Airline and Airport News
When major disease epidemics strike, airlines are often forced to shut down travel between countries to stop outbreaks from spreading. But a recent study by Florida State University (FSU) researchers shows that changing boarding procedures could drastically reduce transmissions rates.
Ashok Srinivasan, a computer science associate professor, and his team found that the current zoned boarding procedures used by many airlines plays a major role in the spread of disease. To...
Airline crashes, once almost commonplace, are now pretty rare. Better training, better equipment, and enhanced safety protocols have saved countless lives in the last two decades.
But that's not to say that there haven't been some extremely close calls, the most recent occurring last month at San Francisco International Airport.
A report from the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) reveals an Air Canada jet that was landing at the airport very nearly crashed into ...
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Nobody likes being delayed or late, especially travelers that have to make connecting flights in other cities. But worry not! United Airlines will be guaranteeing on-time arrivals for its future customers. . . well, for a select few of its customers, anyway.
The company has announced a new reliability guarantee for its business and corporate travelers, saying that it will get them to their destinations on time. If it isn't able to follow through on this promise, these tr...
Airline safety is vastly improved since man first took to the skies. Crashes claiming multiple lives, while not everyday occurrences, were not uncommon either.
Over the years, the air transport industry learned valuable lessons from every accident.
By the late 1990s, airline safety showed vast improvements, by virtue of better equipment and better training. Now, an air disaster within the U.S. is very rare.
But that's not to say there aren't plenty of close calls. What wor...
Air travelers, it appears, were a pretty content bunch in early spring.
According to the Department of Transportation's (DOT) Air Travel Consumer Report there were just 1,122 complaints about service from consumers -- down 21.5% from a month earlier and off 20.9% from the same month the year before.
The carriers posted an on-time arrival rate of 84.5%, an improvement from March's 81.5% mark and April 2015's 81.8% on-time rate. As far as cancellations go, just 0.9% of sche...
The airline industry has gone through some changes as of late, the most notable being the inclusion of a “basic economy fare.” While Southwest recently derided the fare as being a “huge mistake,” companies like Delta, United, and American Airlines have all jumped on the bandwagon.
Now, American has announced an update to its boarding process that will take the new fare into account. The company says that starting March 1, boarding groups will no longer be called by their...
It’s been a pretty rough stretch for Spirit Airlines over the past week. CNN reports that the company has canceled over 300 flights in the past seven days, and tensions among travelers are beginning to boil over.
On Monday, a brawl involving consumers and airline staff took place at Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport after passengers on nine canceled flights angrily approached the front ticket counter, cutting in front of others who were waiting in line. Dep...
With an improving economy, you can expect the nation's airports to be more crowded this spring.
Airlines For America (A4A), a trade group representing U.S. airlines, estimates 145 million passengers will fly on U.S.-based carriers between March 1 and April 30. That amounts to nearly 2.4 million a day and would represent a 4% increase over last year.
“There has never been a better time to fly, as evidenced by the record levels of traffic U.S. airlines saw in 2016 and will ...
For the airlines, the world changed on April 9, 2017.
That's when United Airlines summoned Chicago airport police to forcibly remove a passenger on a Louisville bound flight after he refused to give up his seat to a United employee. Video of the incident was recorded by numerous passengers, sparking world-wide outrage.
Since then airlines have been subjected to intense scrutiny by passengers, fed up with the often unpleasant rigors of today's commercial air travel. Every e...
It might be a tumultuous Thanksgiving week for O’Hare International Airport in Chicago. Yesterday, labor leaders at the airport said that “hundreds” of low-wage workers voted to strike and may not show up this coming week, according to the Chicago Sun Times.
Around 2,000 non-unionized workers – including baggage handlers, security officers, caterers, and cleaners -- voted on the course of action in protest of unsafe working conditions, unpaid overtime, and retaliation ag...
Back in March, U.S. officials announced a laptop ban on certain flights originating from 10 airports in eight countries, a measure meant to address the threat of in-flight bombs being smuggled in electronics.
The new rule was met with an outcry from all corners and did little to ease tensions between the U.S. and foreign countries. But in an announcement yesterday, Secretary of Homeland Security John F. Kelly proposed a new set of security measures that will roll back th...
Travel between the U.S. and Europe isn't exactly cheap. That is, unless you get booked on one of Norwegian Air's newly-approved flights between the U.S. and Ireland and the UK, for $65 one-way.
The Trump administration has given the green light for the low fares after a protracted political battle. The application, which the Obama administration called one of the most complicated ever, was bitterly opposed within the airline industry and took three years to complete. The...
Travel site TripAdvisor.com has named what it considers the 10 best airlines in the world. Unless you do a lot of international travel, you might not get to enjoy most of them.
