United Airlines: the airline we love to hate, but we can't agree on why
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@Polygeekery said in United Airlines: the airline we love to hate, but we can't agree on why:
@Zerosquare does it cover guitars?
Only if they don't get broken.
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I've seen insurance policies that almost boil down to that, when you read the dozens of pages of fine print listing everything it doesn't cover.
And sometimes they go the other way. For example, my business insurance explicitly covers damage resulting from satellite falls. Uhh... thanks?
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I feel like some people didn't pick up exactly what I was putting down.
United Breaks Guitars – 04:37
— sonsofmaxwell
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@Zerosquare said in United Airlines: the airline we love to hate, but we can't agree on why:
my business insurance explicitly covers damage resulting from satellite falls.
But there's probably some sub-clause that excludes that if the entire block is taken out.
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Yeah, probably. But in that case, I'd have bigger things to worry about. Or rather, I'd be in no condition to worry about anything any longer.
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Since I don't this we have a "Bad flying: Necro edition" thread, I'll put it here:
Passengers were reportedly left fuming after a Virgin Atlantic flight to New York was forced to turn back to London when it became apparent that the co-pilot was not qualified to fly because he had not completed his final assessment.
The Airbus A330 was about 40 minutes into its flight to JFK Airport on Monday when the two pilots became aware of what the airline later called a “rostering error.”
The captain is not a designated trainer and was not qualified to fly with a co-pilot who had not completed Virgin Atlantic training protocols, according to the airline
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@Zerosquare , in "Other news", I think. However, this bit of information wasn't stated, or at least not clearly, in the other article:
The captain is not a designated trainer and was not qualified to fly with a co-pilot who had not completed Virgin Atlantic training protocols
He was a fully licensed and qualified pilot, or he wouldn't even have been in the cockpit, but he hadn't finished his company-specific training. That's a little different from the other article, which blathered about how terrified the passengers were because they had to make a "U-turn" and how every first officer (co-pilot is an obsolete term, because both captain and first officer are qualified to fly, and take turns flying, the aircraft) can only fly with a training captain.
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If there was no real risk and no legal liability, I wonder why they did make that choice instead of keeping quiet and doing nothing.
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@HardwareGeek said in United Airlines: the airline we love to hate, but we can't agree on why:
That's a little different from the other article, which blathered about ... how every first officer (co-pilot is an obsolete term, because both captain and first officer are qualified to fly, and take turns flying, the aircraft) can only fly with a training captain.
To be fair even the terribly worded other article specified that it was a company-specific thing
they need to be accompanied by a training captain according to Virgin Atlantic policy
But yes it missed the detail about the first officer otherwise being fully qualified.
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@Zerosquare I'm guessing here, but probably for one or both of two reasons. If something had gone wrong, there would have been huge liability. And if they had knowingly continued to violate company policy and not corrected it as soon as they could after becoming aware of it, they likely would both have lost their jobs. Pilots are in continuous contact not only with air traffic control, but with their company dispatchers (and, if necessary, technical and maintenance departments). It's entirely possible it was the company that made them aware of the problem and told them to turn around.
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@Zerosquare said in United Airlines: the airline we love to hate, but we can't agree on why:
If there was no real risk and no legal liability, I wonder why they did make that choice instead of keeping quiet and doing nothing.
Why have a policy if you're not going to stick to it?
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@loopback0 said in United Airlines: the airline we love to hate, but we can't agree on why:
it missed the detail about the first officer otherwise being fully qualified.
FYI, the typical career for a wanna-be airline pilot progresses something like this:
- Private pilot license
- Instrument rating
- Multi-engine rating
- Commercial pilot license (This does not allow a pilot to fly an airliner. It allows a pilot to do things like fly corporate aircraft, do aerial photography, crop dusting, and other things that involve getting paid that a private pilot cannot do.)
- Certified flight instructor. Optional, but common. Flying is expensive, and this allows the pilot to earn money while building hours.
