The wife of a September 11th United Flight 175 Captain Saracini is campaigning for a second barrier to the cockpit and reportedly is gaining some traction with congress.
I think this is security theater. Since the September 11th tragedies, there seems to be this belief that we must be safe at all costs. Particularly in an airliner. I couldn’t disagree more.
The reality is that there is no such thing as 100% safe from hijackings and there never will be. Safety comes from vigilance and proper screening. If a hijacker has gained entry to the aircraft and has a weapon good enough to penetrate the cockpit door in flight, you’re security has already utterly failed. More barriers aren’t going to stop that attack or effectively slow it.
I think the 2nd barrier idea looks great as an issue and I’m sure that everyone is attracted to it because at the end of the day, it scores points against airline management.
But airline management is the one who is right on this issue.
It’s not lost on me that this all surrounds United Airlines and appears to be related to both United Airlines pilots’ union maneuverings. I feel the union is maneuvering the captain’s wife in this effort to jab at United Airlines for not doing enough. It’s a way to gain the public eye, discredit management and seemingly get the upper hand.
But what upper hand is really gained? Scoring points on this subject is silly. It’s not a poltiical issue and, frankly, the more security is turned into a political issue, the more it will certainly be deficient.
I would ask the question: Do you want to be secure or do you want to enjoy the illusion of security?
The former means you’ve got to listen to security professionals and properly evaluate your risks and mitigate against them.
The latter means that the wife of a lost pilot from a tragedy that occured 12 years ago and which will be highly unlikely to happen in that manner ever again drives the perception of security.
This isn’t disrespect for the feelings of this wife. She deserves sympathy and empathy for her losses. She also is not a security expert and has no business advocating for security on an airliner against those really do know better. More importantly, the issue here is not “safe at all costs”. It’s an unrealistic requirement in which the only answer is to never leave your home.
United Airlines has reported a 1st quarter loss of $417 million which is almost 60% of United Airlines’ 2012 total year loss of $723 million.
Yes, in the first quarter of 2013, United Airlines has lost 57% of the total losses for 2012. For those keeping score, we have still got 3 more quarters to go.
There is runway for United Airlines to make this up. I don’t think they will. Not this year. United isn’t running on all cylinders, not yet anyway and I see nothing to signal a dramatic change in their approach to earning money. CEO Jeff Smisek points to a slightly improved operational record and while it is true, it isn’t the answer.
United has lost a lot of high paying customers and it isn’t earning enough revenue and it needs a strategy that reverses that course.
I’m now in the position of wondering if Jeff Smisek was the right CEO for this integration. One thing that stands out: Smisek isn’t very prominent in leading this airline. Other Continental leaders were far more prominent and stood out in front with their employees. I get the sense that Smisek is more like United leaders who hide in a tall building hoping problems might go away. It’s his perception to change.
US Airways has announced it will match United Airlines’ increase of $50 on ticket change fees. I find this unsurprising since US Airways tends to be very opportunistic with fees. In fact, I would regard US Airways as the leader in developing fees and arguably one of the most successful airlines in implementing them.
Will this mean that American Airlines will adopt such a thing? No, not necessarily. Once the two airlines blend together, the analysis will ultimately be based on what’s best given the combined customers the new airline has.
US airways has announced a $55 million profit (excluding special items, etc) vs American Airlines’ $8 million profit (excluding special items) and that’s coming from an inferior network and an airline that is roughly 1/3 the size of American Airlines.
This is great for US Airways, great affirmation for the team that will run the new American Airlines and I do wonder when these folks will get this merger done. My best guess is October but they’ll suitably impress me if they get it consummated by September.
This merger integration will be fascinating to watch in comparison to the Delta/Northwest and Continental/United mergers. US Airways CEO Doug Parker and his team all have merger integration experience but none have experience with the scale that the new airline will possess. It will be hard for them to balance the pull of the AA insitutionalization with the attraction to adopting the US Airways Way.
What I most look forward to is seeing the new airline about 18 months after the merger deal is closed. I want to see how the AA network is reorganized and made to work by the US Airways team and Robert Isom in particular.
There is quite a bit of talk about United’s sudden increase in change fees which see a rise from $150 to $200 for domestic flights. Most see this as overreaching and they’re not wrong.
If we accept that we’ve entered the Era of the Fee in the airline industry (and I do), then we have to accept that fees will be charged for a variety of things. To a degree, I see fees as being something that can be OK but which the airline industry does very poorly.
