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United canceled flights for thousands of passengers while the CEO took a private plane

Excerpts from a current report in The Guardian:
United Airlines CEO Scott Kirby apologized Friday for hopping on a private plane to get out of the New York area earlier this week while thousands of United passengers were stranded because the airline canceled so many flights.

“Taking a private jet was the wrong decision because it was insensitive to our customers who were waiting to get home,” Kirby said in a statement issued by the airline. “I sincerely apologize to our customers and our team members who have been working around-the-clock for several days – often through severe weather – to take care of our customers.”

Kirby concluded by promising “to better demonstrate my respect for the dedication of our team members and the loyalty of our customers”.

Kirby caught the private flight from Teterboro, New Jersey, to Denver, Colorado, on Wednesday, when United canceled 750 flights – one-fourth of its schedule for the day. That figure does not include flights on United Express.

United has canceled nearly 3,000 flights this week, with the largest number at its Newark Liberty international airport hub in New Jersey, which was hit by thunderstorms for much of the week.

Kirby blamed disruptions in Newark last weekend on a shortage of Federal Aviation Administration air traffic controllers. He said in a note to employees “that the FAA frankly failed us” by reducing the rate at which planes could arrive and depart the airport, where United is the dominant carrier.

As United continued to struggle throughout this week, transportation secretary Pete Buttigieg, whose department includes the FAA, said on Twitter that airlines had recovered from the storms “with the exception of United”. He drove home the point by including a bar graph that compared United’s cancellation rate with the rest of the industry.

Unions representing the airline’s pilots and flight attendants have joined in the criticism, accusing United management of poor planning, a lack of crew schedulers, and operating too many flights.

Chicago-based United said it did not pay for the CEO’s flight on Wednesday. The airline declined to say whether Kirby frequently takes private planes.

Kirby concluded by promising “to better demonstrate my respect for the dedication of our team members and the loyalty of our customers”:

Welcome to America, peasant.

Comments

  • *Welcome to America, peasant."
    Completely.
  • edited July 2023
    Good response by Former Mayor Pete, not letting him get away with blaming the FAA instead of 'fessing up to United's greed and incompetence. Which in my modest experience with them, has been the M.O. there long term.
  • edited July 2023
    Seems to me Chris Christie and family got caught enjoying a lovely day at the beach when all other citizens were required to shelter at home. I also recall the sensitive masked Ted Cruz and entourage being caught by a camera as they sought to flee Covid by traveling to Mexico. I’ve never seen a pic of the United CEO, so I can’t opine as to his membership in the Fat Cats Club.
  • In my brief stint as an air traffic controller we informally called UAL "Untied Air Lines". But not to a UAL flight crew, for sure.
  • edited July 2023
    Old_Joe said:

    In my brief stint as an air traffic controller we informally called UAL "Untied Air Lines". But not to a UAL flight crew, for sure.

    :) - But honestly, all of the airlines go up and down.
  • Well, that's actually pretty normal... what goes up must come down, you know. :)
  • edited July 2023
    Sad about all those folks being stranded, Happened to me few years ago at LaGurdia. No private jet. Just a cell phone to hammer away on hoping to catch a ride home to Michigan at any price. It’s nice that you have 24 hours to cancel as I booked one or two very expensive one-way tickets home while standing in line to talk to a rep. Eventually got home on my own carrier, but with a couple extra connections and after spending an extra night in NYC.
  • edited July 2023
    All of this confirms my reluctance to fly. Perhaps a foreign carrier may be a better bet. We may be headed to Spain to meet-up with a cousin next year. And I can share that Air Canada sucks for basic air. Steer clear. Checking fares, I was on Delta's website and it allowed me, step-by-step, to fill-in the data fields. Then I clicked the fabulous button that's supposed to find me some flights and fares. The webpage hiccuped and then showed me a lovely picture of a big Delta jet plane. Great!

    The airlines from here that can get us direct to Barcelona are few: AA, Delta, Air Canada. And AC is showing split-service including Lufthansa on SOME flights. So... Fly all the way to Frankfurt in that case, and then fly BACK to Spain. Sure.

    NOTHING is simple, straightforward and easy anymore. I just discovered my Irish passport renewal MUST be done online. I have to upload a picture. Do I know how to do that? They don't care. Maybe it will be simpler than I'm thinking.

    Oh, ya; United is another one that could get us to Europe. No, thanks.
  • @Crash: uploading the photo is simpler than one might think. When we travelled to India 4 years ago, we had to apply online for visas, which required photos, of course, as well as a generous fee. I think I scanned our passports and then created a compressed version of the pic because of software capacity constraints. All countries, including the US of A, have discovered the lucrative business of heaping fees onto travelers. Our passport renewals are coming up in 2025 and will cost way more than in 2015.

    FWIIW, Spain and Portugal are hard to get to directly. Unfortunately you’ll be changing planes in some European city whose airport can’t find enough employees. Last year Heathrow had 18,000 job openings! Do avoid Air Canada. I think Paris (CDG) might be the worst major airport I’ve ever navigated, either as a destination or a transfer point. Amsterdam and Frankfurt are not at all that bad.
  • Post-COVID time period, i have had mixed experience in air travel. There seems to be fewer flights and at higher cost. Hopefully this will return to normal in the coming years. In the meantime, we stay locally to visit the national parks on the west coast. We renewed our passports recently and will visit Canada if it wasn’t for their wildfires, even in Vancouver Island.
  • edited July 2023
    BenWP said:

    @Crash: uploading the photo is simpler than one might think. When we travelled to India 4 years ago, we had to apply online for visas, which required photos, of course, as well as a generous fee. I think I scanned our passports and then created a compressed version of the pic because of software capacity constraints. All countries, including the US of A, have discovered the lucrative business of heaping fees onto travelers. Our passport renewals are coming up in 2025 and will cost way more than in 2015.

    FWIIW, Spain and Portugal are hard to get to directly. Unfortunately you’ll be changing planes in some European city whose airport can’t find enough employees. Last year Heathrow had 18,000 job openings! Do avoid Air Canada. I think Paris (CDG) might be the worst major airport I’ve ever navigated, either as a destination or a transfer point. Amsterdam and Frankfurt are not at all that bad.

    *I did walk through MOST of the passport process last night, without completing it, and just used a photo saved on my computer to attempt the upload, to see what would happen. It looks like they have made it pretty easy. I can have the picture at the drugstore put onto a flash drive and download it on my hard drive, then simply select it, and it appears on the application screen.

    If I lived in Ireland, Northern Ireland or England, I could do this by mail, which I'm accustomed to. (Somehow, not Wales?) Blame all this crap on the g-d Marketing Dept., eh? Another thing I'm wondering about: i'll have to pay by credit card, online. But all the fees are listed in euros........ Maybe the conversion will just be automatic? Like at any shop I might walk into over there?
  • @Crash: I believe you can use a US-bank credit card, but each bank may have different commissions and exchange-rate fees. I would use my Schwab debit card because it has a good fee structure. YMMV.
  • BenWP said:

    @Crash: I believe you can use a US-bank credit card, but each bank may have different commissions and exchange-rate fees. I would use my Schwab debit card because it has a good fee structure. YMMV.

    +1. Navy Federal: no foreign transaction fees. :)
  • edited July 2023
    BenWP said:

    [snip]
    I also recall the sensitive masked Ted Cruz and entourage being caught by a camera as they sought to flee Covid by traveling to Mexico.
    [snip]

    Ted Cruz just wanted to be a good dad for his daughters!
    This had absolutely nothing to do with the power outages or water shortages resulting from a winter storm.
    Besides, what can a U.S. senator possibly do to ameliorate the situation?
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