On May 19, a United Airlines flight was forced to abort landing in order to avoid a Southwest Airlines Boeing 737 on the runway. Then an Alaska Airlines jet aborted its landing, too.
Air traffic control called out the Southwest pilot – “you shouldn’t be on the runway.”
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.
Disappearing planes, and no clear answers, just isn’t something that happens in aviation. There hadn’t been a single commercial aircraft go missing in the prior 13 years. Nearly all the aircraft that have disappeared have been probable crashes. Perhaps surprisingly commercial planes simply aren’t ever stolen. At least they almost never are.
Yet a Boeing 727 disappeared on May 25, 2003 from the international airport in Luanda, Angola. The plane used to belong to American Airlines. It was never found.
It’s been five months since Southwest Airlines experienced an unprecedented meltdown. They initially blamed weather, but they were cancelling over 60% of their flights a day even while other airlines throughout the country were operating normally. They found themselves short-staffed, and without the systems to recover. Their phone system broke. And they had to rebuild schedules manually, getting in touch with crews one at a time. And this went on for a week.
Now the airline is headed into summer – peak travel – so observers both inside and outside the company are asking whether they’re ready.
The Department of Justice successfully sued in District Court to block American Airlines and JetBlue from continuing to cooperate in their ‘Northeast Alliance’ where they divvied up which carrier flew to which city, and shared revenue.
The judge’s decision cites some pretty interesting coordination over pricing that happens in the airline industry prior to and outside of this alliance. Competitors talking about pricing, and in particular how to raise prices, is forbidden, and yet they seem to do it in plain sight without actually saying “let’s do the crime” so that they can get away with it.
The brand new St. Regis Chicago wasn’t offering Marriott Bonvoy Platinum members breakfast as they’re required to. They claimed that their restaurant was operated by a third party, and this got them out of the obligation. This all was addressed quickly, in just a couple of days.
In the meantime, however, there were a flood of consumer reviews of the property on TripAdvisor – most of which were very bad (and likely fake).
Many frequent flyers use Plastiq to pay bills with a credit card, they charge the card (and you earn miles) and they pay electronically or via check. Their fees have increased in recent years and are now up to 2.9%, but some find it worthwhile for paying things like mortgages and car payments that can’t otherwise be charged – especially when earning an initial bonus for a new credit card, or earning high spend bonuses and credit towards elite status.
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.
It’s not clear what started the fight, but this actually breaks out into more than one fight. It always amazes me that at a major international airport there are numerous law enforcement agencies of all kinds on premises, and cameras literally everywhere, yet no one seems to intervene.
Both chains are more booking platforms than hoteliers, since they not only don’t own hotels they generally don’t run them either, preferring to franchise. Choice currently has over 7,000 properties and Wyndham over 9,000.
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 »