Watching airlines implement fees for services is one of the most painful things I can do as an observer to this industry.
Change fees, like baggage fees, are inconsistently implemented and the rationale behind those implementations seems . . . without real reason. United is now charging $200 to change a ticket. Let’s be clear, if you have a $300 ticket, you can change it for $200 plus the difference in fares. This essentially renders your ticket useless in all but extreme cases.
My question would be is a $200 change fee a revenue driver or a behavior driver? I suspect the latter. It’s there to drive people to not change and not create chaos. Sometimes I wonder if airlines wouldn’t be happiest in taking people’s money and just not having them travel. Often it seems as if the objective isn’t to deliver a service but, rather, part people from their money without delivering value.
If we’re going to go to fee based systems, I’ll buy in on a change fee. But why not simply have that fee cover the cost of the transaction plus some small penalty? $50 for a domestic ticket change seesms both reasonable and appropriate. $100 for international trips. Make that change easy, not hard. Let’s these changes happen fluidly and everything will work out in the end.
These change fees are, in my opinion, drive by overly complex fare structures among airlines. Airline fares are so complex and so diverse that they make the airline believe that the opportunity costs of a seat are hundreds of dollars more than they really are.
People say that those change fees help defer the money that the airline lost in not being able to sell that seat in advance to someone else. Well, did they lost that opportunity? Part of that opportunity presupposes that all airplanes are full when they depart. They are not. They are nearly full and I’ll grant that it can be hard to fit standby people on but as for paying passengers who want to buy a ticket, you can almost buy that seat if you want it. It just might cost you a small fortune when you buy it at the last minute.
The airline also doesn’t notice that the person who buys a ticket 2 months in advance has given money to the airline that it can benefit from economically for 2 months before it incurs the bulk of the costs associated with that purchase.
Why do airlines want to drive behavior with fees? Because they hate saying no to a customer. With an exorbitant fee, they can say yes but charge a fee. The problem with that is it is assumed that the customer loves this and they don’t.
In fact, I believe its fees like change fees and baggage fees that breed some of the biggest contempt felt towards airlines. Customers aren’t stupid and they do know when they’re being gouged. They may not have a choice on that flight but they know they can exercise choice the next time and they will. Think I’m wrong? Just look at how things have gone for United Airlines when they inconvenienced their customers and abused their good will. Bookings went down, revenues evaporated and everyone noticed real quick.
United’s fee is exorbitant and insulting. Unfortunately, United also cannot measure the ill will generated by this and compared it to the revenue it gains.
If you don’t like it, then vote with your money. And for what it is worth, more and more I think that American Airlines’ decision to allow a customer to “insure” themselves against change fees with . . . a fee is pretty smart. I don’t hand out compliments to them very often but I think they are trying to package real value for the customer on that front and that is better than most airlines right now on the subject of change fees.
The FAA has approved the design change made by Boeing to address lithium ion battery risks on the 787. The FAA will make a directive on how the fix should be made and it will make FAA inspectors available to expedite the repairs. Boeing has had kits and staff ready to deploy to customers for making these fixes and I would imagine that Boeing has told them “go”.
A couple of observations:
1) Boeing will destroy its reputation for many years to come with both the public and airlines if this fix proves to be inadequate. I would want to be very, very sure and very certain that those batteries are contained against everything short of an act of god. Spin and damage control will not fix that problem.
2) Nothing that I can so far find has any guidance on what kind of ETOPS the FAA will permit with the 787. There was, originally, speculation that the FAA and other agencies would be inclined to not grant enough ETOPS time to be useful to 787 users. If this fix works, then it should not have an impact on ETOPS. If the original ETOPS granted is amended to be something considerably less, then I think that reflects a lack of confidence on the part of the FAA.
I would expect a practical return to service for the airlines being some time at the end of May or the first of June.
US Airways is, supposedly, being sued by two people who were flying as non-revenue passengers in first class for being asked to remove their hoodies and dress according to a dress code.
Why? Because paying first class passengers were allowed to fly in hoodies.
It has long been common practice for airlines to enforce a dress code for those flying as non-revenue passengers. Those dress codes are no longer nearly as strict as they used to be. Today, “nice casual” or “business casual” is generally accepted even in First Class.
When I flew as non-revenue First Class passenger in the 1970’s, you wore a suit. Period. End of story.
