Tag Archives for coronavirus.
The Helsinki airport ‘Covid-sniffing dogs’ pilot project has gotten a lot of press, but now we have more robust results.
Ultimately if Covid-sniffing dogs would work, that could allow people to be sniffed on the way into the airport and could also open the possibility of having large events again. It amounts to universal and instantaneous testing, provided that training for both the dogs and their handlers could scale.
Last week’s Airlines Confidential podcast was recorded at the Boyd International Aviation Forecast Summit, and Mike Boyd was on briefly and dropped – almost as an aside – “one little thing drops out of a lab in Wuhan..” and aviation is upended.
I’d walk through the ‘conspiracy theory’ of the virus, not just because of what SARS-CoV-2 has done to aviation (since it’s done even more to human lives) but also because the conspiracy actually involves the Wuhan airport.
New York State has had a challenging set of rules for travel. Anyone arriving from a state with more than 10 positive cases per 100,000 residents on a rolling average basis, or greater than 10% of Covid-19 tests coming back positive has had to quarantine for 14 days on arrival. Enforcement has been spotty.
With very few states left on the list of allowable travelers entering New York, the state is replacing that regime with mandatory pre-travel testing and shorter quarantine on arrival with a second test for everyone as an alternative to a 14 day quarantine.
United has a way for everyone to have confidence that travel is safe from the virus – test everyone on the plane before departure – and believes this can open up travel as well as bring back passengers. So they’re offering it free as a trial on several Newark – London flights that customers can choose to book. Now we’re getting somewhere.
Countries are opening up to travel, but in many cases only where they can assure themselves the likelihood someone entering doesn’t have Covid-19. Some do testing on arrival. Others require tests prior to departure. Eventually we’ll likely see vaccination certificates as a condition of entry as well.
But what if people are faking their negative Covid tests where a predeparture test is required? In some cases that is apparently happening.
A new study purports to show 59 Covid-19 cases ‘linked’ to a single flight, but that’s somewhat misleading.
Inflight transmission seems to be rare, it certainly isn’t impossible, and someone with a high viral load and lots of shedding may overcome the best precautions. The virus might spread at security, in a lounge, at the gate area, or simply transiting the terminal. It could spread on the jetway as well. Flying is safe, but not totally safe. In many ways, just like going to the grocery store.
A London-based flight attendant who worked United Airlines flight UA15 from London Heathrow to Newark on Tuesday tested positive for Covid-19. That flight attendant quarantined at an airport hotel. Eight London crew were supposed to work United flight UA829 from Newark to Mumbai the next day. They were taken off that four-day trip. The next day, I’m told, four of the eight tried to deadhead back to London Heathrow the next day but the flight’s Captain refused to carry them as passengers. So they traveled back on Thursday. Others pass rode back to Europe.
I asked United why passengers from the flight weren’t notified of their exposure and why the other flight attendants were allowed to deadhead back to Heathrow rather than quarantining?
We have to be making progress when Costco.com is now selling a saliva PCR test online that promises results returned in 24-72 hours.
This isn’t available in Pennsylvania, Nevada, or Maryland, and they can’t ship to Puerto Rico. But it’s something you can buy from Costco as a one-off and you don’t even need to buy a pallet of tests. The price may work for a trip, but for return to normal life we really do need sub-$5 tests, which are certainly possible.
A woman died of Covid-19 on a Spirit Airlines flight from Phoenix to Dallas Fort-Worth on July 24. The story is only just now being reported. And the facts seemed so obviously not alarming that I didn’t cover it right away. But now that I’m seeing claims like, “so much for the ‘you can’t catch covid on a plane’ nonsense” that it’s clearly important to dive in.
United Airlines flight attendants don’t have to social distance from each other in the galley. On long haul flights they’re in close contact with customers as they serve beverages and even meals. But the airline is telling them that as a Covid precaution they need to stop sharing beds up in the crew rest area of widebody aircraft.
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 »
