuters reported the other day that airlines and airports send more of their trash to the dump than the country as a whole. Airlines and airports sent 80 percent of their garbage to dumps or incinerators rather than recycling…the national average of 70 percent. The thirty largest airports in the United States generated as much…
As the Cranky Flier reports, Jetblue has ‘started dating’. Jetblue previously announced it would seek arrangements with international airlines. What they have so far isn’t exactly what we would expect. AeroSvit, the National Airline of the Ukraine, offers JFK to Kiev flights and will give you $100 back if you connect to Jetblue. Just submit…
Spirit Airlines, following its application to serve Caracas, Venezuela, has filed an application to serve Port-au-Prince, Haiti from its Ft.Lauderdale hub…hoping to start service April 1st. With these two routes, Spirit will be taking on American’s Caribbean and South American service, and bringing low-cost carriers where they have never gone before.
Jetblue announced in a press release today that it would be removing a row of seats from its Airbus 320 aircraft, reducing the total number of seats on this aircraft from 156 to 150. This will have the effect of increasing the seat pitch from 32 inches in rows 1-11 to 36 inches, while the…
Is merging a good thing? In some cases, yes, some cases no. But now everyone is on the merger bandwagon. When one thinks about the Ma Bell breakup, and the fact that Ma Bell seems to be rising from the grave…one wonders about the future and megacorporations. For airlines, the experts say that the airlines…
Breitbart.com reports that the trees removed from the airport will be restored. Airport officials emphasized that the rabbi in question, and his organization, Chabad of Greater Seattle, never, as previously reported, request their removal. The lawyer for Rabbi Bogomilsky stated that he has received all kinds of calls and emails, many of which apparently were…
The Airbus 380 received certification from European and U.S. aviation authorities today, signing airworthiness certificates for the much delayed airliner. The testing for this certification took it 70,000 nautical miles of route proving, including takeoffs and landings in a variety of conditions. USAToday reports that as this happens as an investigation into EADS and its…
American Airlines has amended its bid for Dallas-Beijing service because the westbound flights are 15 minutes longer than allowed under the current pilot’s contract. To get around it, the flights would fly from Dallas to Chicago and change flight crews before continuing to Beijing. On the return, they would go nonstop to Dallas. Most industry…
The Human Rights Commission of New Zealand, the New Zealand Herald reported, highlighted recently a case of a Muslim religious leader known only as Mr. Adam who was removed from a flight. Mr. Adam was dressed in religious attire and had planned to read religious texts on the plane, and gone to the toilet to…
King-5 News reports that all of the Christmas trees inside the terminal at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport have been removed in response to a complaint by a local rabbi. The rabbi in question wanted to install an eight-foot menorah and have a public lighting ceremony. He threatened to sue if the menorah wasn’t put up and…
The Herald reports that John Wilkie, a lecturer teaching stage management at the Royal Scottish Academy of Drama and Music in Glasgow, was arrested on the orders of Ryanair for trying to disembark an aircraft. The plane from Paris Beauvois to Glasgow’s Prestwick Airport was diverted to Edinburgh after a terror alert. Mr. Wilkie and…
The Associated Press reports that a 42-year old woman gave birth to a girl late Wednesday night on a Mexicana Airlines flight from Guadalajara to Chicago’s O’Hare Airport. An obstetrician-gynecologist happened to be on board and the baby was born nearly an hour before landing. We continue to wonder…in this case…which country would this girl…
Frontier Airlines is considering selling travel insurance or vacation packages, a tactic many airlines have invested in, looking for a way to diversify its sources of revenue. It could announce the results of its attempts in revenue diversification in the next six months. Frontier’s cross-promotional partnership with Airtran will likely generate five or six million…
USAToday reported on Friday that the TSA is testing whether it can allow people without boarding passes to enter the secure areas at airports. If the test programs at Dallas-Fort Worth and Detroit are considered successful, many airports are fighting for the right to allow others past checkpoints. Thus, those waiting for arrivals would be…
Today in the Sky reports that Northwest has reached a deal to sell seven of its DC-10s to ATA Airlines. Northwest has replaced its DC-10s in favor of more efficient aircraft and is looking at slowly doing the same with its fleet of DC9s. ATA is likely to use them for its charter operations, most…
After the US Airways announcement of a desired merger, Delta first announced service from New York to Phoenix, then Salt Lake City to Charlotte…and now, they announced today Salt Lake City to Pittsburgh, effective March 1. Delta Connection carrier Skywest will operate once daily service using the 70-seater Bombardier CRJ-900, with 10 first class and…
Today, the chief of Boeing’s commercial airplanes unit said the 787 Dreamliner is on schedule for its first test flight next summer and first customer delivery in 2008. Assembly of the main sections is set to start in January. Boeing already has 435 orders for the aircraft. Meanwhile, Lufthansa has announced that they are ordering…
US Airways issued a press release earlier today, advising that they are fully committed to their proposal to merge with Delta. Today in the Sky reports, however, that CEO Doug Parker told USAToday that his company could abandon the attempt if management continues to oppose the merger. He will not fight Delta in court without…
USAToday reports that an American flight from Washington National to Dallas Fort Worth Airports was diverted Monday after passengers reported smelling struck matches. The plane landed safely and the FBI, TSA, and airport authority responded and everyone and their luggage was offloaded. A woman admitted she struck the matches in an attempt to conceal flatulence.…
Today in the Sky reports that the Boeing 767 might be hanging around for longer than expected. The jet was supposed to be obsolete. But now it and other widebody aircraft are in high-demand as there is increase demand and a shortage of such aircraft. As Boeing considers shutting down 767 production, lease rates for…
Yesterday, British Airways announced an eight daily roundtrip flight between JFK Airport in New York and London Heathrow. Meanwhile, Virgin Atlantic announced their April inauguration of service from O’Hare Airport in Chicago to London Heathrow. O’Hare is the tenth US gateway for Virgin and the 17th daily flight from London.