Virgin Atlantic Airways Airbus A340 (G-VRED)
I wasn’t going to write on this topic, but seeing all the airline-hate out there, I just can’t help myself. Once again, passengers get stranded on a plane and all hell breaks loose in the media. Calls for stricter regulations and people saying “I told you so,” with the three hour tarmac delay rule being “right,” and wanting to expand it to international flights. Okay, let’s all take a deep breath and look at the big picture here.
Don’t get me wrong. That experience would bite. The London to Newark (EWR) flight is almost eight hours to begin with. When they got close to EWR, a storm caused them to circle over for about an hour, hoping the weather would clear. It didn’t, so they diverted to Bradley International Airport (BDL) in Hartford, CT. Virgin Atlantic doesn’t normally fly into BDL and the airport doesn’t have a 24hr customs staff that can handle a load of 300 passengers at 8:30 at night.
International passengers are not allowed to be unloaded with out being escorted and processed by customs. So passengers were on the A340 for another 2.5hrs before customs staff could get there to assist. This means passengers were on that plane for 11-12hrs before being allowed off. That is hard. Very hard. Especially when you are expecting to be on the plane for eight hours. I can see why people might be angry and upset, but it doesn’t mean we need to change how the whole industry works.
In this instance, Virgin Atlantic had very few options. They wanted to land at EWR (and I am sure so did the passengers), so waiting for the weather to clear was a good call. They couldn’t have let passengers off at BDL since it was against rules that are not set by them. They could have tried another large airport with a full customs staff, but weather was moving in and fuel had to be taken into consideration. I doubt the pilots wanted to be stuck in the cockpit any longer than they needed either (at least passengers get access to Virgin Atlantic’s sweet entertainment system).
There are reports that the Airbus A340 didn’t have air conditioning and passengers were not being fed. I suspect that there was some reason for the A/C not working and people were fed on the flight over. Again, these are not fun experiences, but nothing close to life-ending.
Unfortunately this just gives ammo for people to demand for stricter rules for international flights. The airline business is extremely complicated and things like this will just happen. It is a risk of flying and a risk of being in this business.
I am all about looking at this instance and seeing if there is anything we can learn about it, but jumping to conclusions and adding regulations that won’t help is not the solution. Let’s say the three hour rule was in effect for this flight. Then what? Either the airline would have gotten a whopping fine or the flight would have refueled and fly back to London. I doubt that passengers would have liked that outcome.
This is very rare when an international flight has to divert to a facility that is not prepared to handle them. There are thousands of international flights that happen all over the world each day and most go flawless. Let’s all take that breath an realize how amazing and efficient our air transportation system is the large majority of the time and how nice it is we don’t see this happen more often.
Image: benallsup
Can you see Mount Adams, Mount Rainier and Mount St Helens in this photo taken from an Alaska Airlines flight? Photo by Rita Harvey.
Rita, a friend of mine, recently flew from Seattle to Chicago on Alaska Airlines. Every time one of my friends fly I tell them to get pictures of the flight (I don’t care about the destination). Most roll their eyes and say, “sure David,” and get me nothing (I’m talking to you Colton — who just came back from Hawaii).
One of the first photos she sent was an amazing photo of Mount Rainier from the plane. I thought it was great, but there was no plane. A true aviation nerd photo will have a plane part in it. Oh, she delivered.
I have spoken with a few different people,including my mother, to determine what mountains we are looking at and I am pretty sure it is Mount Adams, Mount Rainier and Mount Saint Helens (arrows showing where the mountains are). After talking to a few people and looking at maps, I am 98.5% sure those are the right mountains. If they aren’t let me know, but does it matter? It is amazing.
The the other great photos Rita took (be sure to look at the one with the moon)
Southwest Airlines Boeing 737-300 (N655WN) sitting at Denver International Airport, waiting to take me to Tampa.
Airline: Southwest Airlines
Trip: Seattle (SEA) to Denver (DEN) to Tampa (TPA)
Planes: Boeing 737-300 (N655WN) and Boeing 737-700 (N747SA)
Seats: 20F & 24A, in the back but both windows
Back on the road again. This time it was to head east to visit my father for Father’s Day. I got tickets on Southwest Airlines leaving on Thursday June 17th. I haven’t flown Southwest in quite sometime and I forgot the importance of checking in as soon as possible.
