Monthly Archives for March 2024.
A roundup of the most important stories of the day. I keep you up to date on the most interesting writings I find on other sites – the latest news and tips.
Both pilots of a Batik Air Airbus A320 fell asleep in the cockpit on a flight from Kendari to Jakarta, Indonesia.
The aircraft was carrying 153 passengers, 4 flight attendants and 2 pilots. While cruising at 36,000 feet, the pilots removed their headsets and increased the cockpit speaker volume. The captain decided to take a short break and rested….
United Airlines flight 2477, a Boeing 737 Max 8, encountered an issue after landing at George Bush Intercontinental Airport in Houston on Friday. Following its arrival from Memphis International Airport, the aircraft deviated from its intended path during the transition from the runway to the taxiway around 8 a.m. local time. The plane exited the paved surface and entered the grassy area beside the runway.
It is possible for a loyalty program to return points to a bank transfer currency! Now a customer is asking the Department of Transportation to force United Airlines to do it.
JetBlue crewmembers have been told that the airline will open club lounges at New York JFK and Boston. They’re currently expected to be called Mosaic Clubs.
Several customers are suing American Airlines after their AAdvantage accounts were shut down. They used invitations to apply for Citibank credit cards that circumvented rules limiting how often one could get a new card bonus. People lost millions of miles.
There’s a lawsuit. American has responded. And they advance a pretty draconian theory.
As the aircraft climbed through 12,000 feet, the left engine “emitted a series of bangs and streaks of flames.” Pilots returned to the airport after advising air traffic control of an engine stall, and the plane landed safely around 35 minutes after departure. United assigned another aircraft to operate the flight and passengers were delayed a little over 3 hours.
All seems pretty normal, right? Well, two things are notable about this flight:
JetBlue does a really nice job with their onboard soft product. Maybe too nice of a job, considering they don’t seem to be earning a revenue premium on their transatlantic flights.
They’re promoting new meals and amenity kits. The meals seem good enough, the amenity kits interesting (especially with American Airlines handing out cardboard boxes), but what is really striking to me is the wine that they’re hardly even promoting.
This is seriously cool. JSX is going to run a special solar eclipse-viewing flight on April 8th. One of their pilots is ex-NASA. And they’re giving away the seats.
United Airlines has real claim to being the U.S. global carrier. They’re already the only U.S. airline flying to the Philippines – having launched Manila service – and now will fly to Cebu there as well (via Tokyo). They’ll add service to Morocco – direct to Marrakesh – and to Medellin, Colombia. Fifth freedom flying from Japan and love for their Houston hub make these adds even more interesting.
Gary Leff is one of the foremost experts in the field of miles, points, and frequent business travel -- a topic he has covered since 2002.
Co-founder of frequent flyer community InsideFlyer.com, emcee of the Freddie Awards, and named one of the "World's Top Travel Experts" by Conde' Nast Traveler (2010-Present) Gary has been a guest on most major news media, profiled in several top print publications, and published broadly on the topic of consumer loyalty. More About Gary »