The idea behind the dress code is not hard to understand. You are expected to dress well to represent the company among paying passengers and so that you do not run the risk of drawing attention to yourself as a non-revenue passenger. Paying passengers tend to resent people getting for free what they paid for.
Airlines vary some on what they’ll allow but I do not believe any US airline would permit hoodies and bluejeans in First Class by a non-revenue passenger. (And if any airline would permit it, I would suggest they shouldn’t.)
Are dress codes wrong or class driven?
No, they’re not. If you are flying as a non-revenue passenger, you are doing so on the courtesy of the airline. They airline makes this privilege available to certain people as a benefit and a courtesy. It is not a mandatory thing for them to supply and it really is a privilege.
So in return for not paying hundreds of dollars for your ticket, the airlines want you to dress appropriate, blend in well and represent the company appropriately.
They also want you to shut up about flying as a non-revenue passenger. That is not for public consumption . . . ever.
And since these two jokers were on “buddy passes” which are tickets supplied by an employee of the airline, I can assure you that the employee who supplied them is mortified and no doubt started distancing themselves from these two creeps as soon as possible. This is the kind of thing that gets one’s flight privileges lifted or suspended.
I feel bad for the US Airways employee who did these two jerks a favor and I hope this person is able to make it right with the company and their managers and retain their good name within the company.
Bankruptcy Judge Sean Lane has disallowed the $20 million kiss for American Airlines CEO Tom Horton. Horton was to receive roughly half in cash, half in stock as severance upon his departure from the new company (to be called American Airlines Group) formed after the merger. His departure was scheduled for the first annual meeting to be held after the merger which most believed would be in May as has been tradition for American Airlines.
I vociferously disagreed with this severance payment. So did a US bankruptcy trustee who argued that it violated federal governing such things in bankruptcies. After review, Judge Lane offered that the idea that this was taking place post bankruptcy and therefore not entirely within purview of the court was a legal fiction. I couldn’t agree more.
When you get a severance of that size, it should be for accomplishing something. Based upon all that has come to light so far on the journey of both US Airways and American Airlines, Tom Horton didn’t have much to do with the success of this agreement. In fact, if anyone really had much to do with getting the company into alignment with markets, it was Beverly Goulet, AA’s Chief Restructuring Officer.
Horton sought to delay, obfuscate and sabotage the merger at most every point. He has made public arguments that he’s the superior CEO to Doug Parker in semi-veiled statements made to the press. The problem with that is there is actually no evidence of what value Tom Horton has brought to the process in approximately 16 months.
Is it the atrocious livery that has been perpetrated on those aircraft?
Judge Lane has pointed out that when the new company is formed and has exited from bankruptcy, the new Board of Directors can vote on this severance.
I have long felt the current American Airlines Board of Directors has not governed the airline well for many years. Like so many boards recently, it has seemingly given blanket endorsements to the CEOs without regard to assessing what leadership of the company has achieved and without determining if the course set by the leadership is a sound one.
But, man, they sure can vote bonuses well.
$20 million is too much for Tom Horton and what he brought to the table. But if everyone truly thinks it is necessary, then I would suggest that the new Board vote on it and give it to him.
I would point out that Horton not only isn’t needed to make this new airline work, he’s not wanted. This deal doesn’t need him.
Frontier Airlines has been trying some rather weird destinations over the last year. Weird for this airline and weird for any airline.
The airline has started flights into Trenton, NJ for instance. Now it’s just announced Wilmington, Delaware as an alternative to Philadelphia and Baltimore’s main airports.
When a company is running around and trying very hard to go head to head with competitors, there is a problem. Frontier has been killed in Milwaukee and has been roughed up badly in Denver, it’s home base. Other focus cities have been discontinued but there is something more going on here.
I don’t know what this airline does anymore.
I don’t know what service level it offers, I can’t identify a market it has aligned itself with and it is getting hard to figure out where the airline flies to. These airport choices defy explanation to me. Wilmington, DE might seem like a decent alternative to Philadelphia until you realize that those 30 miles separating the two airports represents a significant inconvenience to most in the Philadelphia area. It’s a matter of traffic and logistcs. 30 miles isn’t 30 minutes of travel. It’s not even 60 minutes of travel in many cases. It’s considerably more and people in that city don’t need more complications.
More importantly, the people of Philadelphia aren’t screaming for low fares either. Nor is Baltimore.
How this airline is hanging on at this point defies my imagination. The fact that Republic can’t even sell this airline says something.
