- May 12th, 2010
- US Airways Makes Further Strides in Baggage Handling with Planeside Scanning
- SOURCE: The Cranky Flier
- Last year, I wrote about how US Airways had started scanning bags at planeside. When I was in Phoenix with the airline recently, I decided to stop in and get an update on how things were going. They’ve made a lot of progress since then, and there are [...]
- April 16th, 2010
- Volcano Decides to Halt European Flights Since Nobody is Striking This Week
- SOURCE: The Cranky Flier
- It’s a rare week when there isn’t a strike at a European airline, but this appears to be one of them. Unhappy with this news, a big, mean volcano in Iceland called Eyjafjallajokull (strangely enough, pronounced simply as “Billy”) decided to start erupting. Thanks to the prevailing winds, [...]
- April 13th, 2010
- If You Book with an Online Travel Agent, Always Double-Check With Your Airline
- SOURCE: The Cranky Flier
- I’ve run across plenty of problems when it comes to helping our Cranky Concierge clients, but a recent run in with CheapOair.com has me absolutely steaming. It also provides a very valuable lesson: always double check with your airline if you book via an online travel agent. One of our [...]
- April 7th, 2010
- American Learns a Lesson in Communications (Or At Least, They Should)
- SOURCE: The Cranky Flier
- I’ve written here before about the importance of good, quick communication when it comes to dispute resolution in the world of social media. Most notably, United’s confrontation with a broken guitar made headlines, but there are countless examples from around the web every day. Today, let’s talk about [...]
- February 22nd, 2010
- St Louis: The Incredible Shrinking Airport
- SOURCE: The Cranky Flier
- Lambert-St Louis International Airport is a hub without an airline. It has been struggling with the dramatic drop in traffic since TWA went under and American slowly culled the remains, and now it’s trying to reconfigure itself to be a smaller airport. That’s not something you see [...]
- February 15th, 2010
- American and British Airways Finally Receive Alliance Approval From the US (Tentatively)
- SOURCE: The Cranky Flier
- About 10 minutes after the Wright Brothers put their first airplane into the air, American and British Airways applied for blanket codesharing and antitrust immunity. More than 100 years later, their wish has finally been granted, at least by the US authorities. Yes, they have to give up [...]
- December 28th, 2009
- New TSA Rules Actually Make the Liquid Rule Look Rational
- SOURCE: The Cranky Flier
- I’m back home from my holiday trip, and I have my trip report ready to go, but then someone tried to blow up a Northwest flight into Detroit and the TSA jumped into action. I tried to let my anger cool off for a couple days, but the more [...]
- December 1st, 2009
- Atlanta Airport Lets You Rent Rooms by the Hour
- SOURCE: The Cranky Flier
- Next time you’re in Atlanta and you feel the need to rent a room by the hour, you’ll be able to do it without leaving the airport and heading to a sleezy part of town. Behold, I bring you the Minute Suites. For world travelers, this is nothing new. [...]
- November 30th, 2009
- Lufthansa Starts Making Changes at bmi
- SOURCE: The Cranky Flier
- After a few months of hemming and hawing, Lufthansa has finally started to make its mark on bmi. The airline announced a big restructuring that will involve cutting routes, moving airplanes around, and just generally aligning itself better with the growing Lufthansa empire. When Lufthansa took control of bmi thanks [...]
- November 28th, 2009
- Cranky on the Web (November 24 – 28)
- SOURCE: The Cranky Flier
- What are Scope Clauses and Why Are People Fighting Over Them? – BNET If you’ve heard people talking about scope clauses and wondered what they are, here’s your guide. Think a Lot of People are Using Wifi In the Air? Think Again – BNET Runway Girl Mary Kirby caught on to some numbers [...]
- November 10th, 2009
- Frontier Quietly Introduces Stretch Premium Economy
- SOURCE: The Cranky Flier
- Frontier has been surprisingly quiet about its latest product change, a new premium economy section called Stretch. I saw it mentioned on their Facebook page, and I believe they mentioned it on their earnings call, but I haven’t seen much else. This will be good news for some [...]
- November 5th, 2009
- SkyWest to Start Flying for AirTran in Milwaukee
- SOURCE: The Cranky Flier
- You cheeseheads may still be hurting from your second Favre-related beatdown this year, but you can rejoice that you now have yet another airline coming to town. SkyWest (yes, the regional airline) will begin flying for AirTran in Milwaukee. It’s very clear that this is happening because of the AirTran [...]
- October 30th, 2009
- Midwest and Frontier Start Swapping Airplanes in the Middle of the Day
- SOURCE: The Cranky Flier
- We’ve talked about how Republic’s acquisition of Frontier and Midwest has given the carrier tremendous flexibility in moving its airplanes around between its different subsidiaries. We’ve already seen announcements that Frontier will operate aircraft under the Midwest name, and some of the Republic-operated Embraer aircraft will come to Denver [...]
- October 22nd, 2009
- Southwest Announces Panama City (Florida, not Panama)
- SOURCE: The Cranky Flier
- There is a lot of route news for Florida fans this week, but the biggest of all is that Southwest has announced its newest city . . . Panama City. No, this is not the airline’s first foray into Latin America. It’s the other Panama City. The [...]
- October 21st, 2009
- Using Electronics on Takeoff, Standing Flight Attendants (Ask Cranky)
- SOURCE: The Cranky Flier
- I have an Ask Cranky two-fer today as one reader had two semi-related questions to ask. Fortunately, I’ve got the answers (or as close to the answers as I’m going to get). Hi Cranky, A couple questions about FAA Regulations. 1) I’ve often wondered why FA’s are free to walk around the [...]
