News and notes from around the interweb:

• When reading this piece about Hong Kong’s new draconian security law (“Do you know with the national security law, we have all the rights to unlock your phones and get your passwords?”) people in the U.S. don’t realize border officials do the exact same thing now.

• Airbus pilot reviews Microsoft Flight Simulator

• Things to know about the Thai Airways rehabilitation fundamentally though if the airline remains a political toy, and a tool for corruption, it won’t recover even if the macro environment improves. There are four basic reasons the airline was floundering even before Covid-19.

  

• Running an airline is hard, and in normal times airlines have access to specific belts at baggage claim, but really should work with airports to spread things out and fully utilize carousels.

  @AmericanAir at Newark now and bags arriving 30 min late in the empty airport…. and you put all arrivals in one belt to further ‘Improve’ social distancing in place! worst performing airline now! @thepointsguy @BoardingArea @garyleff pic.twitter.com/VlmglrGzKY

  — Raf (@raf_traveller) August 25, 2020

• Will summer travel season extend into fall because people could take all the trips they’d planned?

• Don’t get on that plane.

  Something wasn’t right about Captain Saud. Sitting on a fine-grained leather couch in the custom wood-paneled cabin of his Boeing 737-800 in Paris, he had the outward appearance of a pilot. His uniform was crisp, his demeanor confident and friendly. He cracked jokes and showed pictures of his children to staffers of the VIP he was supposed to fly to Cairo, a Saudi prince named Sultan bin Turki II.

  But little things seemed off. One member of the prince’s entourage was a recreational pilot, and Saud couldn’t keep up with his small talk about 737 pilot training. The captain’s plane had a crew of 19, more than double the usual number of staffers. And the crew was all men, some a little burlier than you’d expect. Where were the leggy European blondes who were fixtures on Saudi Royal Court flights?

  Then there was the watch. Saud was fascinated by the Breitling Emergency watch the prince’s companion wore. “I’ve never seen one of these,” he said, in perfect English.