I honestly believe that if David Neeleman were still running JetBlue, he would have bought both Frontier and Virgin America and merged them into a national domestic airline. But Neeleman isn’t around and no other airline executive exists with enough vision and courage to make something like that work.
As much as I want regional mainline airlines to exist, I can’t find a good argument for Frontier at this point. Who flies them and why do they bother?
I like how Turkish Airlines has operated its business. Over the past decade, the airline has transformed itself from a primarily government owned entity to a primarily private owned entity that is earning an impressive profit. Turkey has focused itself on supporting its airline business by promoting growth through the development of new airports that could serve as “Middle Eastern Hubs”.
The Turkish government has managed itself well in these economic times and considering their strong desire to enter the European Union, you have to give them credit for being aggressive. It’s notable that they are not suffering economic crisis despite the fact that their mediterranean neighbors largely are bankrupt and in smoking heaps presently.
Turkey committed itself to modernizing how it interacted with its airlines and realized that by making themselves an attractive country for international hub operations, it would attract investment into other segments of the nation’s economy.
Contrast that to how Italy has behaved with Alitalia or Ireland with Aer Lingus. Both of these supposedly more modern, more liberal and more free nations have worked exclusively towards protecting the employees of those airlines by propping up those airlines with support.
As a consequence, the airlines operate poorly (Aer Lingus is OK on the long haul front but that amounts to 7 aircraft presently) and are shoved around by their own unionized employees. If someone suggests selling the airline, particularly to an aggressive company, or doing anything to improve productivity, the unions call a strike to teach the government and airline managers a lesson.
Why would anyone do business within such a framework? The answer is that no one does. Many may have disapproved of Ryanair taking over Aer Lingus but there would have been some pretty strong benefits to Ireland.
Alitalia is simply once again on the path to a merger with a larger, better run European airline. Unless the Italian parliament can find a way to preserve domestic ownership without running afoul of EU regulations.
I can’t think of a government run airline or airline industry today that is running successfully. I can think of many which are jobs programs but that’s it. What’s crazy about this is that the countries suffer massively as a result.
Countries like Ireland, Italy, India or Argentina all suffer far worse economic impacts overall from a failure to address the “airline problem” within their countries than they benefit from providing a jobs program. Those jobs programs are heavy concrete shoes for those nations economies and they signal that those countries aren’t prepared to do business in a fair and equitable manner.
Yet the supposedly backward and inferior Turkey and its airline get out front and decide to make something of itself. The contrast is remarkable.
Several weeks ago, the TSA decided to revise its position and allow knives, among a few other things, to be carried onto an airplane. These knives couldn’t be more than what would be described as a common pocket knife.
Since then, quite a few people have weighed in on this decision publicly and I had decided to leave it alone because I felt the decision was really immaterial to any debate on security.
I say that because Bob Greene essentially calls Janet Napolitano, Homeland Security and the TSA idiots. Let’s be clear here: Bob Greene, a journalist and columnist with many years of experience, has decided that he has better judgement than the experts who have exposure to all the facts.
Here is an example of Bob Greene’s good judgement: Bob Greene Wiki
He also makes a specious argument in his piece when he says that the tragedies of September 11, 2001 were caused by knives.
Well, they weren’t. Knives were the instrument used by terrorists to take over multiple aircraft and were used to assault and kill flight crew.
Curiously, those terrorists didn’t succeed because they had knives. In fact, if the tragedy wasn’t so tragic, the reason for their success is nearly comical. They succeeded because we had spent more than 3 decades telling people to cooperate with hijackers.
Globally, we had told people that their best chances for survival when their transportation was hijacked was to cooperate. More specifically, to shut up, do as told and to not try to interfere with the hijackers. We, as a global community, couldn’t have been more of one voice on the subject.
Every airline (with the exception of El Al) told its crews to cooperate fully, get the aircraft on the ground and do your best to provide an opportunity for someone outside the aircraft to solve the problem.
And it was an incredibly successful strategy. Few people got hurt, there were very few violent episodes and it worked very, very well in getting innocents away from danger.
The terrorists used our policies against us. It wasn’t the box cutters they carried that killed people on those aircraft. It was the “cooperate” policies that did this.
It’s actually extremely difficult to kill someone with a box cutter who actively resists.
When we found out what the hijackers did on those aircraft, I made the statement to several friends the first night that we’ll never see another successful hijacking in all likelihood. I speculated that we may well see aircraft bombed or hit with missiles but that I didn’t think we would see one successfully hijacked.
