People lets make Jetblue go away

[sgeeeee]

I'm with you, newguy.

I avoid flying today as much as I possibly can. Being retired allows me to drive to and from almost any North American destination and avoid flying. Ususally I would prefer driving one or two days one-way to going through the airport/airline annoyance.

Airlines lie to passengers daily. I learned a lot about standard airline lies when I worked in the avionics industry. Many of our customers were the airlines and airline manufacturers who were very saavy of how things really worked.

If you've been told that a plane is delayed for maintenance, that is probably a lie. A plane has many redundant systems and only a few of them are required for flight. At any given time, several non-required, redundant systems are probably out of spec. The airline can pull almost any plane at any time and claim it is for maintenance. That's probably not the real reason they chose to delay your flight. They have something to gain from inconveniencing you.

If you've been told that air traffic is holding the plane you are waiting on from another airport, it is probably a lie. Once weather has delayed schedules, air traffic establishes a new schedule and each airline is given a certain number of take-off/landing slots. But the airline is choosing which flights will fill those slots. They don't go in order of the original schedule. They decide which passengers have limited other options and they make them pay with their time.

Once they start, airlines tend to lie in intervals of approximatley 20 minutes. Most passengers will wait out a 20 minute delay, but if you tell them it will really be an hour or two they are more likely to transfer to another airline's flight. On a number of occasions I have waited for a plane to arrive from a city that is ~ a 1 hour flight away while the airline lied about expected arrival time in 20 minute intervals for more than 2 hours.

The new homeland security laws are a boon to airlines lies. They can tell any ludicrous story they want. If a passenger questions the information, the airline can refuse service and possibly have the passenger arrested. It keeps the sheeple under control.

 

[samclem]

Bwahh-haa-ha! The evil airline conspirators have been found out, but it is too late to foil their plot!!

If you've been told that a plane is delayed for maintenance, that is probably a lie. A plane has many redundant systems and only a few of them are required for flight. At any given time, several non-required, redundant systems are probably out of spec.

It is absoltely true that planes fly all the time with known mainteneance problems (known as "delayed discrepances" in the biz). But, some systems are critical. Does anyone really think it is a good idea to take off with one engine misbehaving even though the plane could fly without it?

If you've been told that air traffic is holding the plane you are waiting on from another airport, it is probably a lie. Once weather has delayed schedules, air traffic establishes a new schedule and each airline is given a certain number of take-off/landing slots. But the airline is choosing which flights will fill those slots. They don't go in order of the original schedule. They decide which passengers have limited other options and they make them pay with their time.

So, the airlines, who have trouble even getting an airplane and a crew together at the same gate to make their regular scheduled run, somehow do an anaysis of the routings off all passengers on all delayed flights and use this information to decide which flights they should book when? Wow. In any case, when there are fewer slots than originally scheduled, somebody is going to be delayed. Telling this to the affected passengers is not a lie.
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[ladelfina]

I am REALLY stuck.. since the only major travel I undertake is from Europe to the US. I was quite interested in the QEII thread, and spent a bit of time investigating that option. Aside from the QEII and the Queen Mary there are very limited options. Most all transatlantic cruises (including many of the QEII and QM routes) would involve flying as well. This despite that the fact that there are a couple of major ports not only w/in an hour or two's drive of where I am (Genova, Livorno, Civitavecchia).. but also a couple of major ones w/in a couple of hours' drive of where I want to arrive (NYC/NJ, Boston). The dots just don't seem to connect very well.

The choices are either the high-level cruise where you "dress" (i.e. formalwear) for dinner.. or.. the freighters CFB mentioned elsewhere. Nothing in-between.

One interesting statistic I saw in passing was the amount of fuel necessary per passenger to travel X miles. Ships beat planes hands down.

My time is my own, so I wouldn't mind a 6-day journey each way. It's just that the options are so limited time-wise. Even if money were no object, and accounting for a week there, a week's stay, and a week back.. those crossings are only available logistically when certain stars are in alignment. You might also be able to wangle a week there, a 3 weeks' stay, and a week back.. but that's an even rarer combo. Most people doing "the crossings" do it One Way only and then fly back. Plus, there doesn't seem to be a discount for RTs. The whole thing is not really set up as a commercial proposition for getting from point A to point B, but as a "cruise experience". I wish that would change.

 

[saluki9]

If you've been told that air traffic is holding the plane you are waiting on from another airport, it is probably a lie. Once weather has delayed schedules, air traffic establishes a new schedule and each airline is given a certain number of take-off/landing slots. But the airline is choosing which flights will fill those slots. They don't go in order of the original schedule. They decide which passengers have limited other options and they make them pay with their time.

Really? I don't know if you're a pilot or not, but try listening to O'hare arrival or departure sometime. There are only so many runways, and many more planes. Around here congestion is a major cause of delays.

 

[ladelfina]

If they ditched the ridiculous "hub" notion as a be-all and end-all.. they could save fuel and eliminate, what? 30-40% of take-offs and landings, freeing up all those gates.

They're sacrificing a certain level of efficiency to attract the business traveler, who apparently needs the idea of "N flights daily" (no matter whether they actually GET there or not, or if you could drive quicker) or a flight each day of the week. God forbid someone wanting to plan a meeting might have to wait 'til the next day.. better to sell them the Boston/Atlanta/Chicago/Phoenix route, apparently.

 

[sgeeeee]

. . .It is absoltely true that planes fly all the time with known mainteneance problems (known as "delayed discrepances" in the biz). But, some systems are critical. Does anyone really think it is a good idea to take off with one engine misbehaving even though the plane could fly without it?

No one said it was a good idea to take off with one engine misbehaving. The point is that the airline often does not want to fly because it would save them money to delay and combine with another flight. They do this by claiming they need to do non-required maintenance. But in reality, if the flights had been full, they would not have chosen to do that maintenance at that time. The lie is the underlying reason for not honoring their original agreement with the passenger.

So, the airlines, who have trouble even getting an airplane and a crew together at the same gate to make their regular scheduled run, somehow do an anaysis of the routings off all passengers on all delayed flights and use this information to decide which flights they should book when? Wow. In any case, when there are fewer slots than originally scheduled, somebody is going to be delayed. Telling this to the affected passengers is not a lie.

Again, the lie is that air traffic is holding your plane. The airline could choose to release your plane first. They could choose to release planes in the original scheduled order. Instead, they choose to release flights in order of how they keep the most paying passengers. If you are on a flight between major hubs with lots of competition, you can come out ahead in this game. If you are flying to a less popular city with few other flights offered by other airlines, you may wait a long time.

In both of these situations, the major problem is that you, as a passenger, cannot make the most informed decision because the airline is intentionally misleading you. If you had more information, you might still choose to wait. Even if you choose that option, it would be nice if they were honest about the real timing rather than pretend things are about to get better 20 minutes from now -- followed by another 20 minute delay, etc. As a passenger you purchased a ticket for specific travel at a specific time. In most service industries, the ticket provider has obligations when the service is not delivered as specified. Clearly, weather and real mechanical problems can result in the service you purchased not being delivered. But whether you want to believe it or not, the airlines often do choose not to deliver service simply for their convenience and by using these lies, avoid consequences.

I'm not sure why anyone would defend these airline tactics. Why should airlines be allowed to manipulate their customers without consequences in this way?