Sky Talk

American and two different viral Internet issues

American Airlines has been popping up all over the Internet for two very different reasons: a picture of an obese guy in an AA plane and a spider who makes a surprise appearance in a piece of cake on an AA flight.

First, the guy who takes up a seat and half the aisle...Here's the photo floating around the Internet and of course, the thing that we're all asking is if it's real.

The London's Telegraph seems to think so.

American spokesman Tim Smith had this to say about the photo:

"We cannot verify the authenticity of that photograph, nor do we know who might have taken the photo.  We do have a policy that tries to be flexible for passengers of size....We do not always or routinely charge for an extra seat unless there are simply no other options. Our people are trained to work with customers to try and accommodate ALL passengers onboard. Often, pending how full the flight is, we can get everyone taken care of.  In some cases, we cannot, so we book the person on another flight or in some cases, depending on the customer’s schedule needs, we do book and charge for two seats, but certainly not all the time.  We train our people to try and find another solution if at all possible."

Now for the second viral Internet issue for American: someone had a spider in their cake.

 

National Geographic Traveler reader advocate Christopher Elliott blogged about the video on Monday and pondered Why Wasn't Spiders in my Dessert the next United Breaks Guitar?

Watch the video and check out the spider's appearance around 15 seconds in.

Smith says that American's quick response to the passenger who posted the video helped mitigate what could have been a p.r. nightmare for the Fort Worth carrier.

"Because we have people on staff who closely monitor Internet postings and diligently "listen" to what our customers are saying, we found the video posting very quickly after it appeared - certainly within a few hours the same day it showed up, which was several months ago......The person who posted it did contact us and he seemed pleased that we had been listening and reaching out to him. We were able to discuss and personally handle his concerns."

-Andrea Ahles

Continental goes cashless

Cash is no longer king on Continental Airlines flights.

The Houston-based airline said that flight crews will accept only credit and debit cards for in-flight purchases starting on Tuesday. All domestic flights will now have hand-held devices for the flight attendants to use to charge customers for alcoholic beverages and headsets.

However, cash will still be used on Continental's China flights and on Continental Express, Continental Connection and Continental Micronesia flights.

The full release is here.

-Andrea Ahles

Airlines jump in on Cyber Monday

Several airlines are giving Cyber Monday a shot, advertising air fare sales on a day that online retailers have trumped up as sort of an electronic version of Black Friday.

United Airlines, Virgin America and JetBlue have all announced cheap fares for spring travel, of course with some caveats. The three carriers have $39 one-way fares for some city pairs.

Even the Starwood hotel chain, which includes Westin, W Hotels and Sheraton brands, is offering deals today on hotels in some hot spots like Hawaii and the Caribbean.

It remains to be seen if any other airlines will match fares.

"Typically Monday night is sale night so we'll keep an eye out," tweeted Rick Seaney, chief executive of FareCompare.com.

-Andrea Ahles

Aussies commit to F-35 acquisition

Lockheed Martin and the U.S. government have apparently found their first foreign buyer for the F-35 joint strike fighter.

The Australian government has approved plans to buy an initial lot of 14 F-35A combat jets, according to a report issued by the Ministry of Defence. The A-model is the conventional takeoff aircraft that will be operated by the U.S. Air Force and most foreign buyers.

The Government has approved acquisition of the first 14 Conventional Take-Off and Landing (CTOL) Joint Strike Fighters and infrastructure and support required for initial training and testing, at an estimated cost of $3.2 billion.

“Approval of this first batch of JSF aircraft is evidence of the Rudd Government’s strong commitment to defence and our commitment to implementing the Defence White Paper,” Senator Faulkner said.

Approval of the next batch of aircraft and all necessary support and enabling capabilities, sufficient to establish three operational squadrons and a training squadron of CTOL JSF, will be considered in 2012. This will fulfil our White Paper commitment to acquire three operational squadrons comprising not fewer than 72 aircraft.

Australia's announcement comes as most of the news in the U.S. in recent weeks has focused on continued delays in production and testing of jets and Pentagon estimates of higher costs to complete development and testing.

Australia eventually plans to buy 100 F-35s, in order to have three combat-ready squadrons totaling 72 planes. The F-35 will replace F/A-18s in the Australian arsenal. The government has yet to place its order with Lockheed, but said it expects to take delivery of the first plane in 2014.

A strong,vocal opposition has emerged in Australia to the F-35 but the government said the decision was made following "many years of unprecedented evaluation and planning by all nine countries involved in the JSF’s development."

This just in from the loyal F-35 opposition:

This is a courageous move on the part of the Australian Government, particularly given the flawed data and marketing spin upon which this decision has been based.

At a unit procurement cost (UPC) in excess of $200 million, in 2014 dollars, this decision confirms the real price that Air Power Australia (APA) and other experts around the world have been predicting and brings into serious question evidence put before the Australian Parliament over the past 12 months, such as “I would be surprised if Australia were to pay any more than A$75 million per aircraft, in 2008 dollars, at an exchange rate of 0.92”.

Though we wish it were not so, the just so flawed JSF Program is a ‘perfect storm’ which will make the global financial crisis (GFC) look like a mere stumble.  While the GFC and its more voracious sibling, the World Economic Re-alignment (WER), have brought the concept of sovereign financial risk into stark relief, the JSF will put the very sovereignty of western nations, including the USA, at serious risk.

- Bob Cox

Civil aviation, safety advocate Ed Stimpson dies

Anyone remotely connected with civil aviation affairs in the last 30 years probably came across Ed Stimpson. The former head of the General Aviation Manufacturers Association and U.S. representative to the Council of the International Civil Aviation Organization, died Wednesday.

