News and notes from around the interweb:

• DC travel meetup is on Tuesday

• Pilot drops a phone from a plane. It survives

• Ryanair’s call for limits on airports selling alcohol is disingenuous

  “Here’s the thing, though: notice that they don’t want to stop selling alcohol themselves and in fact by preventing people from boozing it up before flight, they’ve got customers more likely to want to buy from the airline,” US airline industry expert and commentator Gary Leff wrote in an opinion piece for his travel blog, View From the Wing.

  “The airline could choose not to sell alcohol on its flights. They could reduce the pressure on crew to generate revenue from in-flight sales. They could take it upon themselves to prevent intoxicated passengers from boarding.”

• Flying for free flights no longer makes sense

  “It is harder to use miles at the price that people are expecting to pay,” says Gary Leff, who writes the View from the Wing travel blog.

  Even for frequent flyers like Leff, a once-cherished benefit of the miles — using them to upgrade to first class — has been diminished because airlines sell more of those upgrades for cash.

• Inside Singapore Airlines by National Geographic. (HT: Robb)

• I think this Cathay Pacific AsiaMiles video about a secretary who knows her boss’ account password, can call to use his miles, and reminds him to earn at restaurants is supposed to be endearing.