AvTalk Episode 345: Reasonable people

AVT 345 Transcript
EPISODE 345
[EPISODE]
[0:00:07] IP: Hello, and welcome to episode 345 of AvTalk. I am Ian Petchenik, here, as always
with –
[0:00:16] JR: Jason Rabinowitz. And here we are, the most interesting of the A340 series of
podcast episodes, I think.
[0:00:25] IP: This is going to be a long, long episode.
[0:00:29] JR: Long. I mean, maybe we dedicate this episode to the aircraft that, once upon a
time, operated the longest haul flight in the world.
[0:00:36] IP: Exactly. Exactly.
[0:00:38] JR: The A340-500, I think, the best of the A340s.
[0:00:43] IP: We should have John on next week for a debate.
[0:00:45] JR: I don't think I will win that debate.
[0:00:50] IP: Of course, referred to our good friend, John Walton, who may be the world's
biggest A340-600 fan. Maybe we'll hear about that next week. This week we begin in the United
States National Airspace System, which is just this side of a disaster.
[0:01:10] JR: It's hanging on by a thread, but what else is new? It seems to be hanging on by
less of a thread than usual.
[0:01:18] IP: Smaller thread, shorter thread, some metaphor here that winds things around the
way they need to be wound.
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[0:01:25] JR: I believe there is a lit candle underneath the thread slowly burning through.
[0:01:29] IP: Yes.
[0:01:30] JR: The little pieces of fabric letting it all somehow function, kind of.
[0:01:37] IP: Last week, we left things where the Department of Transportation had come out
with a plan to cut flights by 10% at 40 major airports. That was Wednesday when we recorded,
where we had just that amount of information and nothing more.
[0:01:58] JR: Hey, we weren't alone in that, because it turns out, the airlines and airports also
had no idea this was coming and shrugged and said, “Hey, you guys know anything about this?”
Everyone else turned around and said, no. Because the FAA forgot, or just didn't bother to tell
anyone until they announced it to the public, which is super cool.
[0:02:19] IP: Yeah. What happened then was that – I think it was, there was some good public
messaging from, I believe it was LaGuardia Terminal B.
[0:02:29] JR: Not public messaging. That was an internal letter from LaGuardia Terminal B to
employees at airlines that I got a hold of, basically saying like, “Hey, if you guys at airlines hear
about what's going on, could you let us know?”
[0:02:42] IP: Please let us know. Also, this was public messaging from Orlando Airport. They
posted on social media, “We don't know anything here. Someone please tell us.”
[0:02:55] JR: I think BWI did the same. Yeah. There was a lot of confusion. To be fair, here we
are a week later and really, nobody knows the math behind the scenes of whatever, DOT, FAA,
determine it's going to be 40 airports, 10% of those flights, nobody has shown any math. The
FAA as far as I'm aware, has not come forward with any data behind the scenes, even though
airlines have asked like, “Hey, could you show us the data how you came up with this?” They
just haven't.
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[0:03:24] IP: Yeah. There was some good reporting from Jon Ostrower and Will Guisbond over
at The Air Current on that very topic, where airline executives said, what is the proclaimed data-
driven basis? What is the basis for this? Because that could inform where and how we cut those
flights. That has not been given publicly. If it's been given privately, we don't have that
information. What we do know is that instead of canceling 10% of flights at these 40, what the
DOT termed high-impact airports, what ended up happening is they scaled that back to ramp up
beginning at 4% up to 10% over seven days.
These 40 major airports, and just think mostly the 40 largest airports in the US handling a vast
amount of traffic, then airlines needed to cut 4% of their flights by last Friday. Then 6% by
Tuesday, so yesterday. 8% by tomorrow, and 10% by this Friday, the day the podcast comes
out, if the FAA's order is still in place. We don't yet know when that order will be lifted. If it’s
shutdown is over, order gets lifted, or it’s shutdown’s over, there's a delay period to let things
stay cancelled, while ATC starts coming back to work more, because now they're getting paid.
We also don't know when exactly the ATC folks will be getting paid. There's a lot we don't know
at this point.
[0:05:03] JR: Yeah. To be clear, airlines are supportive of a cutback of flights. I mean, I have an
email here from United, which quite literally says, “The last week's FAA directive to cut flights
during the government shutdown, which United supported, came without much notice.” They're
both saying, “Yeah, we support this, but what the hell?  How do you do something like this
without at least giving us a heads up ahead of time?”
[0:05:25] IP: Some notice would have been nice.
[0:05:26] JR: Some notice would have been good. Not saying this was a bad idea, or a bad
concept. It was probably a good idea and a good concept. But the execution, wow, this was bad.
[0:05:37] IP: A for effort. F for execution.
