Tag Archives for pilot.
The captain of an American Airlines flight comes out into the cabin – into economy, no less – to talk to passengers about their flight delay. He explains what happened, that the aircraft had arrived late from Puerto Vallarta, and he offered that they planned to make up a few minutes in the air if they could. He even offered to take passenger questions. But talking to passengers in person isn’t all that the captain did.
The pilot union has taken a strike authorization vote, but isn’t legally permitted to strike because they haven’t received federal permission to do so (and that would only come after a 30 day ‘cooling off period’). Pilots are getting frustrated over the time it is taking to get to a contract, though the airline has publicly committed to substantial raises.
Some pilots do not want to wait, and are suggesting taking matters into their own hands. The mistake they’re making, though, is putting this in writing – and the union, therefore, has taken steps to disavow it.
Why are they even training for a middle of the night interrogation inside a hotel with guests sleeping?
While 110 million Americans haven’t even played Microsoft’s flight simulator, apparently one third of Americans think they could take the controls of an aircraft and land it if they had to. For males the number is 50%.
A United Airlines pilot, hired in April 2022, was terminated after less than two months at the carrier “because he struggle[s] to discern different colors while flying at night.” The pilot is suing.
Southwest Airlines has completely melted down. They didn’t just cancel more flights than anyone else over the Christmas holiday – by a large measure – they’ve failed to recover their operation. They keep cancelling a majority of their flights.
The reasons for this are many. SWAPA, the Southwest Airlines Pilots Association, has something to say.
United Airlines agreed to allow an alcoholic Buddhist pilot back into the cockpit after a substance abuse program that doesn’t involve Christianity nearly two and a half years after the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission backed the pilot, and pay him $305,000. The agency argued that the airline violated the pilot’s religious liberty by insisting he attend Alcoholics Anonymous meetings, contending he should be permitted to substitute a Buddhist alternative.
Most passengers would have been beyond annoyed at the hassle, even though it was beyond the airline’s control. Yet the passengers on this flight were downright pleasant. And it’s because even though the delay wasn’t something American Airlines could prevent, how they managed the delay was in the very capable hands of the airline’s captain – who organized a pizza party for everyone on the plane.
A Southwest Airlines pilot is suing her airline after the captain in charge of flight WN6607 from Philadelphia to Orlando on August 10, 2020 pleaded guilty “to dead-bolting the cockpit door during a flight and stripping naked in front of her.”
As she explains it, the flight was the first time she’d met the man. He said it was hire retirement flight (though he actually continued to fly for 3 more weeks). And he shared that there was “something he wanted to do” before he retired.
A reader was flying from Charlotte to Cleveland on American Airlines flight 1264 Thursday morning when he caught the moment that an entrepreneurial pilot went the extra mile to ensure their aircraft was ready to fly.
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 »
