News and notes from around the interweb:
- Travel blogging for a cause: Ed from Pizza in Motion and Summer from The Points Guy are raising money for Give Kids the World by attempting the Parkeology Challenge to ride all 49 Disney World attractions in a single day.
- The story of Southwest Airlines growth at BWI and the role the airline has played at secondary airports on the outskirts of major metropolitan areas. BWI plays a role similar to Chicago Midway and Oakland, and Southwest surpassed US Airways as the largest carrier there in 1999.
- Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan has long aggressively offered to status match customers who have elite status with another airline. That offer now has a website but wait a few weeks to take advantage, historically matches prior to October 1 have only lasted through the end of the same year, while those October 1 onward have been good through the following year.
- The PETS Act doesn’t require hotels to accept hurricane evacuees with pets though hotels do have to accept service animals accompanying guests under the Americans With Disabilities Act. (HT: Paul H.)
- What it’s like to fly into a storm like Florence (HT: Dan R.)
- After several failed attempts since 2009 Montenegro Airlines may finally be privatized. El Al, Etihad, Turkish and others have been suitors in the past.
- The man who stole a Horizon Air Q400 at SeaTac raised suspicions a year before his demise.
Thank you for sharing the Give Kids the World challenge!
Interesting bit about SW at BWI.
I grew up between Balto and DC, not entirely far from BWI (which my parents still call “Friendship”, and will never incorporate Thurgood Marshall into their vocabulary). By the time SW entered the BWI market, I was ensconced inside the beltway in Northern Virginia, and I recall the initial flights to Midway and Cleveland. SW picked marginal customers from DCA and to a lesser extent IAD, but their presence required that marginal fares for the price sensitive compete.
I cannot call SW a LCC any more, but their looming presence with gobs of markets served from BWI no doubt forces AA, DL and UA to provide better service and pricing from DCA.