Airlines

Category Archives for Airlines.

United Suspends New Pet Bookings, Tries to Figure Out Why it Kills More Dogs Than Anyone

by Gary Leff

petsafe van
Mar 20 2018

United’s poor handling of pets has been in the news a lot over what’s really just the last week but given the barrage of media feels like far longer.

After forcing a dog into an overhead bin where it ultimately died, shipping a dog to Japan by mistake, and then loading a third dog onto the wrong aircraft — so for PR reasons they actually diverted that plane to deliver the dog to its proper destination, keeping all of the passengers onboard waiting, they are finally acknowledging what I’ve been saying for years: United has a problem with how it handles pets.

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Now Delta Lost a Dog. After Four Flights, an Overnight, They Gave a Man Someone Else’s Puppy

by Gary Leff

dog
Mar 19 2018

Josh Schlaich got a call from an out of service number letting him know his dog — sent to him by a breeder — wasn’t going to make it. He called Delta several times to find out what happened and he was “hung up on.”

Although United is statistically much worse, their PR team is probably cheering that they can now say “it’s not just us.”

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Lufthansa Cancels Passenger’s Ticket After Misconnection and 5 Hour Delay

by Gary Leff

lufthansa
Mar 19 2018

A reader writes that they were flying Lufthansa business class from Nuremberg to Rome via Frankfurt using United miles. Their flight out of Nuremberg was delayed due to weather and they were rebooked onto a later flight.

They say they went to board “30 minutes prior to” the new delayed departure time but their seat was “given away, me and a half dozen people.”

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Thai Airways Bans Fat Passengers and Lap Infants From New Business Class

by Gary Leff

thai airlines
Mar 18 2018

Thai Airways has myriad inflight products. They’re known for aircraft swaps at the last minute. Although in recent years they’ve tried to rationalize their fleet as part of an effort to stem losses, with the Thai national carrier you never quite know what you’re going to get. One of the things that’s different in the fleet is that the reverse herringbone seat in their Boeing 787-9s. And these seats have seat belts with airbags. They can’t accommodate waists larger than 56 inches, and you cannot add a seat belt extender to them or else the airbag would be misaligned. This size limit also means parents with lap infants can’t sit in these seats. So Thai Airways has banned passengers of a large size and parents with lap infants from the new business class on their…

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American and Chicago O’Hare Make Peace at Last Minute

by Gary Leff

airport tarmac
Mar 15 2018

United Airlines has 14 more gates than American at Chicago O’Hare. American is opening 5 new gates that they paid for, reducing the gap to 9. But the new O’Hare expansion plan re-opens the gap and returns United to a 14 gate advantage.

After escalating things by FOIAing communications between the Chicago’s Mayor and United this week — and as the city was scheduled to approve the plan, American’s lack of assent notwithstanding — there are now reports of a stand down and a deal.

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