The girl featured in this video was stranded in the Pittsburgh International Airport for 10 hours during Snowpocalypse ‘09. She passed the time by video taping herself. Well done!
Via Boing Boing

[Click the comic strip to see larger version]

One again I had the privilege to fly Southwest Airlines last week when I took a business trip to New Orleans. I thought it would be much better flying Southwest this time since they introduced their new line policy. You no longer need to line up immediately upon arriving to your gate. Once you check in, your place is saved in line. I arrived two hours early and ended up with B44. Not bad, I thought. As illustrated in the cartoon above, I ended up with the center seat.

I think it’s time for Southwest to abandon the whole “Grab any seat you want” policy. It may have worked well in the seventies when the planes flew with less people, However it’s not working so well these days.

Here’s an example. Say I purchase a ticket to go see my relatives up in the northeast six months in advance. The day I’m to return, I spend a little more time with my family. I arrive at the airport just under an hour before my flight leaves. I potentially end up with a “C” line ticket. The only advantage to buying my ticket ahead of time is the monetary savings. It doesn’t guarantee my place in line. I would rather know I had a center seat at the time of booking. I’ll take that incentive any day of the week.

C’mon Southwest, you’re the airlines with heart. How about cutting us all a break. Even Subway abandoned that silly sandwich cut. (Remember the cut where it appeared there was more on the sandwich because all the meat and toppings hung out the side) Sure it’s great to be different but let’s face it, people hate it. It makes us feel like we’re all cattle lining up. This is a new century. Start listening to your patrons. SWITCH TO ASSIGNED SEATING!

Also see:
Southwest Airlines reservations – or why I don’t like to fly Southwest
Virgin America is the new jetBlue
Dog + Pig

After spending five and a half hours on the tarmac in Austin Texas late last year, It was interesting to read that 2007 was one of the worst travel years on record.

Here are a few of my favorites from a USAtoday article:

• A passenger in first class on a British Airways Delhi-London flight in March awoke to discover that a corpse, upgraded from coach, had been propped in a seat in his row.”She kept slipping under the seat belt and moving about with the motion of the plane,” Paul Trinder told Britain’s Sunday Times. “When I asked what was going on, I was shocked to hear she was dead.”
• A 64-year-old man was hospitalized earlier this month after chugging a liter of vodka rather than surrendering it at a checkpoint in Germany’s Nuremberg airport.
• SkyWest airlines apologized to a passenger who said he was forced to urinate in an airsickness bag during a short flight in March because the only restroom was closed due to a malfunctioning light. The man told the Salt Lake Tribune he’d had two “really big beers. It was like I had no choice.” The pilot called police upon landing in Salt Lake, but the airline later gave the passenger a travel voucher in addition to the apology.
• In July, a flight from St. Petersburg, Russia, to Turkey turned back after the crew was unable to break up a fight involving three inebriated men. It started, said the Russian News and Information Agency, when one of the men was “given the cold shoulder” by a woman he was chatting up and hit her in the face.
• Toilets overflowed on an Amsterdam-Newark flight on Continental Airlines in June, causing passenger Collin Brock to tell a Seattle television station King 5 News, “I was forced to sit next to human excrement for seven hours.”
• Passengers weren’t the only ones guilty of bad behavior in 2007. In April, a Northwest Airlines pilot locked himself in an airline restroom, where he had a loud, obscenity-laced conversation on his cellphone as passengers boarded his flight in Las Vegas. When confronted by a passenger, the pilot cussed at him. The flight was canceled as a result of “inappropriate language by a crewmember,” the airline said.
• A stowaway squirrel on an American Airlines flight from Tokyo to Dallas in February caused the plane to land in Honolulu. An airline spokesman told the Associated Press the pilots were worried the “varmint” might damage the plane’s wiring.
• Nepal Airlines personnel sacrificed two goats on the runway in front of a malfunctioning Boeing 757 to appease the “Hindu god of sky protection,” Reuters wire service reported in September. After the goat sacrifice, the plane took off for Hong Kong.
• Not even Vatican-backed Mistral Air was willing to appeal to a higher power when authorities confiscated holy water from pilgrims returning from the Roman Catholic shrine at Lourdes, France. The airline’s president cited rules that ban carry-on containers holding more than 3 ounces of liquid, telling the Associated Press, “These (regulations) have to be respected.”

