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.
Paul Manafort was removed from Sunday’s Emirates flight from Miami to Dubai while he attempted to travel on a revoked passport.
Manafort chaired the Trump presidential campaign in the summer of 2016, and under his leadership had support for a free and democratic Ukraine removed from the Republican platform. He was accused of providing internal polling data to Russian intelligence working in Ukraine, and had previously lobbied for former pro-Russian Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych as well as former dictators of Zaire, Mongolia, and the Philippines.
My award booking partner, Steve operates an ‘Amazing Race For Normal People’ team travel competition to Europe once a year. Competitours.com features unique and compelling challenge activities that push you gently out of your comfort zone.
Your routing is a mystery, with each day’s location only revealed with a few hours’ notice. The destinations zig zag around the nooks and crannies of Western Europe- so forget the well-beaten tourist path. There are no eliminations and no one gets left behind as teams transfer to another destination.
A week and a half ago at the Salt Lake City airport, a man walked up to an airport police officer – and punched him in the head. On March 12, a 33 year old man’s first interaction with two officers was to drop his carry on bag, punch one of them, and then try to hit the other.
He had the presence of mind to know what he was doing – and what was coming next. So he dropped right to his knees on his own and placed his hands behind his head for arrest. Here’s both airport surveillance camera footage and an officer’s body cam footage of the incident.
American Airlines and JetBlue introduced reciprocal elite benefits this past fall. The major omission was reciprocal access to extra legroom seats, largely a function of JetBlue not even offering those to their own elite members.
However JetBlue has been rethinking its elite benefits and now both JetBlue and American elites gain access to extra legroom seats on both airlines along with additional new benefits.
Earn with any Avios program. Transfer Avios between programs. This makes Qatar Airways Privilege Club, already a useful program, much more relevant to audiences around the world.
On March 10 a passenger on board flyDubai from Dubai to Tirana, Albania filmed the moment when the entire cabin pitched in to cheer up a crying child, breaking out in song to PinkFong’s “Baby Shark.” Everyone claps and sings and then the camera cuts to the crying toddler.
This child reportedly started crying shortly before takeoff. A passenger sitting behind the child “started quietly murmuring the words” to the song. Then another joined in, and another, and suddenly the whole cabin had busted out the cringeworthy meme like one giant slow clap.
Air New Zealand is launching three day a week Auckland – New York JFK service September 17th using a Boeing 787-9.
At 8,828 miles this will be the world’s third longest flight. It will clock in at 16 hours northbound and nearly 17 and a half hours southbound.
At a recent internal question and answer session with pilots, Vice President of Network and Schedule Planning Brian Znotins shared how American is thinking about using the Airbus A321XLR in Charlotte and how it will trade off with existing widebody service.
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.
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 »
