I am sure you have heard on the news about passengers being stuck in planes for hours and hours with little food and water. Is that a fun experience? Heck no.
When I was a teenager I was stuck on the tarmac for over five hours and it was not a pleasant experience. However, after the five hours I got to fly home to my family. My flight was from Seattle, WA to Reno, NV and we had to be diverted to San Jose, CA due to poor weather. With the new rules going into affect in two days, I could have been stuck at an unfamiliar airport, with no family and no real money.
Over the past few years, quite a few airlines have made the news for leaving passengers stuck on the runway for hours; passengers got angry. Some passengers got REALLY angry. They wanted the government to step in and make sure no other passenger had to be stuck on the tarmac for long periods of time again.
To me, being stuck on the plane was not a fun experience, but it is life, it happens. No matter the form of transportation I would have used, the end result would have been the same — delayed due to the weather.
The new rules, starting April 29th, state that an airline will have to allow passengers to disembark if they have been sitting on the tarmac for three hours, unless doing so would jeopardize safety. The new rule sounds like a pretty good deal for passengers in theory, but in reality, I think it will cause a lot more frustration, loss of money and even more angry passengers.
With the new rules, an airline can be charge up to $27,500.00 per passenger that is left on an airplane for more than three hours. That is a lot of money. If an airline sees that a flight might be delayed for three hours, instead of waiting, they might just cancel the flight. This doesn’t mean that the plane will just sit around waiting. That plane needs to be at the next destination. It might have to fly empty to pick up the next set of passengers. If it doesn’t, routes all over will be delayed and even more passengers will be upset and more revenue will be lost.
That leaves the question: Would you rather be stuck on a plane for four hours and reach your destination? Or would you rather be stuck in a city, sleeping in the airport for much longer…possibly days?
What’s worse is New York’s JFK airport is already known for their long delays. Right now their main runway is closed for some improvements. Because of this, some airlines have asked for an exception from the three hour rule, but they were denied. Remind me not to fly out of JFK for the next few weeks!
Again, this is another time where the government should not be interfering with the airlines. Already airlines get a bad rap if they leave passengers in the airplane for hours. The mainstream media loves to bash them.
The airline business is extremely complicated and that is when things go right. Throw in bad weather, aircraft issues, scheduling problems, huge pressure for the lowest prices, and security and you have a business just waiting for things to go wrong.
For me, I would rather be stuck on an airplane going no where for a few hours, than not being able to reach my destination. I can easily survive a few hours without food and water and waiting inside an airplane is a heck of a lot better than trying to take a bus.
The first Boeing 787 Dreamliner for Royal Air Maroc is out on Boeing's Paine Field flight line, in Everett, on Friday April 23, 2010. (Joshua Trujillo, Seattlepi.com)
It is a Boeing 787 blog-day today!
On Friday, the 17th Boeing 787 Dreamliner made it’s way out of the paint hangar. Due to not having my camera and short on time, I wasn’t able to get up to Paine Field myself to take a look, but luckily the Seattle PI did get a photographer out there.
There are also two all-white Boeing 787’s (photo from @ImperfectSense) sitting out on the line for LAN. Some think they might be willing to paint them in a special livery, but will have to wait to find that out.
The Boeing 787 Dreamliner (ZA003) undergoing cold weather testing in McKinley Climatic Laboratory, Florida
If you have been following the path of the Boeing 787, you know that ZA003 recently made a trip down to Valparaiso, Florida for extreme weather testing. Being in Florida you might assume they are testing the Boeing 787 Dreamliner in just hot and humid climates.
However it just recently went through extreme cold testing of minus 45 degrees Fahrenheit (that is about minus 43 Celsius). How do does this happen? Well, you find a big facility that can create it’s own temperature (and snow). Eglin Air Force Base, just outside of Ft. Walton Beach, has a climatic chamber, large enough to house the Boeing 787. In the mid-1990’s, the chamber was opened up to the general public at a cost of $20,000 to $30,000 per day.
Normally Boeing chaces the cold weather around the globe (normally finding it in Fairbanks, Alaska), but having a controlled environment is so much easier. “Here we say minus 45 and they set the knob to minus 45, and work their magic and get minus 45 and it stays there as long as we want it,” Tom Sanderson, one of the flight test directors for the Boeing 787 told Glenn Farley with KING5.
The Boeing 787 will also undergo extreme hot testing of 115 degrees Fahrenheit (about 46 degrees Celsius) in the same facility. ZA003 is the only Dreamliner with a partial interior. The aircraft will be living at the facility for about two weeks to conduct all the testing needed.
I am sure you want to see more than one photo, luckily I have tracked down some additional media for your enjoyment:
Southwest Airlines is known for having special state livery airplanes. Yesterday, they showed off their newest one: Florida One. The plane will be taking a trip around Florida, showing off the new livery. The newest livery is one of 13 other special liveries already in the Southwest fleet: Arizona One, California One, Illinois One, Lone Star One (Texas), Nevada One, New Mexico One, Maryland One, three Shamu aircraft (SeaWorld), Silver One (celebrating Southwest’s 25th anniversary), Triple Crown One (recognizing Southwest’s top rankings for ontime performance, baggage handling, and Customer satisfaction), and Slam Dunk One (tribute to our NBA partnership).
Florida One required 32 people at the Boeing Company working three shifts over the course of eight days to paint. Over 46 gallons of paint and 16 different colors were used.
