Improved inflight internet was one of the five priorities I outlined for the airline now that they completed customer-facing integration of US Airways and American. Another was offering a consistent product.
American is going to go with ViaSat for domestic high speed inflight internet. For some planes. Starting over a year from now. So they will have 3 different internet providers, and fast internet only on a small portion of their domestic fleet.
Scott Mayerowitz, covering yesterday’s launch of a new United Airlines premium product, shared this interesting tidbit about United CEO Oscar Munoz’s health having returned to the job after a heart transplant shortly following his being appointed to the role.
The CEO of United has been under doctor’s orders not to even fly commercial. We certainly wish him – and United – continued recovery!
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.
One Chinese teen reports that he found Emirates A380 cargo “comfortable.” It just goes to show that Emirates A380s are comfortable in all classes of service.
The 16 year old boy from Bazhong City climbed a fence at the Shanghai airport and snuck into the plane’s cargo hold. The flight took off shortly after midnight and made the journey to Dubai where the young Mr. Xu planned to make his fortune.
Tweeted to me by @IFlyPlaces and confirmed by One Mile at a Time, Swiss First Class is currently bookable using miles in Air Canada’s Aeroplan, which is an instant transfer partner of American Express Membership Rewards.
It’s likely bookable through United as well, an instant transfer partner of Chase Ultimate Rewards.
Oscar Munoz took the stage at Gotham Hall in New York this morning to talk about their new push at United. It as as much about the culture of the airline as it was about the new product — the “culture of caring” and “new spirit of United” that he acknowledges has been “missing far too long.”
So the center of their design is the new Zodiac seat (coming from Zodiac UK, with a dedicated product line that United says is on-time for a seat that’s been certified).
The seat will be fully flat with direct aisle access. That puts it a cut above British Airways and Lufthansa, but plays catch up to Delta and American.
Julian over at Travel Codex picks a fight with me. He doesn’t just disagree with me over privatizing the TSA. He gets personal: “Though do you remember the Dean in “Old School”? That guy was a total jerk, right? So maybe for the purposes of today’s post we’ll think of Gary as that sort of “Dean” of Boarding Area and then it’ll be okay to argue with him and maybe egg his house or something.”
He throws down with Jeremy Piven, who isn’t just Ari from Entourage. He’s also the creepy guy who kept texting evil travel hacker Justin Ross Lee‘s girlfriend.
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.
Putting an award on hold is really useful. Award travel can be complicated. Here’s what several different airline frequent flyer programs allow you to do.
The best way to understand Washington Dulles is to go back to how the concept was being explained before it was even built.
This animated film by Ray Eames and Charles Eames explains the idea — how tragic they believed it was to walk long distances to gates, how revolutionary it would be to have “mobile lounges” that became the Dulles People Movers.
And it offers a fascinating window into how the future of aviation was seen through the eyes of the 1950.
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 »
