A Cathay Pacific Boeing 777-300ER preparing for a Test flight at Boeing’s Everett Factory. Image: Mal Muir.
If you need to travel between New York and the Canadian west coast, there are just a few choices. Your main options are Air Canada or WestJet, which both operate direct flights between New York and Vancouver. Another option is flying a US-based airline (like United or American) via one of their hub cities. But what if you have a nice chunk of points to burn and want to get the best bang for your buck? Sure, you could redeem for Air Canada business, but that would just be like flying any other US airline in the front cabin. What if you could get a truly unique experience for the same amount of points as any other redemption? Well you can, with an unexpected airline.
Cathay Pacific Airlines (CX), based in Hong Kong, operates four daily flights between New York’s JFK Airport and Hong Kong’s Chek Lap Kok Airport. However, one of those flights has a layover in Vancouver. The last flight of the day (CX889) makes a stop along the way and Cathay Pacific has “Fifth Freedom” rights between New York and Vancouver.
What is a Fifth Freedom flight? It’s where an airline is allowed to sell tickets on a flight between two foreign countries as part of a service connecting their own country. Confusing, right? In layman’s terms it means that if, for instance, the airline needs to make a fuel stop mid-route or something similar, then it can sell a ticket from that stopping point to the end destination.
Cathay Pacific’s flight from New York to Vancouver is unique in that those in premium cabins get all the standard international service items, despite the fact that it’s only a five-hour flight. So even though I was flying a transcontinental flight JFK-YVR, I still got the multiple-course meal, amenity kit, and even pajamas. All the standard items you would get as though you were flying Cathay Pacific for a 14-hour flight.
Air travel is expensive, that is a well known fact of life. While the cost has indeed dropped dramatically over time, flying is still fairly expensive once you add up the taxes, miscellaneous fees, and everything else that goes along with flying. Last week, however, JetBlue offered a deal that was simply too good to pass up. 90% off any flight out of New York City? Sign me up!
After three frustrating days of trying to book a trip to literally anywhere JetBlue flies, I was finally able to book a round trip flight to West Palm Beach, FL for a whopping $66.99, $24.95 of which was taxes. That fare, booked the day before travel, was already incredible. At over $400 off the normal price, I was extremely happy. What came next, however, brought the fare down to less than the cost of a Big Mac.
Delta Sky Club at JFK.
When Delta opened their new T4 at New York’s JFK Airport on the 24th of May they also opened their new flagship Sky Club. The newest and largest Sky Club in the Delta network is a revolution to both AvGeeks and the traveling public.
Located just past gate B30 in Terminal 4, this 24,000 square foot facility is the new home to those with Sky Club access. Delta has created a number of new technologies based on traveler’s wishes and turned this into one amazing lounge. The entrance to the club has the same nondescript doorway that you might find at other lounges what is found inside is quite unique.
Staff are celebrating the opening of the new Delta T4 at New York JFK Airport – Photo: Mal Muir | AirlineReporter.com
With the closure of the famous Pan Am Worldport (T3) at New York’s John F. Kennedy International Airport (JFK), Delta decided to move their facilities to Terminal 4 (T4) and I was invited to join in on the grand opening. Even at 4am on the 24th of May (the day the new terminal opened), construction workers were still putting on the finishing touches. Since Delta is the primary tenant at T4, they started the day with a very large celebration.
The new T4 refurbishment and extension brings state of the art technology together with new services, shopping and dining facilities to provide an amazing new guest experience.
BONUS: Delta Previews JFK T4 With T4X In Lower Manhattan
“Thanks to Delta’s $1.4 billion investment, travelers to and from JFK will experience a state-of-the-art facility with improved amenities and better services,” said New York Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg. “Over the past six years, Delta has doubled the number of employees based at JFK and created quality construction jobs, with a focus on local hiring. We look forward to their continued expansion and partnership with New York City.”
A Korean Air Airbus A380 visits me at home
For nearly my entire life, I have lived in the shadow of one of the busiest airports in the country. Draw a straight line from my house and you end up on JFKs runway 22L in almost 2 miles. Arrivals glide across the sky mere seconds from landing, while departures roar directly overhead. When people ask me “why are you so into aviation?” my answer should be “the real question is what took me so long?”
JFK and airplanes are a daily fact of life in this area. Most people are so used to A380s at 500 feet over their backyard, they don’t even look up. For many years of my life, I was one of these people. DC8s, 727s, 707s, Concorde, all the classics you might now find in a museum were all right over my head, but I just never looked up.