And so far, we really haven’t.
Passengers immediately began actively responding to threats in the cabin and restraining people who intend harm on an aircraft. It works, too. In fact, those passengers have never gotten seriously injured either.
Our cockpits are now guarded with very strong doors that can withstand human force very well. Our pilots won’t be acting passively either. In fact, I fully agree with the idea of pilots being allowed to carry weapons in the cockpit and I think it should be encouraged. Pilots should be trained to use them as a defense if that door is penetrated.
Knives aren’t a threat on aircraft. No more so than many items that are already on that aircraft. There are countless items that exist on airplane that could be turned into cutting weapons that are at least as good as a pocket knife.
Now, in a rare exhibition of sanity, the TSA has rightly realized that it needs to focus on real threats in security lines and eliminate some aspects of the security theater that have been going on. And for their trouble, they get the likes of Bob Greene attacking them.
I have not approved of most of our security theater for the past several years in this blog. There have been a number of steps taken to drive the perception of security while not providing any enhanced security at all. I have vocally criticized those moves many times.
If you think you’re safer flying on an airplane in which pocket knives are banned, I have request:
Don’t fly. You’re really too ignorant to be allowed on an aircraft and, frankly, I cannot trust you to do the right thing should there be a real emergency. Take a car, please. Or a train.
And if you think Bob Greene is qualified to call a entire security department of the United States idiots, then I would ask that you definitely not travel at all. You’re a risk to too many people.
Personally, I would like to urge Bob Greene to go back to what he arguably does extremely well: Personal interest stories about real people.
Global airline consolidation has a way to go on some continents but it would appear that the era of big deals is over for a while now. Alliances have been greatly affected by mergers lately and I’ve begun to wonder at their value.
You often hear of airline CEOs talking of the synergies that exist from alliance partners. In one example, American Airlines has consistently offered very positive feedback on its alliances within Oneworld over both the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans.
But there are others, particularly in the Middle East, who eschew these alliances in favor of direct “one off” agreements with airlines. The Etihad, Emirates and Qatar airlines all tend to move towards striking regional deals with other airlines that offer direct benefit on specific routes. (Yes, I realize that Qatar is now in Oneworld and if you think that means Qatar is going to change its approach, you aren’t paying close attention to who runs Qatar.)
I question the value of the global alliances a lot these days. For example, I question the value QANTAS brings to the table in the Oneworld alliance at this point. I don’t question what value they bring to the table with Emirates or even what value Emirates brings to QANTAS. It’s significant and that’s very clear to me. But how does QANTAS truly benefit Oneworld members at this point?
I’m not sure it does.
I see the power of the joint ventures between airlines such as Delta and Air France/KLM but do those two airlines need SkyTeam to make such a deal? No, they don’t. It’s possible to argue that the alliances allowed airlines to get comfortable with each other and even helped standardize IT systems to a degree. But the value received within those alliances is really between 2 airlines.
I think that mergers are going to muddy the waters even more for alliances. People often suggest that alliances drive mergers but I’ve noticed that that pretty much isn’t true. Sometimes the alliance in a merger is a convenience, sometimes it is a nuisance. There is no strong correlation.
At this point, why does one of the largest airlines in the world need 10 or more alliance partners to succeed? Why isn’t it more beneficial to arrange independent deals with partners and benefit only from those who add value to your business model? The answer is that it *is* more beneficial. And look for more airlines to do it.
Notice that Delta is no longer strongly focused on SkyTeam but very focused on building relationships with a variety of smaller airlines who do add value. Airlines such as WestJet and Alaska Airlines are good examples.
People argue that alliances need partners in India. I would argue that airlines need partners in India.
And it will go that way through the rest of the world too.
Boeing is reporting that they are about half finished with tests necessary to restore the 787 to flight and they have crews deployed to customers, especially Japan, to install the fixes at the word “go”.
Unlike many, I find the solution they are engaged with to be fairly satisfying since it is based upon fairly simple science. Simple science trumps Rube Goldberg ideas every time. I also find the idea that this is beging regarded as a greater fire hazard than virtually anything else a bit exhausting.
Many are treating a lithium ion battery was more dangerous than, say, an unknown fault in an electrical pump inside a fuel tank. These problems are going to happen and they can be confounding to figure out and identify a root cause. Often times, it takes several events to identify a root cause and while that seems unsatisfying, it really isn’t.
