News and notes from around the interweb:
- British Airways London Heathrow First Wing screening expected to re-open March 27th
- Government sale of South African Airways falls apart after 3 years of negotiations, can SAA survive on its own?
The government estimates SAA can sustain itself financially for the next 12 to 18 months.
The government has also come to the conclusion that the flag carrier will no longer receive any bailout money. SAA will have to survive on its own or find a new merger partner.
- IHG 2,000 bonus points every 2 nights in April and May
- How little control and involvement restaurant brands have in their airport locations since they don’t generally rent the space, build it out, manage it or hire the workers. Related, why Tortas Frontera is the only airport restaurant that overcomes this and delivers a quality product.
- Wut
AIRPORT RACES… 0dds: GIVE ME A TRIM 33:1 – Real people. Real problems. Some solutions. . Enjoy life @delta @SouthwestAir @AmericanAir pic.twitter.com/JfoIbUfkJv
— Kato Kaelin (@Kato_Kaelin) March 18, 2024
- Don’t forget that these are a thing.
Got my first one @Delta pic.twitter.com/WfAHsN420R
— Dad (@XxVrgo) March 20, 2024
I went to Chick-Fil-A in IAH B Concourse and … I am about 99% sure that they were not using CFA nuggets. They were awful – VERY heavily breaded with very little actual meat.
South Africa as a nation probably has the same amount of time.
Just flew SAA CPT-JNB; JNB-VFA – less than 2 hour flight, full meals and 24 first class seats which were empty on all legs sans 2 pax on one leg. Not bad when a walkup fare that morning is ~$100.
Went from 20 747s to 9 planes, total. Such a poorly run airline. Any buyer is inheriting old planes and a tarnished name.
Thing is that even if the SA Govt wanted to dump more money into SA Airlines (“bailout”), they can’t spare it. Country is now on the verge of official failed state status.
I was on CGTN News earlier this week to discuss the SAA situation in a bit more detail – including some really juicy quotes from their auditors such as the inability to actually audit their financial reports due to “inadequate record-keeping, misstatements, and a lack of critical skills and capacity… to prepare credible financial statements”
https://youtu.be/DrrWiWt_1-k?si=rQlpe7C8Rskgzq4B
Lessee…where to start? The president of South Africa put his 2nd grade schoolteacher mistress in charge of the airline. They proceeded to fall off the cliff (so to speak) due to the corruption between the president, his mistress, stealing the money for their own use. As the airline began its fall, they filed for business rescue (bankruptcy). They fired all but 88 junior pilots of color, robbed the fired pilots of their “401k” monies, taxed them for the monies that they didn’t receive, flew an A350 from Johannesburg to Germany to pick up COVID vaccines with a crew that wasn’t current or qualified, the aircraft sustained an “alpha floor” (save itself) event that both Airbus and Rolls Royce questioned (but got stonewalled…black boxes mysteriously erased), came back with vaccine that was either outdated, spoiled or the wrong type, demanded that the fired pilots come back and sign a “new contract” (why would they do that since the airline didn’t honor the last contract??) only to be junior to the pilots that were retained…and the list goes on! The country can’t even supply electrical power to the residents as the power plants are old coal fired plants that haven’t been maintained, power shut offs twice a day, while the power is off, the corrupt and uneducated citizens cut down the power lines to sell the copper… WHY IS ANYONE SURPRISED??
Not only SAA is in trouble…. i think the entire country is in trouble too