Friday Flyer – October 27, 2023

This week’s biggest news was certainly the sudden and unexpected announcement that Akbar Al Baker would be retiring/resigning as CEO of Qatar Airways.  I can always tell a big news story based on the number of people who send me articles about it, and this time there was no shortage.  It appears this wasn’t his decision, and the turnaround time is quite short (November 5th).  This article, shared by Andrew, went a bit more in depth about Al Baker’s tenure at Qatar and what made him such an enigmatic and controversial personality.  

Interesting Aviation News

  • There is rumor of government intervention in airline loyalty programs.  This week the CEOs of United and Delta both spoke on what the impact of that change would be.  As you’d expect, they believe it would likely spell the end of the frequent flyer programs as we know them.  That could be bad for both passengers and the airlines. 
  • This story has made international headlines as it’s quite scary.  An Alaska Airlines off-duty pilot was flying in the jump seat and, midflight, attempted to disable the aircraft by pulling the fire suppression system handles, which would have immediately turned off both engines.  Luckily, the pilots flying the plane were able to prevent this and restrain the passenger.  There were clearly mental health issues at play, so, safe to say that it is good this man won’t be flying passengers in the near future.  It will be interesting to see if this changes rules regarding who is allowed in the cockpit during flight. (h/t: Carlos P.)
  • Imagine you’re patiently waiting to get off the plane after landing, when, out of nowhere, the plane just rotates backwards.  That’s exactly what happened on a recent Jetblue flight at JFK airport.  Luckily this isn’t a regular incident, but quite scary for those on board.  (h/t: Rachel G.)
  • Avianca, the Colombia-based airline, announced a rebrand they’ve kicked off.  The most obvious change is to their logo, where they’ll now be using a lower case “a”, with the branding as “avianca” now.  This is a continuation of the reimagination of their image and brand as they come out of bankruptcy caused by the pandemic. 
  • Over the years of writing this weekly flyer, I’ve shared various planes in special liveries.  This article has a collection of those planes.  These were fun to see all in the same place.  (h/t: Andrew)
  • Editorial Note:  It was brought to my attention that I shared the wrong link last week for the story regarding the sumo wrestlers flying on Japan Airlines.  Here is the correct link. (h/t: Christopher H.)

Interesting Aviation Fact

In several articles over the years, I’ve shared how airlines are working towards using more Sustainable Aviation Fuel, or SAF.  It’s become a popular topic in the industry lately.  On the surface, many of us just assume it is aviation fuel that is made sustainable (as the name implies).  But there’s more to it than just that and this article shares that information.

Cool Aviation Photo

The most common airplane manufacturers are Boeing and Airbus.  But one that most of you have probably flown is Embraer.  They’re focused on smaller jets that are generally used in the regional airline space.  The Embraer E195-E2 is known as the Profit Hunter as it is one of the most fuel efficient aircraft made.  To help promote the plane, they have one decked out in a special “Tech Eagle” livery.  And it looks cool!  Here’s an article about the plane and I’ve shared one of the pictures below.