- Air transport pilot license (This is what allows a pilot to fly for an airline.)
- Fly for a cargo and/or small, regional airline for a few years
- Maybe get hired as a first officer by a major airline
- Eventually get promoted to captain
There are regulatory and company-policy minimum number of hours required for each step (and of course training, written exams, and practical exams). I'm not sure if it's regulatory or company policy, but in the US a pilot typically needs at least 1500 hours as pilot-in-command before a major airline will even look at his/her job application. Pilots don't normally work a 40-hour work week, and even if they did, only a small fraction of their hours count toward pilot-in-command, so you're looking at a few years of experience before they can even become a rookie pilot at a major airline.
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@HardwareGeek: sorry, my message wasn't clear. I didn't mean the pilots (like you said, I would be way too risky for them to take such a decision) ; I meant the higher-ups at the company. I'd have expected them to allow a one-time exception to their policy, rather than have to admit publicly they made a mistake and make their clients angry.
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@Zerosquare I think point one still stands. If there had been some kind of incident, and investigators found that the aircraft was being operated in violation of their own policies (which may reflect some regulatory requirements), the airline higher-ups that approved that exception would be in deep doo-doo.
There is a common saying in aviation, every regulation is written in blood. Every regulation that says "do X" or "don't do Y" exists because somebody did Y or didn't do X, and people died because of it. And many company policies are implementations of regulatory requirements. So regulatory agencies, airlines, and individual pilots will (or should, and do in the vast majority of cases) always choose safety and compliance over convenience.
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@HardwareGeek said in United Airlines: the airline we love to hate, but we can't agree on why:
There is a common saying in aviation, every regulation is written in blood. Every regulation that says "do X" or "don't do Y" exists because somebody did Y or didn't do X, and people died because of it.
Unfortunately, that seems to be what it takes. Some very serious people spent years and years in the 90s pushing for airlines to reinforce cockpit doors against the very plausible event of a hijacking attempt. The airlines resisted, not wanting the expense.
Then 9/11 happened. Now they're all reinforced.
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@HardwareGeek said in United Airlines: the airline we love to hate, but we can't agree on why:
FYI, the typical career for a wanna-be airline pilot progresses something like this:
In the US at least the first bit of that often happens in the military.
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@HardwareGeek said in United Airlines: the airline we love to hate, but we can't agree on why:
There is a common saying in aviation, every regulation is written in blood.
Not just in aviation. This same issue affects almost any form of transport, especially public transport. If y'all can find a copy, it's worth reading Red for Danger by L.T.C. Rolt, for a history of railway accidents in the UK up to the 1950s. It describes in meticulous detail the evolution of railway safety mechanisms (boiler pressure controls, brakes, etc.) and procedures (the different kinds of signalling systems and "block" systems), and the loss of life that lead to each change.
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@Mason_Wheeler said in United Airlines: the airline we love to hate, but we can't agree on why:
@HardwareGeek said in United Airlines: the airline we love to hate, but we can't agree on why:
Some very serious people spent years and years in the 90s pushing for airlines to reinforce cockpit doors against the very plausible event of a hijacking attempt. The airlines resisted, not wanting the expense.Then 9/11 happened. Now they're all reinforced.
And then a pilot locked the cockpit door while the copilot was in the lavatory and flew the plane into the side of a mountain. Before 9/11 hijackings were regarded as hostage situations at worst; they were eminently survivable for passengers and crew.
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@scatters said in United Airlines: the airline we love to hate, but we can't agree on why:
@Mason_Wheeler said in United Airlines: the airline we love to hate, but we can't agree on why:
@HardwareGeek said in United Airlines: the airline we love to hate, but we can't agree on why:
Some very serious people spent years and years in the 90s pushing for airlines to reinforce cockpit doors against the very plausible event of a hijacking attempt. The airlines resisted, not wanting the expense.Then 9/11 happened. Now they're all reinforced.
