I am a big fan of Spirit Airlines. They offer some of the lowest fares and push to promote their a-la-carte-style pricing. Although it seems that many customers see them as the enemy and “extorting” people out of their money, I see them as a viable, cheap option to get from point A to point B. Are they going to be like riding in business class on a Qatar A380? No… not even close. But that is not what they are about, nor should that be the expectation flying them.
Last week, I posted a letter from a reader complaining about his experience with Spirit and my hope was that people would see him as ridiculous and defend the airline. Many did, but some I saw (via the story and social media) agreed with the passenger. That surprised me.
I reached out to Paul Berry, who is Spirit’s director of communications, advertising, and brand to see what he thought. Although I was just looking for a few lines, I was very impressed with how seriously he took this complaint; he gave a very thorough reply. Below, you can see how he breaks down each topic and gives a detailed description on how Spirit operates.
The vintage 1952 Grumman Albatross – Photo: Jason Rabinowitz
“Do you have time this week for a flight in a 1952…”
’œYes.’
’œWhat time do you have ava’¦’¦’
’œI’ll make time available. Just grab me a seat!’
That’s pretty much the conversation I had prior to the 2015 APEX Expo, where Global Eagle subsidiary Row 44 had its Grumman Albatross on hand to give demo flights throughout the week. Naturally, when offered the chance to hop on board for one of the flights, I made it my business to be available.
The classic controls – Photo: Jason Rabinowitz
Global Eagle is the in-flight internet provider to a few major airlines in the United States, including Southwest Airlines. While its satellite equipment is installed on hundreds of commercial aircraft, an aircraft it can call its own is necessary to constantly test the service and upcoming products. While our friends at Gogo now have a 737 to call their own, Global Eagle kind of went the other way on this one. Its test aircraft is this wonderful old Albatross. What better way to test the future of in-flight connectivity than with a half century old twin’“radial engine amphibious flying boat?
An American Eagle CRJ200 taxiing at LAX, with an Embraer 175 following – Photo: John Nguyen | AirlineReporter
Let’s face it… the 50-seat Bombardier CRJ200 isn’t very popular. At all. You’ll find countless articles and blogs about how much flyers dread flying in it, and how all-around terrible the experience was. Complaints were numerous: claustrophobic cabin, tiny overhead bins that fit only the smallest of carry-on bags, no first class, inoperable lavatories, and so on. This wasn’t limited to just one airline either; CR2s are found in the regional fleets for most of the major U.S. airlines. Coincidentally, many of them are operated under contract by the same regional carrier, SkyWest Airlines.
Does the CR2 deserve its bum rap? Maybe, maybe not (but probably). For some passengers, however, there is hope just over the horizon…
The Bare Fare model – Photo: Spirit Airlines
A few times per week, I get emails from upset passengers. The vast majority of these emails come across as entitled people who’ve had a bad experience, but think the world owes them — big. Many times I am cc’d with dozens of other media outlets, in hopes that one of us will create a story: “BREAKING NEWS: Passenger’s Flight Delayed 30 Minutes Due to Weather.” As-if. Sadly, I do get emails like that.
Rarely I will get an email describing a true bad experience, where the airline messed up. In those cases I will take the time to either explain things to them or point them in a good direction to get assistance. Heck, I was getting so many poorly written emails that I even posted a story on how to write a good airline complaint letter.
Often, the emails are just plain entertaining and I want to share. Not only to give an insight of what airlines get on a daily basis, but also to really give these people what they want — publicity of their “horrid” treatment. Maybe even a reality check.
Every time I think about posting one of these emails, I chicken out. Yes, I am calling them out and making fun of them, and that is not very nice is it? Well… I am going to give this a try… and really, with this example, they clearly want to, “inform the masses about [Spirit’s] despicable treatment of its paying customers.” Alright Angry Passenger X (that’s obviously not their real name)… let me give you what you think you want. After, be sure to check out Spirit’s reply.
An Alaska Airlines Boeing 737-900ER landing at LAX – Photo: Carlos Ever | Flickr CC
On Monday, an Alaska Airlines flight from Newark bound for Seattle had to divert to Buffalo for an emergency landing because of smoke reported in the passenger cabin.
According to a statement from the airline, a malfunctioning credit card reader on board Flight 17, operated by a Boeing 737-900ER, started producing the smoke. A flight attendant took it to the back galley, placed the the device into a trash bin to contain it, and used a fire extinguisher to suppress any possible fire, while the flight crew declared an emergency and prepared to divert. There were no flames from the device, and the plane landed without incident at 8:15am EDT with 181 passengers and six crew members on board.
No injuries or fire damage to the aircraft were reported, though fire and emergency vehicles met the aircraft on the runway as a precaution, due to landing overweight from to a full cabin and fuel tanks for the transcontinental flight. A passenger on board the flight posted details of the diversion as it was happening on Flyertalk, an online forum for the frequent flyer community. User “autumnmist” reported that the “[f]light attendants and pilot handled it well,” and also lamented, “[s]o much for getting a solid nap in before landing in Seattle!”
We reached out to autumnmist, who asked to be identified as “J,” for more information. J, seated in Row 13, stated that the passengers were calm, mostly dozing because of the early hour and some not realizing that anything had happened until the descent started. The cabin crew announced that all passengers should be seated and prepared for landing. The captain came onto the PA system to announce that there was a small incident and that they would be landing at Buffalo out of an abundance of caution, touching down in about 17-18 minutes.
