Zimbabwe Seizes American Plane
Mar 9th, 2004 | By Jared BlankBut first, a few quick stories announcing new service and cancelling old service:
JetBlue announced new service from JFK to Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, and Aguadilla, Puerto Rico. Just so you know, one of the Dominican Republic flights departs that country at 1:50 am and arrives in New York at 5:35 am. You’ll want to avoid that one.
Airtran said said that it is ending its contract with Air Wisconsin, a regional carrier that was providing AirTran Airways JetConnect service to smaller cities. Putting in a kind word on behalf of the much maligned Boeing 717, Airtran said that it could serve cities more profitably with its Boeing 717s than with Air Wisconsin’s CRJs.
United announced agreements with 3 regional carriers yesterday. Republic, Chautauqua, and Shuttle America will help United survive the departure of regional partner Atlantic Coast Airways, which is now known as low-fare upstart Independence Air.
And finally, the government of Zimbabwe seized a US-registered Boeing 727-100 in Harare yesterday after it was found with 64 mercenaries on board. I always thought mercenaries were something you just saw in the movies. While Zimbabwe is a tragedy, there is something sorta cool about a planeful of mercenaries, no?