And then a pilot locked the cockpit door while the copilot was in the lavatory and flew the plane into the side of a mountain. Before 9/11 hijackings were regarded as hostage situations at worst; they were eminently survivable for passengers and crew.
Germanwings flight 9525, that extract scenario happened.
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@scatters said in United Airlines: the airline we love to hate, but we can't agree on why:
Before 9/11 hijackings were regarded as hostage situations at worst; they were eminently survivable for passengers and crew.
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@TwelveBaud was there even a door?
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@HardwareGeek said in United Airlines: the airline we love to hate, but we can't agree on why:
He was a fully licensed and qualified pilot, or he wouldn't even have been in the cockpit, but he hadn't finished his company-specific training.
One of the aviation channels I subscribe to posted a video explaining what probably happened. He doesn't, AFAIK, have any inside knowledge of this specific incident, but based on his years of experience as an airline pilot, this is what he thinks is most likely.
A pilot can only be "qualified and current" on one type of aircraft at a time. If you've been flying, say, an A330 for years, but you're reassigned to an A320 for a while, then switched back to an A330, you have to be retrained and requalified on the A330. That's a few weeks of training, followed by 2 – 4 "IOE" flights with a "check airman", i.e., training captain, to get signed off to resume flying the A330 without the check/training pilot. (This applies to both FOs and captains.) He thinks the FO on this flight was in that IOE phase, but not yet signed-off.
That IOE is an airline requirement, not a regulatory requirement. As far as the FAA (and/or the UK equivalent) is concerned, he was completely legal to fly without a check/training pilot.
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@Zerosquare said in United Airlines: the airline we love to hate, but we can't agree on why:
I meant the higher-ups at the company. I'd have expected them to allow a one-time exception to their policy, rather than have to admit publicly they made a mistake and make their clients angry.
I'm not sure the chain of command is designed so that such a regulatory/safety issue can go up to someone with authority to overrule it, it probably would take too long.
Besides, I'm fairly sure that I don't want any higher-up to have that authority -- if they could overrule regulations (even if just internal ones) to avoid "admit[ing] publicly they made a mistake and make their clients angry" we'd probably see many more problems.
(why does that reminds of the 737 max??)
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Worldstar!
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@Zerosquare Is there an objective list of comparisons handily available? I'd like to know if the pilots really have it that bad.
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@boomzilla said in United Airlines: the airline we love to hate, but we can't agree on why:
Worldstar!
Bearded soyboy limp wrist slaps someone? That guy must think himself some sort of badass to do that. I do like how he used his face to block the punch as well. His follow through was a bit poor though. God damned invisible tortoises.
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I've not watched it yet, but it seems that video would fit in this thread:
The Airline Industry’s Problem with Absolutely Ancient IT – 22:19
— Wendover Productions
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@Carnage said in United Airlines: the airline we love to hate, but we can't agree on why:
@scatters said in United Airlines: the airline we love to hate, but we can't agree on why:
@Mason_Wheeler said in United Airlines: the airline we love to hate, but we can't agree on why:
@HardwareGeek said in United Airlines: the airline we love to hate, but we can't agree on why:
Some very serious people spent years and years in the 90s pushing for airlines to reinforce cockpit doors against the very plausible event of a hijacking attempt. The airlines resisted, not wanting the expense.Then 9/11 happened. Now they're all reinforced.
And then a pilot locked the cockpit door while the copilot was in the lavatory and flew the plane into the side of a mountain. Before 9/11 hijackings were regarded as hostage situations at worst; they were eminently survivable for passengers and crew.
Germanwings flight 9525, that extract scenario happened.
I thought that flight number looked familiar: KnowYourMeme
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@boomzilla But at least they avoided being in New York.
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@HardwareGeek easier to get off that island.
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"Diverting to another U.S. port would have meant the aircraft would remain on the ground for several days, impacting a number of other scheduled services and customers," an airline spokeswoman told the New Zealand Herald.
