“The airline sells the ticket, and the airline is responsible for at least treating the passenger with some dignity,” Boyd said.OK, look. Maybe I'm not the one to talk. I haven't flown anywhere in a dozen years or more - right, since long before 9/11, for financial, not terrifilicous reasons - so maybe I just don't know. But before I quit flying I'd logged a whole lot of hours in the air.
So I read this ABC story (see below) about Northwest flights being canceled because pilots are refusing to work more than the 90 hours per month their contracts specify and I remembered a day back near the dawn of time - oh, 1968 or so - when I was waiting around in the New Orleans airport for a flight home. I lived in Atlanta back then and Atlanta was weathered in - fog, thunderstorms, something, I don't remember what - and nothing from New Orleans or anywhere else was getting in. There we all sat.
And then a pilot from some minor airline - I don't remember which - strolled casually through the waiting room, bag in hand, and announced, “I'll go to Atlanta if I can get a full plane.”
Not a single soul stood up.
Yeah, the airlines don't seem to care about your “dignity” (here, have some peanuts and shut up). But then, what's a little indignity if the alternative might be landing in a tree?
Link: Pilot No-Shows Ground 200 N'west Flights
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