[0:05:39] JR: Yeah. I do like the idea of ramping up from 4% to 8% to 10% or whatever. That
also makes sense, because it's really hard to cancel a lot of flights with short notice. But it has
basically, I'm not going to say a non-event, but it's something at this point, airlines are very
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accustomed to, whether it's storms, or other sorts of issues. This is not a hugely significant
number of flights, which makes me think why even bother in the first place. We have seen on
and off since we recorded our last podcast, some days with truly horrific air traffic control delays
at major airports, I’m thinking, at least specifically, to nobody here in New York, all three airports
were just absolutely awful. Then there are other days where it's totally fine. Or Newark is a
disaster and JFK is fine. Or JFK is a disaster and Newark is fine. It's very unpredictable, simply
because you can't predict who will show up to work in an air traffic control facility, or tower, and
what the load is for that day and how much throughput there is.
[0:06:42] IP: And how much weather there's going to be and how windy it's going to be,
necessitating the use of certain runway configurations, which limit the rate at which you can
depart and arrive aircraft at certain airports. I mean, it's almost like it's a complicated national
airspace system.
[0:06:58] JR: Yes, it is quite dynamic. If you keep an eye on certain routes, there are some hub
to hub, or international routes that haven't been affected at all. There are others where it's very
consistent, where it's this flight out of the overall schedule for the day will be canceled. Then
there's my favorite, micro first bout between Dulles and LaGuardia, where for all five days this
week, Monday through Friday, the day this podcast was released since United has canceled
flights through the Friday, even if the shutdown is over, all five days this week, there has been a
different combination of canceled flights, and there are only four. Some days it's one flight
canceled. Some days it's three out of the four. Some days it's two.
Even when it's two, sometimes just the first two, sometimes it's the middle two. It's just, I would
love to talk with someone at United, or really any other airline and ask them, how did you
determine which flights you're going to cancel? Even when you pick which flights, how did they
fluctuate so wildly day-to-day? I mean, to the individual, this doesn't matter. You're only flying on
one particular day. You're not looking at flights for all of the days. But if you are looking at it, it's
just really interesting to see how airlines reacted to it and what came and what went.
[0:08:12] IP: Yeah. I mean, I'm sure load factors and connections and a bunch of different
things go into it, but it is really interesting to see when you look at it at a macro level, how
random it seems, even though I'm not sure.
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[0:08:27] JR: Hopefully, by the time this comes out, it is behind us. We'll be back to the normal-
ish we've been suffering through where air traffic controllers have been suffering through for
years already.
[0:08:40] IP: I mean, air traffic controllers, once the shutdown's over, we're still going back to
six-day work weeks, 10-hour shifts and mandatory overtime.
[0:08:49] JR: Overtime. Yeah. It's not great. Not great. We try not to strain to the political realm
on this podcast. Sometimes it happens and sometimes people yell at us.
[0:09:00] IP: Mostly because Jason’s insufferable, but we'll be out this time round.
[0:09:05] JR: I think when the president of the United States releases a statement, I think it's
fair game.
[0:09:10] IP: It's worth discussing. Yeah.
[0:09:11] JR: It's worth discussing. If your immediate gut reaction to that is, “Man, you're talking
about politics,” you could just turn off the next few minutes, because we're just going to read
verbatim what Donald Trump –
[0:09:23] IP: We’ll put it in the show notes when you can turn back in.
[0:09:25] JR: We’ll put it in the show. Should we just read it verbatim?
[0:09:28] IP: Yeah, go for it.
[0:09:29] JR: Okay. Here we go. Oh, this is going to be painful. “On November 10th, 10.32 AM,
all air traffic controllers must get back to work NOW!!!” Emphasis added there, because now is
in capitals with three exclamation points. “Anyone who doesn't will be substantially “docked.””
Docked is in quotes. “For those air traffic controllers who were GREAT PATRIOTS,” and
emphasis added again because great patriots is capitalized, “and didn't take any time off,” again
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on caps for the “DEMOCRATIC SHUT DOWN HOAX,” I will be recommending a bonus of
$10,000 per person for distinguished service to our country. For those that did nothing but
complain and took time off, even though everyone knew they would be paid in full shortly into
the future, I am not happy with you. You didn't step up to help the USA against the fake
Democrat attack that was only meant to hurt our country. You will have a negative mark, at least
in my mind, against your record.”
“If you want to leave service in the near future, please do not hesitate to do so, with no payment
or severance of any kind. You will be quickly replaced by true patriots who will do a better job on
the brand-new state of the art equipment, the best in the world that we are in the process of
ordering.” The last quote, “Administration wasted billions of dollars trying to fix antiquated “junk.”
They had no idea what they were doing. Again, to all of our American patriots, God bless you. I
won't be able to send your money fast enough. To all others, report to work immediately. God
bless America. President Donald J. Trump.” End of post.
There is just so, so much to unpack there. From the threatening of air traffic controllers to just
walk off the job and quit, that they can somehow magically be replaced, even though the
backlog of training and getting people into air traffic control seats has been an ongoing problem
for decades at this point, there is nobody to replace someone who just quits tomorrow. I don't
even know what to say about this.
[0:11:32] IP: Well, we can talk about a couple other things. I mean, we can talk about how, one,
I don't think this is productive.
[0:11:37] JR: No.