It’s the way the real world works. Sometimes it takes a while to fully figure out a problem. When you don’t know the root cause, then the next best solution is one where simple science provides some control.
That said, I think that Boeing is still pushing too hard to control this story and insist on it gaining back all the credibility it needs for the 787. At what point does Boeing admit that it has a credibility problem given that it seems content to allow PR staff and attorneys control the story.
Companies don’t reassure the public or their clients until they own up to their part in problems. That hasn’t been done yet.
If Boeing thinks their problems go away with a successful return to service for this airliner . . . they don’t. Boeing has a credibility problem at this point that has gone unaddressed with customers far too long. If you’re an airline, you want to know that the company you’re buying aircraft from is still the company you once knew. At this point, how do these airlines know this?
Airlines should be doing a bit more to hold Boeing accountable at this point. I would expect these airlines to hold meetings with Boeing Commercial Aircraft president, Ray Conner, and explain to him that Boeing’s word is no longer very golden on all things and that its time to get real with facts instead of spin.
As an airline, you have to be able to count on your airliner supplier at all times. I’m not sure that airlines can do that at this present time with Boeing.
Ever wonder where Randy Babbitt went after his time at the FAA and his departure due to drunk driving charges in Virginia?
I didn’t either. I assumed he retired quietly and given his background, he was well positioned for retirement.
Today I learned that Mr. Babbitt is working for Southwest Airlines as Senior Vice President -Labor Relations. This isn’t a bad thing as Mr. Babbitt and his family actually have a long history in labor relations within the airline industry. His father was a founding father of ALPA and Randy Babbitt is a 25 year veteran Eastern Airlines pilot who also served in leadership positions wtihin ALPA including serving as president of ALPA for 8 years.
Keeping the new American Airlines re-branding should make sense at this point, right? It is a fait accompli in the airline world. There are a number of airplanes now painted in the new American Airlines livery and repainting aircraft costs a lot of money, right?
Well, maybe.
Doug Parker is responding to questions about the rebranding with a fairly non-committal answer that indicates that nothing is decided. I would wager that Parker was annoyed, at the least, with the rebranding roll-out in January and especially so given how close the merger really was at that point.
Anything can happen and nothing likely will until Parker is in charge. This is an example of exactly why I don’t think it’s a good idea that Tom Horton remain in place. He rolled out that rebranding despite all he knew about the near certainty of a merger and that was disrespect for the merger and Parker. That rollout could have waited. Even if you needed to paint 777s, you could have waited.
Will it remain? I kind of doubt it. I think there will be a revision of it at the least and I think it will embody a replacement of the airline livery on the tail. The billboard titles for American Airlines will remain and I think even the logo will remain but I think those tails will be changed and I think whatever replaces them will show a certain continuity for American Airlines history with a nod to US Airways.
British Airways, in partnership with VisitBritain, did this flash mob promotion in a mall in the center of Moscow. Some think it is a bit weak, I think it was actually quite well laid out considering the audience.
It’s been announced this morning that the Braniff International name will be coming back on a new airline this year. The last time the Braniff name was used was more than 20 years ago in 1991. Investors will be establishing a new airline targeting travelers who are enjoying the JetBlue and Virgin America flying experience in the United States.
The new airline will be based in Dallas, as before. Investors spokesperson, April Fulya, says: “Dallas is ripe for a new airiline and has a rich industry base in the DFW area. We expect to draw upon employees working for both Southwest Airlines and American Airlines.”
The City of Dallas is expected to work closely with the airline to provide gate space at Love Field Airport as well as DFW International Airport.
The airline is working to acquire renovated space in the old Dalfort Aviation (Braniff Inc) Operations and Maintenance building at Love Field Airport. That building is currently targeted for removal by the City of Dallas but it has recently been given a reprieve in gaining historical status.
The new Braniff International says that it will incorporate a new livery and new logo for the new operation. The livery will be based on using a white fuselate and billboard titles across the side of the fuselate. However, the new logo will use the old Girard typeface that Braniff had created in the 1960’s.
Braniff International will be using the 737-8Max airliner from Boeing as its single aircraft type for its United States operations. However, in an aggressive move, the airline is also placing orders for the Airbus A330 to use on its international routes. “We expect this to be the ideal aircraft for routes between Dallas and Europe as well as between Dallas and Chicago.” said April Fulya.
To mark its return to the skies, the airline also plans to have one of the new Airbus A330 aircraft painted in the original Alexander Calder colors (See Here) for the airline’s launch.