His passing was announced by the Flight Safety Foundation, which he was chairman of until his resignation Nov. 1. A spokeswoman for the foundation had been battling an undisclosed illness.

Stimpson was presented with the Flight Safety Foundation - Boeing Aviation Safety Lifetime Achievement Award last month.

Prior to his service at ICAO, Stimpson spent 25 years as president of the General Aviation Manufacturers Association, which represents companies involved in the manufacture of aircraft and component parts. Before joining GAMA, he served as assistant administrator of congressional relations at the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration.

- Bob Cox

U.S. won't turn over F-35 software codes

In a decision that probably won't completely quell a long running source of irritation between the Department of Defense and our British allies, the U.S. government has apparently decided it will not give F-35 joint strike fighter buyers, even those who've spent their own money developing the airplane, keys to the software codes for the high tech airplane.

According to a report in DoD Buzz, U.S. officials finally decided that giving the Brits the source codes "would, in the words of one close observer of the program, “turn the British JSF into a Trojan Horse.” The message this source would send the British: “Yes we love you… but who are those third party nationals from the EU working for you? And how do we know we can trust them?” 

Reuters also has a version of the story.

No other country is getting the so-called source code, the key to the plane's electronic brains, Jon Schreiber, who heads the program's international affairs, told Reuters in an interview Monday.

"That includes everybody," he said, acknowledging this was not overly popular among the eight that have co-financed F-35 development -- Britain, Italy, the Netherlands, Turkey, Canada, Australia, Denmark and Norway.

- Bob Cox

Wet landing at end of solo flight

Speaking of flying, we saw this on the wires this morning and just had to pass it along.

(Bloomberg) -- Swiss commercial pilot Yves Rossy dropped into the sea in a bid to make a 40-kilometer (25-mile) flight from Morocco to Spain while wearing a jet-powered wing strapped to his body. He jumped from a plane off Tangier today and was later seen in the water, attempting to swim toward a rescue boat. International broadcasters televised the event. Rossy successfully crossed over the Channel between France and England in September 2008 while powered by the wing.

- Bob Cox

On-time and quiet at D/FW Airport

It's the day before Thanksgiving and D/FW Airport seems to be running very smoothly.

Looking at the departures boards and all flights are on-time with the exception of one canceled American flight to Ft. Smith, Arkansas.

"Flights operations are moving very smoothly at DFW today, and passengers can expect to see short security lines, usually no more than five minutes," said D/FW Airport spokesman David Magana. "The weather is also cooperating so we should see a great day for traveling by air today."

D/FW airport expects 1.63 million passengers to pass through its terminals during the Thanksgiving travel period which stretches from Nov. 20 to Nov. 30. The busiest day at the airport is expected to be Sunday.

Travelocity spokesman Joel Frey, who hung at the airport on Tuesday and will be here all day Wednesday, said that lines have been generally short but he has seen a few travelers pulled out of security lines to check bags that are too big to take on board an airplane.

"The airline staffs are keeping a careful eye on that," Frey said, advising travelers to make sure they are not taking too many bags on just to avoid bag fees.

For Keller resident Scott McNeely, the security lines were short and he and his family had about another hour to wait for their flight to Playa del Carmen, Mexico. 

"It's not as busy as year's past," said McNeely, who takes his family on vacation every Thanksgiving.

-Andrea Ahles

Continental and two regional carriers fined $175,000 for stranding passengers in August

Continental and two regional carriers were fined $175,000 for stranding passengers all night on a plane in August, the Department of Transportation said on Tuesday.

The passengers were on a 50-seat jet operated by ExpressJet that had been diverted to Rochester, Minnesota. The Continental flight from Houston to Minneapolis was diverted to the regional airport due to thunderstorms. When arriving at Rochester, passengers were not allowed to disembark because the airport was closed for the evening, stranding the passengers overnight on the plane.

Continental was $50,000 and ExpressJet was also fined $50,000. Mesaba Airlines, a unit of Delta Air Lines, was fined $75,000 for its role in the ground services for the flight at Rochester.

"I hope that this sends a signal to the rest of the airline industry that we expect airlines to respect the rights of air travelers," said Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood in a statement.

-Andrea Ahles

Continental ranked best domestic airline by Zagat

Fliers of the friendly skies prefer Continental Airlines and JetBlue Airways, according to Zagat's 2009 Airline survey.

Zagat ranked each airline on comfort, service, food and website on a its 30-point scale. The famous restaurant review guide company surveyed the opinions of 5,895 frequent fliers who collectively took 97,600 flights in the past year.

"The newer airlines continue to do well in the survey," said Tim Zagat, chief executive of Zagat Survey. "Being less expensive to operate, they can therefore afford to provide better service."

Large Domestic Premium Class:	21	Continental Airlines
	17	American Airlines
		Delta Air Lines
	16	United Airways
	15	AirTran Airways

Large Domestic Economy Class:	19	JetBlue Airways
	15	Continental Airlines
		Southwest Airlines
	12	AirTran Airways
	11	Delta Air Lines

My favorite part of the Zagat press release though was the outtakes section where Zagat picked the best passenger one-liners given in the survey. Here's a sample:

"Another contender for the 'Passengers Come Last' award."

"If there was any less legroom, I'd have to check my legs."

"Asked why we didn't have blankets, the steward said 'so they could give the execs bonuses."

"They still serve bad airline food, so retro!"

-Andrea Ahles