Thread on Airline & Travel experiences

[Coffee Warlord]

I'll go back maybe about 1/4 of the way, if that. Just a little bit to ease the tension on my back. I never full recline. You're just too damn cramped in cattle class.

[Lathum]

Originally Posted by Edward64

The woman was not wrong in reclining. IMO the seats are too upright to sleep. I am often wasted by the time I get on a flight and catch a nap. Not sure if its my imagination but the smaller 50+ seat jets have an "angle" that is more comfortable.

You're a monster

[Lathum]

99% of the time we do extra leg room or first class thanks to my wife having status, so it's not much of an issue. That being said I usually don't recline out of courtesy, despite being 6-2 and needing the extra space. If the person in front of me reclines it is their right to be a dick, but I will do all I can to bang into their seat every chance I get, including grab the back of it when I get up, which I hate people doing. If my kids are with me and the person in front of them reclines I make zero effort to stop them from kicking the seat. Fuck those assholes.

[Warhammer]

What kills me with flying anymore, it is almost impossible for me to get my carry on in the seat in front of me without burying my face in the lap of the person next to me.

[miami_fan]

I don't do anything intentional if someone reclines back. But at 6'3 with bad knees, I have no choice but pull the back of the seat in front of me if I have to get up or push the back of the chair in front if it is too close to me. It is not a big deal for flights 3 hours or less though I always am searching for an exit no matter what. Anything more than that, I either pay for an upgrade or try to fly during an off hour that will allow me to fly on a non capacity flight.

The guy from the article was an immature asshole and he knew he was being an immature asshole. I believe he selected his victim appropriately. With another person on the wrong day, there would have been an emergency landing for that flight.

[Edward64]

Originally Posted by miami_fan

The guy from the article was an immature asshole and he knew he was being an immature asshole. I believe he selected his victim appropriately. With another person on the wrong day, there would have been an emergency landing for that flight.

The uproar should be he picked on a woman and it was bullying. Let's see him do that with a guy of similar size to him.

I hope social media comes up with his name and blast him.

[Edward64]

Originally Posted by Lathum

You're a monster

Curious, are you able to sleep with an upright seat? I honestly cannot, my head flops everywhere.

I've got a pic somewhere that I took, a selfie of me and a guy nodding off that was resting his head on my shoulder, jerking awake, rinse-and-repeat. I was wishing he would just recline. It was an international flight and messaged it to the family.

[Lathum]

Originally Posted by Edward64

Curious, are you able to sleep with an upright seat?

I can sleep anywhere. I do have a little more patience for recliners on red eye flights.

You also need to not take everything so literally.

[Edward64]

Originally Posted by Lathum

I can sleep anywhere. I do have a little more patience for recliners on red eye flights.

You also need to not take everything so literally.

Nah, I didn't take it personally, I was just wondering.

[molson]

Originally Posted by Edward64

Curious, are you able to sleep with an upright seat? I honestly cannot, my head flops everywhere.

I try to get a window seat and I can sleep using a big bunched up sweatshirt or a coat as a pillow and lean against the window.

I don't sleep as well just putting my head back, but, the incline doesn't make a difference. In fact I'd probably sleep worse with the incline because my mind would just be making me feel guilty.

[Coffee Warlord]

I'm jealous of anyone who can sleep on a plane. I can't even sleep in domestic first class. (Never had the chance to do one of those fancy schmancy lie-flat seats).

[Lathum]

Originally Posted by Coffee Warlord

I'm jealous of anyone who can sleep on a plane. I can't even sleep in domestic first class. (Never had the chance to do one of those fancy schmancy lie-flat seats).

We flew first class to Portugal last year on my wife’s companies dime and had one of those. It was amazing. We basically had our own pod. I didn’t even want to sleep because I wanted to enjoy the experience.

[tarcone]

I was upgraded to 1st class for like 10 minutes once. I sat down got a drink and was loving life.

Then the air waitress kicked me to coach. It was a walk of shame. And I tried to cry to my neighbor next to me and he didnt speak English. It was humiliating.

[thesloppy]

[PilotMan]

Handled a medical emergency yesterday inbound to Newark, AMA.



1. Yes he was feeling better on landing.
2. Was potentially life threatening.
3. Pretty sure they were taking him to the hospital.

[Lathum]

Were there any medical professionals on board?

Were you scheduled to land in Newark?

Why didn't you call me if you were gonna be in Jersey?

[PilotMan]

[quote=Lathum;3266176]

Were there any medical professionals on board?

Yes, we had a Physicians Assistant on board who assisted.

Were you scheduled to land in Newark?

Yes, the flight was inbound from Barcelona, and everything happened about an hour out of landing.

Why didn't you call me if you were gonna be in Jersey?