I am sure most of you know, but Southwest does not do assigned seats. Instead when you check in, up to 24 hours before take off, you are assigned a letter (A,B or C) and a number (1-60). People are boarded by group and number where A1 goes first and C60 pretty much gets the worse seat in the house.
During check in time, I was working on covering the Boeing 787 ZA005’s first flight, so I was rightfully distracted. I could have checked in at 12:35pm, but didn’t get to it until 4:00pm. Dang it, B28. At least I didn’t get the much dreaded C group.
Passengers in Seattle seemed to have a harder time getting the Southwest boarding process than those in Denver or Tampa
Some people LOVE the check-in game, seeing what the best letter/number combination they can get, but if you aren’t into the game and care about where you sit, you can pay a bit more to secure a seat.
You can purchase a Business Select ticket, which gets you a boarding pass in the A1-A15 range, a free drink (is free, really free if you pay more?), additional rewards credit and by-pass security lines at participating airports. If that is too rich for your blood, you can also do Early Bird check-in and pay $10 extra. Southwest will automatically check you in 12hrs before the general population, securing you a better seat. I say a “better seat” not a “guaranteed good seat” because there is no knowing what you might get. Southwest does not limit the number of people that can sign up for Early Bird check-in, so hypothetically if a lot of people pay the extra $10, you could still end up in the B-group (oh the horror). But to most the $10 is worth not having to remember to check in and making sure you don’t end up in the middle seat.
I love those winglet shots. While landing at DEN
My father is in love with Southwest and that is pretty much all he flies. His goal is to still get the lowest number possible. Even though he doesn’t get Business Select, he sure gets the Early Bird special every time. When I told him I didn’t get the Early Bird check in and had B29 I felt he was almost going to disown me (ok, not really).
He admits it doesn’t really make sense, but he just needs the lower number. He feels special having a lower number and is embarrassed to get in the B-group. I don’t think he has ever been in the C-group. I often wonder if he did get in the C-group if he would actually take the flight or just cancel. The $10 is well worth it to him and I assume to others as well.
Through my years of flying on Southwest, the process of getting people in their A, B or C groups has changed quite a bit. Back in the day passengers wouldn’t be given numbers, just A, B or C plastic cards. People would line up hours before the flight. And I mean hours. It was like people camping out for the newest gadget or the hottest movie, just crazy (and I normally love camping in my VW, but not this sort of camping). Now Southwest boarding areas have poles that tell you where you should stand based on your number and TV screens that tell you when those numbers are for A, B or C.
While coming into Tampa we hit some lightening. It was super impressive to see from the air, but hard to get photos.
After experiencing this a few times, I have it down, but the first time I saw this new system, I was quite confused. For some reason passengers in Seattle seemed to have more problems with it than in Tampa. Even at all three airports, there were quite a few people that really had a hard time figuring it out, but we all managed to board the plane in a timely manner.
Some people really have an entitlement of their placement in line and I guess I can understand that. However, I am pretty laid back, but I seem to upset people if I have B15, yet I am standing where B17 should. I am actually letting people go in front of me, but that isn’t ok because I am messing with the system. Almost every Southwest flight there seems to be some passenger whose duty it is to make sure people are lined up perfectly.
It seems a lot of people really love the way Southwest boards the plane. Although it is not a horrible method, I enjoy having my assigned seat. I want to know I have a window seat and I will be sitting next to my travel partner. If I get my ticket late, I know I might be in the center seat and I can prepare for that. If I have a middle seat at the front of the plane, I might check my bag, since I don’t want to risk not having the room. With Southwest, no matter what your boarding assignment might be, there is no guarantee for where I will be sitting and I don’t like that.
Even though I feel I am being jipped in some way, it all worked out. Even though with all four legs I had bad seating numbers (from B15 to B49) I was always able to sit next to my girlfriend and I got a window seat. I spoke with Brad Hawkins, a Southwest communications person, over the phone to see if Southwest was looking at ever going to assigned seats. He told me that they never say never, but when they last asked passengers what they wanted 2:1 wanted to keep the open seating, but quite a few voiced concerns about the boarding process. That is when Southwest started their pole boarding, making it a little more organized.
