Faisal Shahzad, the man who attempted to detonate a car bomb in Times Square earlier this week, almost made it out of the country. It wasn’t until he drove to JFK, checked in, cleared security, and boarded his Emirates...
US Airways Takes Offense to Jeff Smisek’s Poetic Flourish
The Wall Street Journal has been quite humorous this week in covering the UA-CO merger: Two years ago, Continental Airlines Inc. spurned United Airlines’ proposal to marry, believing the time wasn’t right. On Monday, Jeff Smisek, Continental’s chairman and chief executive,...
Glenn Tilton says bloggers have too much time on their hands
Glenn Tilton joined Richard Quest on CNN today to discuss the United-Continental merger. As reported on Flyertalk, The last question Quest had was: "On the internet bloggers are all over this merger. Flyertalkers are having a hard time determining...
CO/UA Merger: Disappointing Livery and a New Slogan: "Let’s Fly Together"
Check out the official United-Continental merger website. “Work hard. Fly right.” and “It’s time to fly” weren’t great slogans, but “Let’s Fly Together” is a lame and uninspired slogan of the new combined carrier. It’s not even cute. Even...
United Will Buy Continental for $3.2BN
Numerous media outlets are reporting that the UA-CO merger has been finalized. UAL Corp, parent of United Airlines, will buy Continental Airlines Inc. for $3.2 billion, forming the world’s largest carrier in a merger that further shrinks the embattled U.S. airline industry...
Reader Input Needed: Business or First Class?
My first year of law school is over in two weeks and before my summer job starts, I want to squeeze in a UA award trip to Thailand and Japan–and perhaps even mainland China. As a backup, I also...
Does Houston Win Even if New UA-CO HQs is in Chicago?
We still don’t have an official announcement about a merger, but numerous news stories hint that an agreement has been reached and a formal announcement is imminent. Many in Houston are moaning about losing jobs if the new airline...
Los Angeles to Honolulu Hawaiian Service: Continental vs. United
vs. The two soon may be one, but I had a chance to try out Continental’s Hawaiian service recently from LAX-HNL and provide this report to compare their service to United’s on the same route. Continental 3 LAX-HNL...
United Records First Operating Profit since 2000
It’s been a decade since United reported a first quarter operating profit, but in a sign that the airline industry is recovering, UA reported a $58MN operating profit today. Still, UA lost $82MN or $0.49/share overall–a big improvement over...
Two Thumbs Up for Tom Bihn’s "Tri-Star" Laptop Bag + Accessories
Tom Bihn sent one of their “Tri-Star” laptop bags and a few accessories over to upgrd.com for review and I had a chance to test them on my trip to Panama last week. There is always a temptation to give...
New Obstacle in United-Continental Merger
With both CAL and UAUA rising (though United is rising more quickly), a new roadblock has arisen in merger talks: …The two sides disagree over the value of the share prices that would be used to calculate a stock...
In dealing with Eyjafjallajokull, who should go first? Stranded or confirmed passengers?
When it comes to irr/ops, should stranded passengers displace confirmed passengers? I watched a news story this evening about how airlines are dealing with stranded passengers, some who have been waiting for more than a week to cross the...
More Cutbacks at Spirit Airlines–No More Seat Recline
Competing with Ryanair in a race to the bottom, Spirit has announced another "enhancement" now appearing on select A320s: Spirit Airlines, the air carrier that recently announced a $45 fee for carry-on bags, has launched another change that may...
Merge By May? United and Continental Talks Heat Up
“I WANT CO!” image courtesy Wall Street Journal We all knew the “talks” between US and UA were just a ruse: Negotiations between UAL Corp.’s United Airlines and Continental Airlines Inc. are picking up pace, with parties believing a merger...
Missed My First Upgrade in Two Years on United!
After going 8/8 with United’s new UDU program and not missing a requested upgrade in over two years (going back to my days a Premier Executive) I failed to clear on a SFO-PHL flight this afternoon. The transcon was...
Woman Arrested for Trying to Save Her 93 Year-Old Mother’s Applesauce from the TSA at Burbank Airport
Take a look at this YouTube video of an incident at my home airport of Burbank: The narrator, who sounds like the lawyer for the woman, tells a convincing story. What say you? Some more context: An incident at...
United Delays Launch of Dulles – Lagos, Nigeria Route
Bad news for those of you who took advantage of UA’s introductory fares to Nigeria: United Airlines said it will delay the start of planned flights to Lagos, Nigeria, because of regulatory issues. The flights had been set to...
Nearly Denied Boarding on TACA…and this wasn’t an oversell situation
I guess it was a bad idea to identify myself as a blogger and start taking pictures onboard my TACA flight from San Salvador to Washington Dulles earlier this evening. The way the purser ran into the cockpit to...
Trapped in SJO and not happy
I scheduled in a four hour layover today in San José, Costa Rica in order to exit immigration, take a brief walk around the airport, and snap some pictures for my trip report. I proceeded to immigration where an...
A Day in the Life of a United Airlines Customer Relations Representative
Few things are more irksome to me than writing to an airline about a problem and receiving a form letter in return that does not address my concerns and sometimes is so poorly constructed grammatically that I have to...