I am always in and out. I actually few in with the wife on Friday for a Saturday morning taking her to NYC for the first time in her life, before our trip to Barcelona.

[Edward64]

I am amazed the AA man seat puncher has still not yet been identified. I would have thought someone would have recognized him by now.

I want that jerk bully publicly humiliated and give an apology.

[Neon_Chaos]

Originally Posted by Lathum

We flew first class to Portugal last year on my wife’s companies dime and had one of those. It was amazing. We basically had our own pod. I didn’t even want to sleep because I wanted to enjoy the experience.

I once flew on Etihad Business Class from Manila to NY on two legs (and the way back) of a long-ass trip. (Manila -> Abu Dhabi -> New York). It was heaven.

[PilotMan]

To give some perspective on how badly our industry has been hit.


I'm bidding for May right now. Typically, I am around 80% of the way down the list just for first officers and on the 777, based in EWR, only. That makes me a low level "line holder" meaning that I have an awarded schedule of flying with set departure and end times. Guys below me, roughly 15% of the group are on reserve. Meaning they have available days where they are on call.



For March and April I am on reserve. Typically, there are about 430 pilots in my group, and I'd have about 100 guys below me, and about 365 of them would have regular flying lines.



For June, there is only enough flying for seven people to have regular schedules. Seven out of 430. This is the same thing across the whole industry. The original money for the airlines will not be enough, even if they furlough 80% of the operation after October 1, they are going to need more unless we see some sort of rebound over the summer.

[Edward64]

I've not personally experienced anything too weird. I've seen real service dogs on flights, smaller dogs in portable crates under the seat, and a great dane once (in the terminal, not plane) but nothing non-dog.

However, I've read other stories about a pigs etc. and can see how airlines were being taken advantage of. So am glad for this ruling.

With that said, I have also read about how animals die in the cargo hold. So hopefully airlines can guarantee safety of animals there.

https://www.cnn.com/travel/article/e...rnd/index.html

Airlines don't have to treat emotional support animals as service animals, a new rule says.

The US Department of Transportation rule announced Wednesday states that "carriers are not required to recognize emotional support animals as service animals and may treat them as pets."

Air carriers are also permitted to limit service animals to dogs.

The final rule on Traveling by Air with Service Animals defines a service animal as "a dog, regardless of breed or type, that is individually trained to do work or perform tasks for the benefit of a qualified individual with a disability, including a physical, sensory, psychiatric, intellectual, or other mental disability."

Emotional support animals are prescribed by mental health professionals to provide their owners with comfort and support, but unlike service animals, they are not required to have training in specific tasks.

Airlines have asked DOT to regulate this issue in part over their concern that passengers were fraudulently passing off their pets as the more loosely defined and fee-free category of emotional support animals.

[Edward64]

Originally Posted by Edward64

I am amazed the AA man seat puncher has still not yet been identified. I would have thought someone would have recognized him by now.

I want that jerk bully publicly humiliated and give an apology.

FWIW, I did not find any recent articles on the seat puncher. Best I can tell he is still unidentified.

[Edward64]

Okay, this would scare the crap out of me. Check out the video of the damaged engine in flight.

United Airlines flight makes emergency landing after dropping debris | Daily Mail Online

A United Airlines flight bound for Hawaii was forced to make an emergency landing shortly after taking off from Denver after suffering major damage to one of its engines 15,000ft above ground and dropping huge pieces of debris over a neighborhood in Colorado as dramatic audio from the mayday call reveals the pilot asking air traffic control to immediately turn the aircraft around.

https://videos.dailymail.co.uk/previ...7014937220.mp4

[whomario]

Originally Posted by Edward64

Okay, this would scare the crap out of me. Check out the video of the damaged engine in flight.

United Airlines flight makes emergency landing after dropping debris | Daily Mail Online

https://videos.dailymail.co.uk/previ...7014937220.mp4

Sth similar happened the same day near Maastricht in the Netherlands with a cargo plane:

Dutch probe shedding of 747 freighter engine parts over Maastricht | News | Flight Global

[Lathum]

DASHCAM VIDEO: Zach Allen shared this video with CBS4 showing the moments before a part of a plane exploded over Broomfield sending debris onto neighborhoods.
STORY: https://t.co/oB98PDdmsy pic.twitter.com/yep5TTNMzS

— CBSDenver (@CBSDenver) February 20, 2021

upper left corner around the 20 second mark

[Edward64]

Originally Posted by Lathum

upper left corner around the 20 second mark

I'll be fascinated by the stories from the pilots/crew and passengers. I can only imagine folks seeing the engine flaming like that and wondering when it'll fall off completely.

I'd guess the pilots would have shut down that engine and it would have stopped burning like the video? So the 777 made it back on one engine which is part of the design. So kudos to Boeing and the pilots & training.