[Thanks JC]

So there it is. JetBlue figured out what jet setters wanted and boy did they deliver. Did I care about the simple snacks served on jetBlue? Those terraBLUE chips. (Okay, I get it, I get it), those cookies, and all the other tasty morsels they offer. The snacks are unlimited and you can eat as many snacks as you wish. They even give you little bottles of water. Doesn’t this make sense on a plane. It sure beats those sad little cups of water those other airlines offer.

Once upon a time in the 70’s, a new airline named Southwest debuted and they changed air travel forever. They were incredibly successful. However, along came JetBlue and they one-upped Southwest and beat them at their own game.

Enter Virgin America into the already crowded airline space. Do we need yet another airline? If it’s Virgin – The answer is YES! – we need it. Richard Branson has built one of the strongest brands in the world. What other brand name do you know of that contains, record stores, cola, mobile phones, etc. When Branson rolls out a new segment under the Virgin brand name, we’re already familiar with it. We know it. We know what to expect. We’re excited because we know that innovation is built in.

Virgin America has a hot look and feel. It looks similar to Virgin Atlantic but is that much hipper. They have a cool frequent flyer program called EleVAtion. Ahh, nice. Of course they don’t actually use the old tired words “frequent flyer program” in a brilliant move to distinguish themselves from what little competition they have.

Virgin America IS the new jetBlue.

Virgin America offers several new features never before seen on a plane. (or at least to my knowledge) Innovative new seats. You’ve never seen airline seats like this before. Stylish, hip, and… different. But what makes these seats so revolutionary is what they have built into them You can now plug your laptop into the standard 120 plug. How about a USB outlet. Yes please. How about Internet connectivity via a CAT-5 cable. YES! Why didn’t anybody think of this before? You mean I can know design on my Apple powerbook, listen to music on my iPod/Iphone and not have to worry about running out of juice… incredible. I’m about to hop off the jetBlue train and gleefully jump on the Virgin party bus.

The only downside is I have to wait until they offer more routes. I’ll can’t wait!

I’m excited once again about air travel. Thank you Richard Branson for bringing it to America!

First of all, I’m not a fan of Southwest’s open seating policy. Sure it sounds like a great idea getting to choose where you would like to sit. However, it is only a great idea if the plane is 50% filled. If the plane is over sold, like most of the flights on Southwest, it doesn’t really work out for the consumer. Instead of a seat assignment, you receive a letter on your boarding pass – either A, B, or C. Of course the letters are first come first serve. “A”s, then “B”s, then “C”s. And here’s what that translates to:

A – Aisle – What the first people in the plane usually select

B – Window – Not the Aisle but close enough

C – Center – What the last resort is if you wish to fly

If you remember to check in online 24 hours before the flight, you stand a good chance to get either an “A” or “B” line assignment. (Notice I said line assignment and NOT seat assignment – more on that later) Of course I did just that for the return flight and ended up with a “B”. Which is better than the “C” or center seat that I had for the previous flight.

Now with my “B” seat assignment in hand, I know exactly which line to stand in. There are three large letters A, B, and C, above the rows for which you line up in order to board the plane. The smart frequent patrons of Southwest know to camp out early in line if they know what’s good for them. You usually see them sitting criss cross applesauce on the ground with a good book in tow for the long hour plus wait. Gradually everyone get the drift and lines up accordingly. So now instead of sitting on the incredibly soft plush airline chairs, you’re stuck in a line as if a new bank is about to open and you’re going to receive a brand spanking new t-shirt with the bank logo on it. No such luck here. What a great idea! I would love to shake the hand of the brain trust that came up with such an innovative idea. I get it. Southwest airLINES. The line part is far too accurate.

Southwest could learn a lot by studying Jetblue’s playbook. Jetblue was founded by former members of Southwest. The smarter ones who knew what didn’t work at Southwest. Why is Jetblue so much better?

• Seat Assignments vs. line assignments
  I would rather know going in where I’m sitting on the plane than to roll the dice and stand in a line for over an hour only to end up with a center seat.
• Jetblue has personal TV screens built into the back of the seat headrest
  With 30+ TV channels for your enjoyment pleasure, it’s much better than looking at the back of the headrest
• An easy to follow point system
• Friendly flight attendants vs. smart-ass attendants
• Better snacks vs. tired, small bags of peanuts
• Solid branding vs. a giant heart, which isn’t aimed at me

Southwest started out as a great idea in 1971. However, time has not been kind and it’s showing it’s age. How long with they hang on to the open seating policy? Who knows the answer to that one but I can only guess they won’t change it anytime soon. *DING* You are now free to move about the country.