Occasionally, we’ll hear of a plane returning to the airport after colliding with a bird or birds upon takeoff –including one incident that resulted in a two-foot dent in a nose of an aircraft — but you don’t often hear about flights returning after other animal strikes. Yet, that’s what happened today when an American Airlines regional jet struck a deer on the runway and began leaking fuel. [More]
airplane
American Airlines Apologizes To Family Kicked Off Flight Over Service Dog
By 11.28.16
American Airlines apologized and opened an investigation recently after an Illinois family claimed they were kicked off a flight because an attendant thought their service dog was too big. [More]
Plane’s Emergency Slide Falls 2,800 Feet, Lands Outside Arizona House
By 3.31.16
Remember last year when an airplane door panel fell from the sky, landing on a North Carolina golf course? While that was certainly an unusual and scary situation, an Arizona woman can now top it: an airplane emergency slide dropped from the heavens and landed outside her house. [More]
Cat Gets Loose On Delta Air Lines Flight, Tries To Realize Dream Of Being A Flight Attendant
By 12.21.15
Traveling can be a mundane, routine task: print off your boarding pass, check your bags, walk through security, sit at your gate, board, and takeoff. But a recent Delta Air Lines flight had the exciting bonus of an escaped feline roaming around the aircraft. [More]
Airplane Door Panel Falls From Sky, Nearly Makes Hole-In-One On Golf Course
By 8.20.15
When playing a round of golf you might hear the occasional “FORE!” as a warning to watch out for a ball flying through the air. What you don’t expect is for the object hurtling though the sky toward the green to be a piece of metal once attached to an airplane. [More]
Spirit Flight Attendant Probably Shouldn’t Have Posed For Photos In Jet’s Engine Well
By 5.27.15
When going through the boarding process for an upcoming flight, one might expect to see the crew members readying the cabin, welcoming travelers or just generally inside the aircraft. That’s why it was a bit unsettling for several passengers to see a flight attendant posing for photos inside the plane’s engine well before a recent Spirit Airlines flight. [More]
Man Behind Hijack Scare On Virgin Australia Flight Was Just Exhausted, Looking For Bathroom
By 4.28.14
An Australian man who caused a hijacking scare on a recent Virgin Australia flight to Indonesia when he banged on the cockpit cabin’s door won’t be charged, officials say, because he was just exhausted and confused at the time. And he just needed to find the bathroom, which can make anyone act a little scary. [More]
Worst Company In The Air: Oceanic Vs. TransAmerican
By 4.1.11
Every airline has a few in-air horror stories in its history, but there are two commercial carriers whose public image is dominated by their catastrophe-related headlines. [More]
Cessna Goes On The Defensive
By 6.2.09
This isn’t a good time to be in the aviation industry. And not just commercial airlines. Corporate airplanes became a symbol of corporate excess and fatcat arrogance during the economic meltdown. So what are companies like Cessna to do? An ad campaign defending business aviation.
Flight Delays Will Only Get Worse, Say Experts
By 9.4.07
The New York Times looks at the country’s most consistently late airplane—American Airlines Flight 1659, from Newark to Chicago—and asks industry professionals about the rapidly deteriorating quality of air travel in the United States. The short answer: it will take at least a decade to upgrade air traffic control systems to handle the new super-busy runways, so unless airlines stop “maximizing” their profits by scheduling flights so closely together or we build more airports, this is the new modern way to travel.
HOWTO: Upgrade to First Class
By 5.3.06
Lifehacker offers up some tips on social engineering (the “cool” and “conscious” way to say manipulating) tactics to employ if you would like to get your airplane seat bumped up to first class. Note too, the comments. Some prefer the snug feeling of a warm blanket of honesty than the plushness of a wide leather site in the front berth.