Coming out on top is Emirates, based in the United Arab Emirates (UAE). It's followed by Singapore Airlines, and then Brazil's Azul.
It's only in the fourth spot that a U.S.-based airline -- JetBlue -- makes an appearance. It's followed by Air New Zealand, Korean Air, Japan Airlines, and Thailand-based Thai Smile at number eight.
Alaska Airlines, the only other U.S.-based carrier to earn a spot on the list, is ninth and Garuda Indonesia rounds out the top 10.
Some airlines investing in improved service
"The airline industry is investing billions of dollars in new aircraft and service enhancements to differentiate the flying experience and these awards recognize the carriers offering the very best experiences and value to the traveling public," said Bryan Saltzburg, Senior Vice President and General Manager for TripAdvisor Flights.
In addition to the top 10 list, TripAdvisor rated airlines in different categories of service, such as first class, business class, premium economy and economy. The awards were based on an algorithm that analyzed airline reviews and ratings submitted by travelers worldwide over the last year.
Besides being named number one overall, Emirates took honors for Best First Class and Best Economy Class.
"The fact that the awards are a result of unbiased reviews and feedback speaks to our commitment to deliver a superior travel experience for our customers," said Sir Tim Clark, President, Emirates Airlines.
Russia's Aeroflot was awarded Best Business Class and Air New Zealand was named Best Premium Economy Class.
Special category for U.S. carriers
Since U.S. carriers were not overly represented on the list, TripAdvisor created a category for North American airlines. It named Delta the top major airline in the U.S.
When it comes to mid-size and low-cost North American carriers, it breaks down this way:
- JetBlue
- Alaska Airlines
- Southwest
- Virgin America
- Westjet (Canada)
Travel site TripAdvisor.com has named what it considers the 10 best airlines in the world. Unless you do a lot of international travel, you might not get to enjoy most of them.
Coming out on top is Emirates, based in the United Arab Emirates (UAE). It's followed by Singapore Airlines, and then Brazil's Azul.
It's only in the fourth spot that a U.S.-based airline -- JetBlue -- makes an appearance. It's followed by Air New Zealand, Korean Air, Japan Airlines, and Thailand-b...
If you're flying into American airspace anytime soon, make sure your phone, laptop and other devices all have fully charged batteries, because as of last weekend, you must add “any phone or laptop computer with a dead battery” to the list of “things you can't carry on an airplane, or else the Transportation Security Administration will think you're a terrorist.”
That list has been in flux since the TSA first invented it. Back in the summer of 2005, all small metal grooming tools, such as tweezers and nail clippers, were banned in carry-on luggage, then they were allowed again.
Shampoo, liquid soap and other toiletry gels were initially allowed, then briefly forbidden altogether, then re-allowed provided they were in labeled bottles or tubes each containing three ounces or less, although that limit has since increased so that today, you can have moisturizer, toothpaste and other personal-hygiene gels in bottles or tubes containing up to 3.4 ounces apiece. However, for terrorist-prevention reasons those individual bottles and tubes all must fit in a plastic resealable sandwich bag no larger than one quart.
All carry-on electronics were banned for a day or two after Christmas 2009, during which time the TSA also imposed a set of rules governing passenger behavior during the last hour of a flight: hands were to be visible at all times, nothing was to be kept in people's laps, no reaching into your pocket or carry-on bag, and no leaving your seat for any reason.
Those punitive restrictions were soon rescinded. One year later, in October 2010, the TSA started requiring fliers in American airspace to submit to what it calls “enhanced patdowns” -- the explicit genital-grabbing all-body searches which, as a TSA agent admitted at the time, were deliberately intended to intimidate fliers into walking through the TSA's then-new full-body scanners instead.
And, of course, there have been the periodic TSA warnings against everything from shoes to cupcakes, all of which might, possibly, have the potential to be a bomb, or hide a bomb, or otherwise do something dangerous.
Old is new again
Hence the justification for the TSA's latest edict: if you are going to fly in American airspace and your cell phone has a dead battery (more specifically, if you show up with a device that cannot be turned on where a TSA agent can see it), they'll suspect the device is actually a disguised bomb, and then treat you as a suspect.
Hopefully, no terrorist or potential terrorist anywhere in the world is smart enough to disguise a bomb as an electronic device and then give it an actual working screen. But this possibility has already been considered and discarded by Jason Harrington, a former TSA agent who wrote in the Guardian that "the new airport cellphone rules wouldn't stop an iBomb" and warned that "the latest ad hoc security directive might actually make us less safe."
