News reports were all over the place throughout the weekend about an American Airlines flight from Charlotte to Boston where a “criminal act” had taken place. Now we know more about what happened on board Saturday’s flight 1441 involving “a juvenile, a phone and a flight attendant.”
It was a hidden camera in the lavatory. And police boarded the aircraft when it landed in Boston.
All business class airline BeOnd, based in the Maldives, has received its Air Operators Certificate, and has announced its first two destinations: Munich (beginning November 15) and Zurich (starting November 17). The carrier has an Airbus A319 outfitted with 44 lie flat seats, and actually serves both via Riyadh, which is an unannounced third destination.
The CEO of Qantas, Alan Joyce, has been forced to step down amidst numerous scandals. But he’s leaving just two months earlier than planned, and pocketing big bonuses on the way out the door.
Senior Vice President and Chief Customer Officer Brady Byrnes told cabin crew that during the second quarter FA4 and FA0 delays were “down 25%” compared to the airline’s goals, and that this was responsible for “point five” of the carrier’s overall improvement in D0, exact on-time departures.
Byrnes noted that not only are flight attendants showing up and doing their jobs (reduced FA0 and FA4 delays), but that the tools and procedural changes they’ve made are helping too.
At an employee ‘Crew News’ question and answer session last week, a recording of which was reviewed by View From The Wing, Senior Vice President of Network Planning Brian Znotins was asked about additional international announcements beyond new routes just announced.
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Last week one of my cousins from Australia was passing through Dallas. He’d been in the Northeast for a few days and didn’t have time to make a visit in Austin, since he needed to make it home for my aunt’s 70th birthday right after being in a wedding. But he booked a long layover, because he was traveling on separate tickets and very badly didn’t want a delay of his first flight to cause him to miss his business class award home. He’d be at DFW airport for about 8 hours, so I agreed to meet him there. I offered that we could leave the airport, but he actually wanted to see all the things. So we decided to make a day of DFW. I caught a 1 p.m. American Airlines flight to DFW.…
He really didn’t want to give up his seat with his wife – they had split up their stuff optimized for travel together, for instance they planned to watch shows together on his laptop. But the parents were “frantic” over their daughter sitting alone.
She was… 16.
Delta Air Lines flight 194 form Atlanta to Barcelona turned around Friday night after a passenger let loose diarrhea throughout the aircraft. The Airbus A350 was two hours into its flight to Spain when a pilot told air traffic control about a “biohazard issue” that necessitated an immediate u-turn.
The flight was over Virginia when the airline told the pilots to turn back. Passengers returned to Atlanta and waited while Delta cleaned the aircraft and found a new crew.
If you’ve never missed a flight you’re spending too much time in airports, although admittedly there are flights where arriving late has real consequences – either because of the importance of a meeting on arrival, or because of limited connecting options. Contra this fast-spreading claim on social media, there’s nothing inherently irresponsible about missing a flight.
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 »