Boarding in this method, also provides them with additional revenue, which lets them keep prices lower and not charge the fees we see popping up with other airlines. It would also cost Southwest additional money, to set up a seat assignment system, against raising fares. No matter what you opinion is, it looks like open seating will be around for quite some time.
It is not just peanuts anymore. Those tomato wheat thins were amazing.
After going through the line up process, passengers started to back up in the jetway. The captain from the SEA-DEN leg came out and was talking to us. He ended up talking to me about what turbulence we could expect from SEA to DEN and why. It was pretty awesome he was out there. Those sort of things are what make the Southwest employees well known for their customer service and I always wonder why more airlines don’t encourage the pilot/customer interaction that Southwest pilots seem to have (plus I always love the ties they wear).
So, not only do I like to get a window seat, but one where I can easily get those winglet photos. You know those ones right? Photos with the airline’s logo/name on the winglet with other stuff in the background. They are extremely common, but dang it, I like to take them.
Not 100% sure where this was, but this is one of the reasons I make sure I have the window seat.
The gate location of the plane from SEA to DEN was hidden and I wasn’t able to check out what model it was (well duh on a 737, but what hundred?). When I got on the plane, I could easily tell it was an older Boeing 737. The seats looked brand new, it was very clean, but the aged bins, stark white walls and old lights and air vents gave it away. Sure enough it was a classic Boeing 737-300.
On both legs to Tampa, flight attendants told passengers the flight would be completely full and make sure to share. They made multiple statements to the fact that no one will be sitting with an empty seat, so be sure not to try to save it (each announcement was done in a friendly and fun manner). However, both the flights had quite a few empty seats (lucky to get empty middle seat from DEN to TPA, but in VERY last row). Maybe the flight was booked, but not all passengers made it or maybe it is a good motivator for people to share and get seated as soon as possible. Either way, not a big deal, but I have found when other airlines say it will be a 100% full flight, it is.
Unfortunately none of my flights had wireless internet. Southwest is currently installing Row44 on to their entire fleet. If I have internet access, I could care less what seating letter/number I have, but I will have to wait a little bit longer, but it will be happening.
Not that long ago Southwest was known as the “no-frills” airline. Yet now, they seem to be the “frills airline.” When others are charging for checked bags, carry-ons, getting an exit row, etc Southwest is doing what they always have been doing, providing cheap and friendly transportation to destinations around the United States. They have a very loyal following (including my father) and I think they really build a strong and positive relationship with most passengers. I look forward to flying with them again, but I will remember to check in a bit earlier next time or maybe even shell out the extra $10.
Additional photos of the trip.
That's me, playing FlightControl on my iPhone during a recent flight.
What ever happened to being allowed to be bored? Don’t get me wrong, I LOVE technology. I feel I am owed Wi-Fi on my flights and I get upset when I can’t choose the movie I want to watch while flying. I know I am spoiled and the way things are going, I assume in a few years I will be spoiled even more.
But whatever happened to being bored on a flight? I kind of miss it. When I fly I always have some electronic something-or-another to entertain me. Heck, I am typing this blog up while flying at 30,000 feet [even though I am not posting this blog while flying]. I am on Southwest and there is no in-flight entertainment or wi-fi. I was playing games on my iPhone and computer and every time I stopped I got bored and went back to my electronic distractions.
It just seems we are moving to a society where we can never ever be bored and being bored is the worst possible thing you could ever be. With computers, phones, the internet, bored-stoppers are never too far.
Yet, are we missing something by not being bored? I have come up with some pretty amazing ideas while flying and being bored. How many amazing ideas and thoughts are being missed everyday by the flying public because they distract their brains the entire flight?
Just gazing out the window, staring at the ground below, letting my mind wander for a few hours is a great experience. Not only do you get to be bored, but you get to see the world from up-high. Well, I am going to bring bored back! I am going to shut down this laptop, stare out the window and be bored for the remainder of my flight. Wish me luck.