[Edward64]

Early findings say it was probably metal fatigue (one of the rotors in the engine broke off). I'm guessing this mean maintenance didn't check/inspect well enough or did not follow proper procedures.

[JediKooter]

Originally Posted by Edward64

Early findings say it was probably metal fatigue (one of the rotors in the engine broke off). I'm guessing this mean maintenance didn't check/inspect well enough or did not follow proper procedures.

It will be that or the usual, "We don't do a routine check on that because it cuts too much into our profits, but, now that it has become an issue, we are mandated to check it" or it's an optional thing that they chose not to do (see text in quotes), which time and time again, has come back and bit an airline in the butt.

[PilotMan]

Or... you know.. shit breaks sometimes. But I'm glad that this one incident has made everyone feel better about disparaging the industry.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-b...-idUSKBN2AP0B7

The Boeing Co 777 plane had flown nearly 3,000 cycles, equivalent to one take-off and landing, which compares to the checks every 6,500 cycles mandated after a separate United engine incident in 2018, said the sources.

[Ksyrup]

I look forward to seeing this covered in 5-10 years on Air Disasters. I love that show.

One thing I've come to appreciate is that as I grew up, plane crashes were pretty routine but not so much now. That's borne out from watching the stories on Air Disasters. It's amazing how many crashes occurred just in the US during the 70s-90s. The great thing about the show is that it explains the investigatory path they took to find the root cause and the improvements the industry made to ensure those types of things never happened again. It's amazing how few commercial plane crashes we have seen in the past 2 decades compared to 30-40 years ago.

[Ryche]

2009 was the last commercial plane crash in the US with more than 10 casualties, 2001 the last with more than 50. That's almost crazy with how many flights there are.

[Ksyrup]

Funny/sad you use the 50 cutoff, because the one in Lexington in 2006 that happened about 8 miles from my house killed 49 people. Only the co-pilot survived.

[PilotMan]

I was just there yesterday to get home. I'll never forget that one. It was my company. I knew the FA. He was a North Dakota boy too.

[sterlingice]

Not exactly about airline travel but I didn't see a good rental car thread

https://www.cnn.com/2021/03/25/busin...ike/index.html

Yeah, rental cars are insanely expensive because rental car companies sold more than 1/3rd of their inventory last year to stay afloat.

What they don't mention in the article, of course, is that there are basically only 3 major rental car companies left even though it looks like airports have counters for like 10+ companies: Enterprise (National and Alamo), Hertz (Thrifty, Dollar), and Avis (Budget, Payless). It's basically one big oligopoly and the pandemic was a perfect time to squeeze the industry and they all did the same thing.

SI

[Edward64]

Originally Posted by sterlingice

Not exactly about airline travel but I didn't see a good rental car thread

https://www.cnn.com/2021/03/25/busin...ike/index.html

Yeah, rental cars are insanely expensive because rental car companies sold more than 1/3rd of their inventory last year to stay afloat.

What they don't mention in the article, of course, is that there are basically only 3 major rental car companies left even though it looks like airports have counters for like 10+ companies: Enterprise (National and Alamo), Hertz (Thrifty, Dollar), and Avis (Budget, Payless). It's basically one big oligopoly and the pandemic was a perfect time to squeeze the industry and they all did the same thing.

SI

Haven't checked company's portal to Hertz/Avis to see if the prices are jacked up like that.

But I haven't used car rentals even the year before covid, pretty much just Uber'ing.

[miami_fan]

So has anyone been a passenger on a plane recently? I have to head to the DMV next week.

[Edward64]

Originally Posted by miami_fan

So has anyone been a passenger on a plane recently? I have to head to the DMV next week.

Supposedly pretty safe on a plane with a mask and all the ventilation. It's the airport that will kill you. Watch who you bump elbows with or how you open doors.

[PilotMan]

Originally Posted by miami_fan

So has anyone been a passenger on a plane recently? I have to head to the DMV next week.

Like 10 times in the past 3 weeks (as a passenger) and it feels like I practically live at the airport. O'Hare was so busy this last Sunday. It felt like a madhouse.

[Edward64]

Looks like some passengers helped restrain the guy and the video shows he was restrained/hog tied.

My guess is probably someone that was drunk, on drugs, or had a real bad anxiety attack. If drunk or on drugs, hope they toss the book at him.

Delta Flight From LAX Diverted After Flight Crew, Passengers Take Down Man Allegedly Attempting To Break Into Cockpit – CBS Los Angeles

The Federal Bureau of Investigation Friday was investigating after a man reportedly attempted to break into the cockpit on a flight from Los Angeles International Airport.

According to authorities, Delta Flight 386 was on its way to Nashville. Video from the flight shows flight attendants and passengers wrestling with the man, tackling him and restraining him.

[Edward64]

What an ass. Lots of pics and a couple vids of this moron.