Why? Why would it remain grounded? This makes no sense.
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@Polygeekery said in United Airlines: the airline we love to hate, but we can't agree on why:
"Diverting to another U.S. port would have meant the aircraft would remain on the ground for several days, impacting a number of other scheduled services and customers," an airline spokeswoman told the New Zealand Herald.
Why? Why would it remain grounded? This makes no sense.
The proper explanation would have been "we'd like to spare our passengers the experience of being brutalized by cops who can't understand their language"
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@LaoC said in United Airlines: the airline we love to hate, but we can't agree on why:
@Polygeekery said in United Airlines: the airline we love to hate, but we can't agree on why:
"Diverting to another U.S. port would have meant the aircraft would remain on the ground for several days, impacting a number of other scheduled services and customers," an airline spokeswoman told the New Zealand Herald.
Why? Why would it remain grounded? This makes no sense.
The proper explanation would have been "we'd like to spare our passengers the experience of being brutalized by cops who can't understand their language"
They're kiwis, not Swedes.
Pöpcørn | Recipes with The Swedish Chef | The Muppets – 03:39
— The Muppets
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Description:
Today, Monday, March 11, 2024, United's regularly scheduled UA830 777-300ER service from Sydney to San Francisco returned to the airport after a little under an hour of flying time. Upon arrival back into Sydney, the aircraft was met with an army of fire crew and police. On approach, the landing gear compartment doors could be seen wide open, as well as smoke coming from one of the tires on the right-hand side of the aircraft. Upon re-watching my footage, I noticed that on takeoff, the tire could already be smoking. It would appear that the crew didn't receive any warnings until well into the cruise, despite the issue being present at takeoff.
United has had a tough run of it lately, with all of the following incidents happening in the past week: a 777-200 bound for Osaka lost one of its wheels on takeoff, a 737max skidded off the runway in Houston, a 737-900 had flames shooting out of its engines after ingesting bubble rap, an A320 made an emergency landing in Los Angeles after a hydraulic failure and news of a 737max landing earlier in the year at Newark with locked rudder pedals.
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@HardwareGeek said in United Airlines: the airline we love to hate, but we can't agree on why:
bubble rap
I'm intrigued, but at the same time, I don't think I'd like listening to it.
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@Zerosquare A combination of HyunA's Bubble Pop and Rap could be interesting.
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: See? This time it's not our fault!
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@Zerosquare said in United Airlines: the airline we love to hate, but we can't agree on why:
See? This time it's not our fault!
I mean, sure, but I'm a gun nut and if 999 times in a row I handle a firearm and it is my fault when it discharges and blows someone's head off, but on time number 1,000 it isn't, I am still going to be blamed.
We as humans follow trends.
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300 reasons to hate Southwest:
TL;DR: Southwest baggage handlers disassembled the wheelchairs to put them on the plane but had no personnel available to reassemble them at the destination. Bonus: They left some normal baggage off the plane to accommodate the wheelchairs, so some able-bodied passengers were angry at the basketball players when they didn't have their luggage.
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American Airlines:
A flight attendant (since fired and arrested) allegedly hid his iPhone in a plane lavatory and recorded videos of young girls using the lavatory. The parents of one girl are suing American Airlines. American's defense, blame the victim: "She knew or should have known [the compromised lavatory] contained a visible and illuminated recording device."
Now American is backtracking and blaming that filing on outside counsel hired in conjunction with their insurance company. "The included defense is not representative of our airline..."
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@HardwareGeek A real criminal mastermind. That's the iPhone's light shining in the picture. (That I posted in case onebox fails for you as it does for me.)
Of course, his victims were kids young enough to buy the excuses.
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@acrow said in United Airlines: the airline we love to hate, but we can't agree on why:
Of course, his victims were kids young enough to buy the excuses.
Fortunately, he was dumb enough to try it with a teenager who figured out what was going on and reported it.