Part two in the Chicago Sun-Times series on The Shame of the Friendly Skies is now available online. And in some good news for United, it appears that they have reached agreement on labor costs that they needed, which prevents them from having to get the bankruptcy court to impose changes unilaterally on their workforce.
The Sordid Details that Brought United to Where it is Today
The Chicago Sun Times printed the first part of a two-part exerpt of The Shame of the Friendly Skies by Paul H. Weaver. While I doubt it will be as riveting a read as Thomas Petzinger’s masterful Hard Landing — a must read for any aviation enthusiast. It will, though, become just as important a piece of United Airlines history as biographies of Pat Patterson. I do plan to read the book, so I’ll certainly have more to say on the subject, but the article does reveal a $47 million kickback to a corporation controlled by the pilots union in exchange for averting a holiday work slowdown. Interesting stuff.
Unfortunately, these aren’t combinable for a 2 week stay
One free day of parking by the San Francisco airport. (Via the administrator of betterbidding.com.)
Earn Triple USAirways Miles on Qantas
Signup here for a pretty impressive bonus. A single LAX-SYD roundtrip would net about 45,000 miles. Not bad.
Free Credit Card Offers
Most airline mileage credit cards have fees. At least the ones that earn one mile per dollar. And some people are just against paying fees — imagine that! I will say that it may be worth it. If the card is earning you a free ticket per year and the fee is $50, that seems like a pretty good tradeoff. It can even be a good tradeoff compared to free cards if you’re spending enough on the card. And I definitely think it’s a better deal than the free cards offered by credit card companies where you earn their points which can be redeemed for travel — because those awards are usually only for coach and must be booked a couple of weeks in advance. That means you’re usually capped on the award at a…
My kingdom for a sane travel writer
USAirways may have paid a consultant $1 million years back to tell it it’s new name (changed from ‘USAir’) but it really should have had Washington Post columnist Bob Levey on the payroll for this column from earlier in the week. (Thanks to Joe Brancatelli for the pointer.) How silly is the column? Levey tells readers: Connecting flights when non-stops are available are no big deal, because you can get a paper or a snack or check your voicemail. In his experience, USAirways has the best frequent flyer program — and he has alot of experience, since he belongs to only one other program. And in a bit of DC-jingoism, he figures that USAirways is a local company and so he benefits local families by flying them. Of course, no local folks work for United…
Alternative to picking taxpayers’ pockets
David Rowell thinks that the solution to the airline industry’s woes is to attract capital and entrepreneurial talent from foreign investors by lifting the ban on foreign ownership of U.S. airlines rather than through another taxpayer funded bailout.
We shouldn’t let the fog of war distract from abuses of power and waste at home
The Los Angeles Times is reporting on gross abuse and waste at the Transportation Security Administration [T]he Charlottesville, Va., airport handles about 470 departing passengers a day. When the airlines paid for security at Charlottesville-Albemarle Airport, they managed to check passengers with a staff of 15 screeners. But since the federal government took over airport security, it deploys 39, a daily average of 12 passengers per screener. Among other things, the Transportation Department’s Inspector General audit found that: The primary contract for recruiting federal security screeners cost $700 million — up from an initial agreement for $100 million. An inspector general audit found $305 million in overbilling by airport security contractors. Six of 13 companies that provided most of the security guards increased their hourly billing rates by 58% to 97% above what they had…
Too cute by half
American Airlines is offering a chance to win a Lincoln Navigator for taking an online tour of the new web check-in feature. It’s probably more trouble than it’s worth, but the demo was cute and I enjoyed doing it.
‘Nuff said.
The Smurf Name Generator.
