Beginning May 2007, South African Airways will operate direct service from Chicago-O’Hare Airport to Johnnanesburg, South Africa four times a week. The flight will make a short stop in Dakar, Senegal. South African Airways features the only nonstop service from the US to South Africa…a flight from Washington, adding to their longstanding direct service from…
Jetblue launched its service from New York’s JFK Airport to Cancun this morning. Cancun is Jetblue’s eighth Caribbean destination. Serving Mexico expands Jetblue’s international destinations, all in the Caribbean or Atlantic area, and its service to sunny vacation spots. Vacation spots like those and the various Floridean destinations it operates can be very lucrative. Certainly…
Reuters reports Delta announced yesterday it will recall an additional 200 furloughed pilots for its international route expansion. This year, Delta recalled roughly 130 pilots, 900 maintenance workers, and 1200 flight attendants. It is also assembling a team to oversee a new hiring process if it has to hire new pilots next year.
Airtran today announced the airline will be offering new nonstop service between its hub at Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport in Atlanta and Phoenix’s Sky Harbor Airport. Effective February 15, they will operate one daily nonstop, increasing to two a week later. On March 6th, a third flight will begin, with its return beginning the following day.…
Earlier this week, we reported on an incident with several Muslim imams…religious leaders…being denied boarding on a US Airways flight from Minneapolis to Phoenix. Passengers, police, and flight crew continue to insist the group raised the security warning flags…that it was a combination of factors that caused them to remove the group. They were praying…
Reuters reports that a German court has rejected a man’s claim for compensation after he was ordered off a plane because others were offended by his smell. The man, a corporate lawyer, was returning with his wife from Hawaii via Los Angeles on a British Airways flight operated by American Airlines last year and missed…
The New York Times reports that Boeing has turned down the request of Southwest to add 2 planes to its recent order of 80. Demand for Boeing aircraft is increasing, especially considering that Airbus has had problems with the A380 and the A350. Scott E. Carson, the new head of Boeing Commercial Aviation, has vowed…
Southwest Airlines raised airfares $10 each on flights of more than 1000 miles, and $3 on fares between 750 and 1000 miles over the Thanksgiving weekend, Reuters reports. The increase was matched by American, United, and Continental. Jetblue said it had not matched the increase. Southwest has been able to keep its fares low due…
In a press release today, Travelocity reported that their airport monitors surveyed a random sample of 1079 travelers at ten of the busiest airports in the United States. 73% of travelers were either satisfied or very satisfied with their experience going through security. Only 9% reported being unsatisfied or very unsatisfied. Only one in ten…
Logan Airport in Boston opened its sixth runway, a 5000 foot runway designated Runway 14/32 to be used for regional jets and other small planes. It is expected to reduce delays by twenty-five percent. Usage of the runway was planned to begin on Thanksgiving Day, but the winds were not favorable that day. The runway…
As if the Los Angeles area does not have enough airports, Los Angeles officials approved a proposal to restart commercial service at Palmdale Regional Airport, hoping to recruit an airline to operate daily jet connections to a hub airport sometime next year. The airport, currently used by the Air Force, lost its last commercial service…
Today in the Sky reports that Spirit Airlines has filed an application with the DOT to serve Caracas, Venezuela from Ft. Lauderdale. It hopes to start selling tickets as soon as possible for an April 1st inauguration of service. Spirit serves multiple destinations in the Caribbean from Ft. Lauderdale, but this would be its first…
bizjournals.com reports that Southwest will be adding a third daily flight from Buffalo Niagara International Airport and Orlando’s Mccoy International Airport, effective March 11. AirTran will also be adding one daily flight between the two cities effective in January. Southwest’s flights to Orlando have been operating nearly full since they were introduced.
The following updates are courtesy of Schneier on Security’s TSA Security Round-Up… An Alaska Airlines employee was apparently arrested on suspicion of being under the influence after a disagreement over a giant ball of rubber bands that he volunteered to surrender. The employee in question was subjected to random drug screenings and a ten year…
Effective March 11 of next year, as they cover in their blog, Southwest will have implemented a large scale schedule change to take maximum advantage of through-ticketing opportunities from Dallas Love Field. The number of one-stop, same plane itineraries between Dallas and cities outside the Wright Amendment perimeter will increase to almost 100 every business…
Mary Jo Manzanares of Fly Away Cafe posted a travel tip we weren’t aware of, and intend to use in the future. 5-1-1, America’s Traveler Information Telephone Number…In July of 2000, the FCC designated 511 as the single traffic telephone number to be made available across the country. While, multiple states have already implemented such…
Earlier today, we commented on a story involving the confiscation of pie on Wednesday at Cleveland Hopkins Airport. Looking for more information on the danger of pies, we happened across this entry from the Consumerist, from the day before. Apparently, in some airports…pies are safe for travel…
As the Cleveland Plain Dealer reports, Cleveland’s Hopkins Airport had a forty percent increase in passenger travel Wednesday as opposed to a normal weekday. As part of this Thanksgiving rush, the TSA confiscated a dozen baked pies, as pie filling is apparently, unknown to these passengers, a banned substance. While we are sure many passengers…
Today, one of the busiest days of the years, Fox News 9 Minneapolis reports that the Northwest baggage handlers at Minneapolis/St. Paul Airport brought their carts together at Gate F7 and sat down on the job, upset about being outsourced. The stoppage lasted about thirty minutes before they returned to work. Slowdowns are expected in…
For those of you traveling tomorrow, Jetblue will be offering an opportunity to join the “Thanksgiving Football Party” with a free beer or cocktail, as well as LiveTV coverage of various football games. We are curious whether they will try this again, perhaps offering a complimentary glass of champagne for their overnight flights New Year’s…
Last month, the Cranky Flier clarified the main reason why people seem to hate airlines. Inconsistency…as he goes on to point, the easiest way to provide consistent service is to keep your rules as simple as possible. We would choose to elaborate on the word simple. Simple in this case is a clear and consistent…
It has been a while since we checked in with the blogging community. Upgrade Travel’s mailbag features yet another reader question…The airline changed my schedule, what are my rights? Airlines waive themselves of liability in the event they change your schedule. That means they don’t consider themselves responsible for secondary fallout from their change…losses caused…
Today, American Airlines announced that it is introducing international check-in capabilities to its self-service machines. Now, the difference between an internationally equipped check-in machine and one only suitable for domestic is the introduction of a passport reader, to allow passengers to scan their machine readable passport and thus supply information that is required prior to…
On October 13th, as USAToday reports, The Gillette family…a couple and their 22-month old, were removed from a flight from Burlington, Vermont to New York. The flight, a Freedom Airlines(ironic name considering the circumstances) flight operated under the banner of Delta, is a relatively short one on a somewhat small aircraft. As they waited to…
A couple were indicted on charges of interfering with the flight crew on a Southwest Airlines flight from Los Angeles to Raleigh-Durham Airport via Phoenix. The full details on their indictment and relevant documents can be found here. According to the FBI report, while on the ground in Phoenix, the couple moved from the back,…