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.
American has some really old inflight internet installations on their planes, when my internet experience is slow I have to remind myself that they haven’t invested retrofitting planes with the latest-generation ‘air-to-ground’ (ATG4) service with Gogo and they haven’t placed any orders for 2Ku satellite internet (2Ku is faster and more expensive than air to ground).
As Delta transitions to 2Ku hopefully that will also relieve pressure on the air-to-ground network and improve speeds on American. It won’t increase the bandwidth that any plane has, but it might reduce some of Gogo’s network congestion. Improved internet was one of the five priorities I outlined for the airline now that they completed customer-facing integration of US Airways and American.
Andrea Ahles writes that American is now suing Gogo over its internet speed.
Gossip site TMZ has a mole at Delta who shares itinerary information of famous passengers.
“It’s not an accident the guy with a camera is waiting at the Delta check-in counter at 8 A.M.,” a former TMZ employee wrote…
There’s speculation that it was a Delta Elite Services Porsche driver selling the information.
A Western Global Airlines MD-11 has been impounded in Harare, Zimbabwe after a dead body and millions of dollars worth of South African Rand were found onboard. The plane had stopped enroute between Germany and South Africa.
The Florida-based cargo operator’s jet had landed in Zimbabwe for refueling. The aircraft had been refused a refueling stop in Mozambique.
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.
Korean Air has the absolute best first class award availability. Most Korean flights will feature at least 2 first class award seats, but 3 and 4 is common on some routes. They offer great value Europe business class awards on partners and Hawaii awards on partners.
They also have one of the most generous policies that lets you put an award on hold without the points yet in your account. That gives you time to transfer points in from a credit card partner after you’ve already secured the award.
Last night’s Virgin Atlantic flight VS25 from London Heathrow to New York JFK departed and was enroute to 36,000 feet 170 miles north-northwest of Shannon, Ireland when the crew declared a medical issue with the pilot.
They had experienced a laser pointed at the aircraft, and the pilot was feeling unwell. The aircraft was an hour into its journey when they turned back and landed at Heathrow an hour and 15 minutes later.
Shining a light at an aircraft in a manner to distract or harm the crew is already illegal. However,
Emirates is launching the two longest flights in the world. The Chairman of Emirates says he flew (a test flight) Dubai – Auckland in economy and liked it.
I bet he got great service from the crew! And he probably didn’t have anyone in the middle seat next to him.
Travelers share their secret affair confessions at PostSecret.
Airport workers share their confessions using the Whisper App.
In the immortal words of Kevin Smith, “just because they serve you doesn’t mean they like you.”
United is going to start restricting club access to people actually flying same day. And they’ve started serving Illy coffee in the clubs (it’ll be a few more months until that’s onboard).
They’ve apparently raised the price of day passes from $50 to $59, following Delta’s $59 day pass pricing move. (United increased the annual fee for its club memberships, too, following a similar move by Delta.)
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 »
