In yet another impressive lapse in airport security, a passenger hid two African parrots in his carry-on luggage when he boarded a JetBlue flight to Newark from Puerto Rico.  The two birds then escaped during the flight, and enjoyed their time flying around the cabin.  Keep in mind that while the government is noting our phone calls as a way of stopping terrorism, they are not stopping people from smuggling stuff on board airplanes.  This time it’s parrots.  Next time, what, roosters?

Air Canada is in the midst of a pissing match with GDSs, the companies that supply airfares to travel agents.  They have removed their lowest fares from the GDSs (and hence, from travel agents) because of technical limitations of the GDSs.  Air Canada has made some really innovative changes to their fare structure, including allowing customers to LOWER the fare $10 by agreeing to not check baggage and not to make changes to their ticket. (On the flip side, they’ll charge you $15 for assigned seating). 

I bring all of this up because this could have a huge impact on how airline tickets are sold going forward.  Air Canada has unbundled much of the travel experience, charging you only for getting you from here to there, and making you pay more for everything else.  This is a good thing, by the way — it keeps fares low.  What’s interesting is that corporations (who book through travel agents) are very, very upset about this.  Boo hoo.  Air Canada has gotten smart about distribution (unlike 95% of airlines out there), and are only selling cheap seats in places where they can make money.  How novel.  I don’t expect US airlines to follow this any time soon (they are very, very slow to change), but European airlines probably will.  And then it’s just a matter of time before you’re getting a discount for keeping your bags on your lap.

Continental’s president Jeff Smisek gave a rather candid speech yesterday at an investor conference where he pretty much bashed everyone he could think of.  The article has the details, but he noted that Continental did not "follow our competitors in a race to the bottom to achieve a crappy product."  Knocking JetBlue, he added, "They are a low-cost carrier, they are also an
extremely low-RASM carrier, and their customers don’t pay them a penny
to watch those I Love Lucy reruns. … It is a wasted investment in my mind."

He also didn’t hold back from criticizing partner airlines, saying that Delta’s international expansion will cause them to "lose their shirts." 

Fun!

Just a little self-promotion:  The OTR got a mention in Sunday’s LA Times article about EOS and MAXjet…

It is a slooooowwwww news morning in AirlineWorld, so the pickins were slim this morning. Which is why I’ll tell you that there are about 2,000 aircraft still parked in the desert waiting for some nice family to take them home. This number is way down from the months following 9/11, but if you’re looking to own a gas guzzling L-1011 of your very own, now may be the time to jump in. As noted here before, it could make a nice house.

El Al has requested that it be permitted to handle its own baggage screening at Newark Airport, a move it has already made in 4 other US airports.  Why?  Because it doesn’t trust the TSA.  Think about that.  A foreign airline — albeit one with the best airplane security in the world — doesn’t trust us to do our own security.  If you’ve ever gone through airport security and felt it was a charade, you were probably right.  El Al doesn’t mess around.  And incredibly (and impressively) the TSA has allowed El Al to retrofit its bomb detection machines with its own software, because El Al feels that the TSA’s software isn’t good enough.  Only the best for us!

The intra-Hawaiian market is in the midst of an overhaul with the launch of the Mesa Air Group’s go! lowering fares across the board.  The once-tiny Island Air was assumed to be the first carrier pushed out of business by the increased competition.  But according to this article, they’ve carved out a nice niche for themselves, flying point-to-point between islands, allowing passengers to bypass a connection in Honolulu.  And, somehow, their fares are about $5 lower ($40 all in) than those of their competitors.  It’s worth a read to see how a niche player deals with price competition.

The NY Times has a good article today about executives’ use of corporate jets for personal business.  Oh, and you’re not going to be surprised to hear who’s paying for the use of those jets.  Uh, you are.  Well you are if you’re a shareholder of the company.  In the past, the company could write off the entire cost of the flight, even if an executive were using the plane for personal use.  Now, when Dick Parsons, Time Warner’s CEO, wants to go visit his vineyard in Tuscany (not making that up), the company can only write off a tiny portion of the bill.  But, here’s a crazy part.  The full cost (depreciation, storage, etc) of using a corporate jet for 5 hours is about $45,000.  If you only include direct costs (fuel, crew, etc), it’s about $15,000.  Yet, in this case, because of some wacky formula, the use of the jet is only counted as about $800 of income for the exec.  A $45,000 perk = $800 of income.  Nice!

Gate 1 Travel has a pretty good fly/drive deal to Amsterdam this fall:  $579 gets you a flight from New York to Amsterdam and 7 days car rental (so you can drive wherever you want).  This price is good Nov 1-Dec 15, but it’s only an extra $100 from September 7 to October 31st (possibly even a better deal).  Have fun and smell the tulips.  (Do they have tulips in the fall?  Probably not).

As part of its 25th anniversary, American Airlines is giving a special offer a day for 25 days.  Most of these offers are pretty weak.  However, there’s one solid deal:  25% off award travel within the US, to Hawaii or to the Caribbean & Mexico.  Book by May 31st and travel August 22-November 8.  That means most Caribbean travel is only 18,750 miles, while a free flight to Hawaii in coach is just 26,250 miles.  Hurry, because the capacity controlled awards will go quickly (especially to Hawaii).