Wonder if he has a job (still).

Drunk Frontier passenger 'screamed his parents are worth $2million' before crew taped him to chair | Daily Mail Online

Berry later retweeted footage of the incident, writing: 'This will forever be the most dehumanizing experience in my entire life.

'Many people laughed and ridiculed me as I was mistreated by staff of a PROFESSIONAL airline.

'Just to make matters worth this has gone “viral” on the internet and will never disappear. My life will never be'

He followed the message with a series of tweets, including the hashtag #JusticeForMaxwellBerry, about the incident.

'Safe to say I’m never flying Frontier again', read one tweet.

'To be clear I DID NOT GROPE ANYBODY. This is just the stupid narrative that the media is pushing', said another.

He later boasted he could buy the airline and asked followers, 'Can somebody tell what the hell is funny about being duct taped to an airplane seat? I was treated like livestock'.

[Lathum]

This guy thinking he is the victim here says all you need to know about him.

[molson]

Could planes feasibly have jail cells? Just like an extra toilet closet without the toilet?

You wouldn't need them often, but, when you do...

[Edward64]

Supposedly this crap will be prioritized. And should be more than just monetary fines IMO. Long overdue.

I wonder how many of these cases are caused by alcohol.

Biden’s Justice Department puts unruly airline passengers on notice - POLITICO

Not only do passengers violate federal law when they harm employees, “they prevent the performance of critical duties that help ensure safe air travel,” Garland said in a letter to his workforce. “Similarly, when passengers commit violent acts against other passengers in the close confines of a commercial aircraft, the conduct endangers everyone aboard.”

Though the FAA has instituted a zero-tolerance policy against mask noncompliance and other bad behavior and has handed out record numbers of fines, unions for flight crews have complained that prosecutions at DOJ have lagged behind and have urged the administration to do more to penalize the behavior.

Earlier this month, the FAA referred 37 cases of egregious behavior from travelers to DOJ, noting that it believes all of them meet the standard for potential criminal prosecution. An FAA spokesperson on Wednesday said it has not passed on additional cases since.

[Lathum]

Major U.S. airlines warn 5G could ground some planes, wreak havoc | Reuters

[Ksyrup]

For someone who closely follows The Points Guy, I find this very interesting. Is there any precedent for a company restricting which 3rd parties I can share tracking information with? It's my information, my account. I wonder if American has a legal leg to stand on, or if they are just trying to bully people away from being able to use TPG's app instead of their own.

The closest thing I can think of is that I use the Shop app to track all of my deliveries. I give them access to my Amazon and other accounts, and when a shipment goes out, they automatically get it and put it in one place. This is basically the same thing.

The Choice to Maximize Your Travel

[Edward64]

I saw the video of the China Eastern airliner doing a nose dive and wondered what the heck could have caused that. Googling says that was not a real pic of the plane crash. The black boxes have been found so we should know what happened soon.

Also, YT had an recent Australian 60 min segment on the MH370 lost at sea. There are new findings that has (supposedly) better isolated where it went down. Supposedly, in very, very deep waters. The senior pilot is still the likely cause of the crash.

[Ksyrup]

I saw an animation of it on one of the major networks so I assume it was accurate and it was crazy - not just the nosedive but the speed. Also, no one in the cockpit responded to any communications. If all of that is true, it wouldn't shock me to find out it was intentional.

[Ksyrup]

I'm flying this week for the second time since Covid and first since October. As I expected, so many people had status boosted/extended because of Covid that it's virtually meaningless for upgrades. I'm now Delta platinum and currently sitting 37 of 99 for my flight to San Diego. I don't ever recall 99 people on an upgrade list, and even as gold, I would usually be somewhere in the 20s. And the TSA Pre-check line was as long as the normal line when I went through security because that's now a perk on so many credit cards.

[Lathum]

I get to fly out of Newark on Thursday. Joy.

[miked]

Originally Posted by Ksyrup

I'm flying this week for the second time since Covid and first since October. As I expected, so many people had status boosted/extended because of Covid that it's virtually meaningless for upgrades. I'm now Delta platinum and currently sitting 37 of 99 for my flight to San Diego. I don't ever recall 99 people on an upgrade list, and even as gold, I would usually be somewhere in the 20s. And the TSA Pre-check line was as long as the normal line when I went through security because that's now a perk on so many credit cards.

I'm a platinum on Delta in Atlanta and the only upgrades to first I've gotten in the last 4 years were a pair of CRJ flights, one to Baton Rouge and one from LAX to Vegas. I did get upgraded the year before COVID on Spring Break to Steamboat, but I gave it to my wife and sat in the back with the kids. The last time I saw a list under 40 or so was 10+ years ago. I just flew back from Bozeman and there were 50+ on the list.