- October 15th, 2009
- United, US Airways Receive Big Fines for Maintenance Problems
- SOURCE: The Cranky Flier
- Both US Airways and United received a present from Uncle Sam yesterday in the form of some hefty fines ($5.4 million and $3.8 million, respectively) for maintenance violations. Should we all run away screaming from these airlines? I don’t think so, but these are both quite serious. [...]
- October 13th, 2009
- The Travel Promotion Act Makes Travel More Difficult
- SOURCE: The Cranky Flier
- You’ll hear lots of fanfare around the Travel Promotion Act these days, but you certainly won’t hear it from me. In fact, I think it’s time for a rant. The Act looks like it’s on its way to sailing through Congress, and in my opinion, it will simply [...]
- October 5th, 2009
- Introducing Cranky Concierge Air Travel Assistance
- SOURCE: The Cranky Flier
- For more than 3 years, I’ve been writing The Cranky Flier to provide opinions and general information about the latest with airlines and airports. Today, I’m officially launching what I think is the next logical extension of the blog . . . Cranky Concierge, a personalized air travel assistance [...]
- September 25th, 2009
- Top 10 New Rooftop Bars
- SOURCE: The Suite Life
- Hotel restaurants and clubs are out, swanky rooftop bars are in. Offering the perfect combination of incredible views, hot décor, tasty cocktails and A-list crowds, these new rooftop bars are not to be missed, if you can get in that is… SLS Beverly Hills – The Altitude Pool Deck: good drinks, [...]
- September 11th, 2009
- Honoring the Flight Crews That Died Eight Years Ago Today
- SOURCE: The Cranky Flier
- It’s September 11 again. You would think that after eight years it wouldn’t sting quite as much, but it still does. This is the fourth September 11th that I’ve written a post, and it’s the third in which I’ve followed Holly Hegeman’s tradition of publishing the names of [...]
- September 4th, 2009
- The Good and Bad of Southwest’s EarlyBird Check-In
- SOURCE: The Cranky Flier
- I know I’ve been writing a lot about Southwest lately, but they’ve had a lot of news to talk about. The latest is the launch of EarlyBird check-in which allows you to pay to get to the front of the boarding line. The idea is a good one, [...]
- August 31st, 2009
- JetBlue Shuffles its West Coast Routes While Virgin America’s Fortunes Improve
- SOURCE: The Cranky Flier
- I have no doubt that this is merely coincidence, but it is certainly funny that at the exact same time Virgin America announced a substantial improvement in finances, JetBlue announced it’s stepping up its focus on San Francisco. Funny indeed. Let’s start with Virgin America. The airline announced second [...]
- August 28th, 2009
- Are Coach Seats That Slide Forward a Good Thing?
- SOURCE: The Cranky Flier
- The big thing at NBTA seems to be showing off seats. Dozens of airlines seemed to have brought their seats with them to make the travel managers drool. While most simply showed off the best seats onboard, others brought everything from coach all the way up. When [...]
- August 27th, 2009
- British Airways Gives Away Business Opportunity Grants
- SOURCE: The Cranky Flier
- I have to admit that I was quite skeptical when I was told that British Airways was going to launch the next round of its Face to Face campaign which encourages business travel. I didn’t think it would really be newsworthy, but when I was told I had the [...]
- August 24th, 2009
- Continental’s Overnight Excursion in Rochester, Minnesota
- SOURCE: The Cranky Flier
- I haven’t commented on the ridiculousness that is Continental #2816 yet, and I’ve received plenty of emails asking me why that hasn’t happened. You know the flight; that’s the one where the passengers got stuck on their little regional jet all night long after diverting from Minneapolis/St Paul to [...]
- August 22nd, 2009
- Cranky on the Web (August 17 – 21)
- SOURCE: The Cranky Flier
- Just a little heads up before we get to the weekly links … I’ll be at the National Business Travel Association NBTA conference next week so my posting schedule may be a little off. I will do my best to keep a regular schedule. If you’ll be at the [...]
- August 21st, 2009
- El Al’s New Low Economy Class Isn’t Revolutionary
- SOURCE: The Cranky Flier
- Think of it as a new airline within an airplane. While many airlines in the past have really liked the idea of starting a low cost carrier, El Al has decided to do it on its existing fleet. There will now be a low-cost class of service on [...]
- August 20th, 2009
- “Southwest Sucks” Highlights the Complexity Involved in Airline Customer Service
- SOURCE: The Cranky Flier
- I received an email from a reader who had a really poor experience flying Southwest. He wrote “Southwest Sucks” on his boarding pass, and he wasn’t allowed to fly. Sounds ridiculous, right? Well yeah, but it’s not that simple. I’m sure that’s how most media outlets [...]
- August 19th, 2009
- Family Airlines Gets Smacked by the DOT
- SOURCE: The Cranky Flier
- In news that will surprise absolutely no one, the DOT has sent a letter to Family Airlines saying that it needs to get its act together if it actually wants to fly. Riiight. That’ll happen. You have to read the request and Family’s completely inadequate response for [...]
- August 15th, 2009
- Cranky on the Web (August 10 – 14)
- SOURCE: The Cranky Flier
- Why is Allegiant’s Load Factor Dropping While Others Increase? – BNET Allegiant’s load factor dropped more than anyone else last month, but I’m not too concerned. Southwest’s Bid for Frontier Raised to $170 Million – BNET Southwest’s final bid for Frontier has been released. American Exits the Orange County – San Francisco Market – [...]