Those of a certain age may recall that this is actually not the first time the "turn on your devices" rule has been implemented. Long before there was a TSA -- back in the 1990s -- security guards at many U.S. airports used to ask travelers to turn on their laptops. Since this was in the Windows XP days, when a boot-up could take several minutes, it resulted in some pretty major back-ups and was eventually abandoned.
The story has generated many international headlines. For example: the U.K.'s Telegraph, on July 3, reported a “UK terror alert: body searches at British airports” with the subheading “New security regime imposed on passengers as American intelligence suggests al-Qaeda plot to use Western fanatics to bring down a US-bound plane.”
The next day, when the Express reported the news, it included warnings from a British travel agency, advising all travelers in the country to allow extra time for airport checks. The Express also said that the increased security measures were due to fears that terrorists might have an “undetectable 'stealth bomb'.”
"More like a physical assault"
Incidentally, both of those British news stories quoted an American tourist, Lisa Simeone, who was in Europe when local news reported the latest changes in American airport security rules. While Simeone and her husband were at Heathrow about to fly back home, a reporter strolling through the airport asked them what they thought about the new rules, and the Express said this:
American journalist Lisa Simeone, 57, said: “When I came through here last it was a cursory pat-down.
“This time it seems they are being a lot more aggressive and really groping people, it’s more like a physical assault.”
She said officials were swabbing belongings, clothes and shoes and even swabbed a baby’s pushchair.
No bombs or terrorists were found.
Simeone, a Baltimore resident and a frequent contributor to the TSA News Blog, is a frequent traveler who said she stopped flying in American airspace in 2010, when the TSA's “enhanced patdown” policy started.
“We used to travel a lot; it was a big part of my life,” Simeone said in a phone interview with ConsumerAffairs. The thought of never visiting Europe again made her rather depressed until she discovered that the Queen Mary 2 docks in New York and takes passengers across the Atlantic, so she and her husband got into the habit of driving from Baltimore to New York, taking the ship to Europe [it makes port calls in England and Germany], then flying back to the U.S.
“The QM2 is not expensive [compared to an airline ticket]; the problem is that it takes time,” Simeone said. A trans-Atlantic flight takes less than a day, whereas the Queen Mary 2 requires nearly a week to cross the ocean. “Not many Americans have enough time to take a vacation without flying.”
Latest American export
At any rate, Simeone and her husband said their vacation took three weeks in all, including the week they spent on the Queen Mary 2. Two and a half weeks into their vacation, Simeone learned, the TSA practices she sought to avoid in America had followed her to Europe.
“We were in Vienna, at the two and a half week mark, when the news reports started to come out: U.S. demanding other countries do this … I thought, 'Oh, my God, This is what's going on in the U.S., and now it's coming to Europe …. the U.S. makes an edict, and every other country knuckles under. They said the bomb they're looking for is 'undetectable,' but they think groping people will help them find it?”
A two-way ocean voyage from Europe to New York and back takes two weeks in all: as much vacation time as many Americans get in an entire year. “I work freelance, so I can take the time if I have to; my husband can't,” Simeone concluded glumly. She hopes the new regime in European airports proves only temporary, though fears that might be unduly optimistic: “The thing about civil liberties — once they're taken away, it's very unlikely you'll get them back.”
If you're flying into American airspace anytime soon, make sure your phone, laptop and other devices all have fully charged batteries, because as of last weekend, you must add “any phone or laptop computer with a dead battery” to the list of “things you can't carry on an airplane, or else the Transportation Security Administration will think you're a terrorist.”
That list has been in flux since the TSA first invented it. Back in the summer of 2005,...
Nothing annoys air travelers quite so much as arriving at their destination only to get stuck waiting at baggage claim for luggage that never comes. While airline companies are constantly striving to reduce the amount of lost or delayed luggage, many are also looking into ways of promptly notifying customers when something goes wrong.
Yesterday, American Airlines announced that it will be doing just that with the introduction of its Customer Baggage Notification (CBN) sy...
To meet the challenges of airport congestion and to improve passengers' boarding experience, Delta Airlines says it is experimenting with a new approach at its Atlanta hub.
Delta says the changes are designed to streamline the boarding process and will get a tryout at three gates on the T Concourse at Atlanta's Hartsfield Jackson Airport.
First, the check-in counters are getting smaller. Mobile agent pods will have a smaller footprint than traditional gate counters, which...
At the beginning of the month, we reported the results of a study by New York’s Hunter College that assessed which airlines had the best food. While Virgin America took top honors, Delta Airlines came in a close second for its low-calorie and vegan options.
While having high marks on food quality is nice, many fliers today must pay extra for an in-flight meal if they’re flying coach and going on a long flight. However, Delta has recently said that it will be testing comp...