Dang, I wish all airline lavatories looked this good. This is on Emirates A380
A 43 year-old man had a bathroom emergency on a Delta Airlines flight on March 28th that landed him in jail. The passenger, Joao Correa, had a meal earlier that day that didn’t agree with him and by the time he was ready to take action, the food services cart was blocking his way to the back lavatory. He decided to try the facilities up front in Business Class when a flight attendant reminded him he had an economy ticket and needed to return to his seat. When he explained the situation, he was advised to wait a bit and the cart would be moved.
The cart wasn’t moved and Correa was in trouble, so he returned to the front of the plane to plead his case. Correa says he then grabbed the woman’s arm to stabilize himself, though she contends he was twisting her arm. Either way, the flight attendant told the pilot of the situation since Correa wouldn’t return to his seat, and the pilot allowed the troubled man to use the First Class restroom.
The incident landed Correa in jail for 2 days. He currently doesn’t face any charges, and admits he could have handled the situation a bit better.
I know the rules governing the airline class system are there for a reason, however I think in occasions like this, the rules can be twisted. I wonder how this scenario would play out in a one bathroom system that Ryanair is proposing?
Source: AJC Image: TelstarLogistics
United Airlines Boeing 757
United Airlines has been holding off for quite awhile from buying any new planes. They had talked about reducing their fleet, however, now they plan to order up to 150 aircraft by this fall.
As they have been waiting for a good time to buy, their fleet of almost 400 aircraft have aged. Now they are looking to replace their wide-bodied jets and Boeing 757’s with new aircraft. They are also hoping to get rid of their almost 30-strong fleet of Boeing 737’s.
It’s a large order, which gives them tremendous buying power. United Airlines states they are in talks with Boeing and Airbus and only want to purchase planes from one of the two manufacturers. This could be a huge payoff to the winning bidder and will probably create a lot of interesting deals for United to consider. With airlines cancelling orders for aircraft already being built, this could be a better than average boom for either Airbus or Boeing.
Source: KOMO Image: code20photog
Ryanair Boeing 737-800 in March 2005 showing off the airline's first winglets
Normally one has to take whatever Ryanair CEO Michael O’Leary says with a grain of salt. He says a lot of crazy things, most likely to get a few news stories written about him. When he first started talking about charging passengers to use the bathroom, I thought it was another crazy publicity stunt, but…
Ryanair plans to add credit card readers to the bathrooms in their Boeing 737-800 jets and even remove two of the three bathrooms to provide more seats. O’Leary is quoted as saying, “We are flying aircraft on an average flight time of one hour around Europe.” Is it crazy for this to start making a little sense to me now? I mean, some people ride buses and trains without bathrooms for longer than an hour on a daily basis.
The airline plans to charge about $1.50 for each bathroom usage and no word on emergency situations for people without credit cards. They plan to have the new system in place within 2 years.
Source: NYT Image: jordi757
Aviacsa Boeing 737-200 at McCarran Int'l Airport in Las Vegas
Due to reports of irregularities of Aviacsa’s airline maintenance, Mexico has demanded no more of their planes fly and have 60 days to fix any issues. The airline has a fleet of 26 planes, serving 17 cities, including Las Vegas.
The airline is defending themselves saying the problems were only “cosmetic — opaque logos, dull lights and scratches on the wings.”
The Transportation and Communications Department however stated that the issues found “put passengers at risk,” and it would be odd for a government to shut down an airline due to faded logos. The fact that 21 of their planes are Boeing 737-200’s and the others are Boeing 737-300 (as of Sept 2008), they are not new planes and could likely have other issues.
Source: AP Image: gTarded
Mark's Website
That’s right! 24/7, comedian Mark Malkoff will be hanging out on an AirTran plane, travelling to about 12 cities per day, sleeping, eating — even washing himself on an airliner for thirty straight days. The beauty? He has a fear of flying.
Not only does he want to conquer his fear of flying, but he is also trying to break the Guinness record for continuous flight. And since AirTran has WiFi, Mark is able to relate his journey through his website and on his Twitter account.
His great adventure started this Monday and will go to the end of the month. I wonder if he is able to earn frequent flier miles through Airtran — I will try and ask him — stay tuned.
Update: Mark’s response: “I hope so!”
Update2: He has earned so many miles he got a big Elite airmiles card.