Have you seen this before?

Last night whilst waiting board a Boeing 767 for my flight, I watched ground crew load a small mazda soft-top sports car - literally "raw" - there was no containers or packaging ..... at first they could not get the car onto those clever machines with rolling floors used to lift and load baggage containers. So one of the crew got into the car, started it ( well all the lights came on) , and drove it onto the loading plaform. they then lifted it up to the hold door and the then guy appeared to carefully drive into the hold. They followed it with subsequent containers. I did not see how they secured the car; but immediately had visions of becoming one of those National geographic programme " Closest shaves" with a white mazda busting itself out of the hold door at 37000 feet. Glad to report we landed safely at Heathrow & I am writing this blog.

Bag Moment

Had a bag moment yesterday - got my KLM plane from Manchester to Schiphol- waiting on the bus for other passengers watching the baggage crew.
Working fast - they filled the first baggage trolley (transfer bags), a guy moved it but before he could put the next trolley in place......... out flew my bag out of hold - dropping 8ft to the tarmac with a thump.
luckily they picked it up and put it on the trolley and when I got it on the baggage reclaim - I am glad to report its contents were shaken not stirred....... though it's no wonder I get through a trolleybag every year !

FCO travel advice for UAE

I am fascinated by this travel advice about the UAE, recently posted by the Foreign Office.
I can find no support for it on any of the website you would expect e.g. US State department. But as ever the FCO remain coy why they are saying - I guess the long suffering travel agency Business in the UK is not pleased.
To my knowledge there have been few or no terrorist or extremist attacks in the UAE. In fact the the rulers of UAE have been very careful to balance the conversion of the Emirates into a Tourist wonderland with support of more islamic schemes e.g. religous schools across Middle East & Asia food and development aid to more improverished states in Asia and Africa etc etc. The big UAE property concerns are trying to rebuild Gaza and the Palestinian homeland.
I am pretty sure that such actions & support provides an incentive for attacks not to be undertaken by Islamic extremists for risk of losing such massive support for their homelands.

Silverjet finally goes under

Silverjet has finally gone under as the potential purchaser realised that the framework of the Business e.g. Aircraft leasing costs, could not be changed to make the business viable. hatip BBC.
Meanwhile Flyeb forges on with apparently low fares depsite invcreasing fuel prices.:

Southampton to... Alicante £59.99 Malaga £79.99 Nice £54.99 Paris (CDG) £59.99
Isle of Man £51.99 Frankfurt £34.99 Belfast City £39.99 Jersey £31.99 Rennes Brittany £49.99 Brussels £39.99 Amsterdam £53.99 Dusseldorf £34.99 Hannover £51.99 Manchester £29.99 Glasgow £55.99 Edinburgh £52.99 Dublin £27.99 Avignon £59.99 Brest Brittany £31.99 Palma £49.99 Bergerac £74.99 Aberdeen NEW! £51.99 Inverness NEW! £66.99 La Rochelle £54.99 Guernsey £34.99 Bordeaux £59.99 Leeds Bradford £29.99

You wonder how much longer Flybe will be able to sustain this level of fares given their costs of fuel etc (though on most of these fares would have extra costs + taxes). I guess though that passenger numbers may hold as to drive from say Southampton to Aberdeen would cost more that £85.

Cuts in US Flights

There are very mixed signals from the airline market. In UK airline market, Players such as Flybe & Jet2.com continue to expand their European routes, whereas in the US there are continued contractions on routes. One of my colleagues from Work only recently used a commuter service to Grand Canyon 2 months ago.
hattip NYT

New Security Machine

I went through Schiphol this afternoon & one of their new security gates - a backscatter X ray scanner to detect hidden weapons and explosives on passengers. These devices, which use Compton scattering that require that the passenger stand close to a panel and produce a high resolution image.

It seems to slow the process down you have to stand at 90 degrees to the entry point and raise your arms. The scamnner rotates inside a cylindrical perspex section that forms the side of the machine

The image is of Susan Hallowell, Director of the US Transportation Security Administration's research lab, taken with backscatter X-ray system, used for airport security passenger screening. hattip Wikipedia and the Boston Globe

KLM moving away from their UK Services ?

Came through Schiphol and infamous gate D6 on a KLM flight for Humberside tonight - those travellers who travel to the UK will know the majority of KLM's UK flight leave from Gate 6, which at busy times is best described as a cattle market. Tonight KLM exhibited all the signs they are about cast off their UK connection:

1. All the flights were late - anywhere between 15 mins - 2.5 hours
2. All the gate staff were under-enthused & unhelpful
3. the majority of flights were over-booked - new tactic exhibited here by KLM - no longer do the offer increasing amounts of euros by loudspeaker instead they ask peope to sign up to lists with their reward being specified after signing - surprise surprise there were no volunteers.
4. The flightcodes are no longer KLM but WA.......

My guess is they will merge the UK part with City Jet Air France's operator out of London City. You read it here first...........