[0:11:39] IP: We can leave that discussion there about the wisdom of the statement. I want to
look at some of the specific things that the president mentioned. Jason, you already touched on
the encouraging basically, for all intents and purposes, irreplaceable air traffic controllers to just
quit. The wisdom of that encouragement, there is none. Setting aside the docking people's pay,
which I don't think they can do, but who knows, recommending a bonus, I'm not sure where that
comes from, but I want to get into the, “Will be quickly replaced by a true patriot who will do a
better job on the brand-new state of the art equipment.”
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[0:12:16] JR: Wasn't there some relevant news about that just yesterday?
[0:12:18] IP: There is news about that yesterday, which is to say that that brand-new state of
the art equipment will not be ready within the timeframe which it was initially promised.
[0:12:27] JR: Shocking nobody.
[0:12:29] IP: That was news from Department of Transportation Secretary, Sean Duffy,
speaking yesterday at, I'm not sure exactly which airport, but he was speaking to reporters in
the terminal of an airport. He confirmed that, yeah, they're going to get a whole bunch of stuff in
place. But the bulk and most important piece of this brand-new state of the art equipment is not
going to be ready within the three-year timeframe that they have set for themselves. Do with
that information, what you will. I don't think that attacking a workforce that has by and large
shown up to work without pay for the past 40 some odd days and kept people, aircraft, moving
throughout the system as safe as they possibly can. I just don't see where this idea comes from.
I don't see how this can be something like, “I'm going to put out into the world, because I don't
think it helps.”
[0:13:27] JR: Yeah. Especially the bit where he mentions, “Even though everyone knew they
would be paid in full.” Correct me if I'm wrong, but weren't there a bunch of Republicans out
there throwing out the idea of, “Hey, maybe we have to look into whether or not we actually owe
any of these people who are being forced to work any back pay. Maybe they don't get back
pay.” I'm pretty sure that was also tossed out there quite extensively. Maybe not by the president
himself, but definitely by the party.
[0:13:52] IP: That was certainly put out into the universe by members of Congress. But also,
folks who are working don't necessarily have that level of financial security, to be able to not get
paid for two, three paychecks.
[0:14:09] JR: Yup. If there was any air traffic controller that did not show up to work for a day,
there's a chance they were doing Uber Eats, or doing TaskRabbit, or whatever to pay the bills,
so that they could show up to actual work, controlling airplanes the following day. This is really,
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really complicated situation, and yelling about it to the world and threatening and saying, “If you
didn't show up, you should walk out and you'll be docked in my mind,” whatever the hell that
means. Unbelievably irresponsible, but par for the course. Okay, if you were not paying attention
and you're skipping through this timeline for when it's safe to you to come back to listen to
aviation, you can listen again.
[0:14:51] IP: I mean, unfortunately, that is aviation at the moment. I mean, that is aviation in the
US right now. We could have just a politics list discussion about creating a safe national
airspace that works across the country for everyone. I would love to do that.
[0:15:12] JR: Yes, that would be great. But if we did not talk about this, we would be doing you,
the listener, a disservice, because this is reality. This is what's actually happening. Like it or not,
it needs to be talked about. I look forward to reading your negative reviews on iTunes.
[0:15:28] IP: We'll take what we can get, but I think it's an important discussion and we'll keep
at important discussions. Speaking of important discussions, let's talk about the updates for the
UPS crash in Louisville last week. The NTSB did multiple days of on-the-ground briefings. J.
Todd Inman, a board member of the NTSB conducting those briefings and providing us with
some good information all around.
We know now that both the flight data and cockpit voice recorders have been found. The data
has been extracted and it is good data. Meaning, that the data was readable. There was data
there from the accident flight and previous flights in the data recorder. We will have a good idea,
hopefully, from both of those records, what happened. Looking at the physical evidence, there
has been the recovery of multiple fan blade pieces on the airfield, as well as most of the number
one engine’s core was recovered on the airfield.
We know from the cameras at the airport, the CCTV cameras at the airport that the bulk of the
engine pylon on the number one engine was still attached to the engine as it separated from the
wing. That was confirmed by the video that the NTSB has viewed. Then the fourth point that I
think is worth raising is that on the CVR audio, 37 seconds after the call for takeoff thrust, so 37
seconds after the pilots said, “Okay, let's go,” a persistent bell is heard.
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The NTSB briefings do not get into what that bell is specifically. Board member Inman pushed
back against the description of the bell as an alarm. Said, it's a persistent bell. What we do
know is the bell continues for 25 seconds after it begins, and that is the end of the recording. 37
seconds after the call for takeoff thrust, they begin the takeoff roll, 37 seconds after that the bell
starts and then the recording ends 25 seconds later.
[0:17:50] JR: Good on the NTSB for not getting tricked into confirming what that persistent bell
is when they don't know for sure, because I don't know the warning systems on an MD-11, and
I'm sure a lot, most people don't, even seasoned veterans in this industry. Maybe it could be a
bunch of things. I don't know. The MD-11 is an older aircraft. But good on them for not just
jumping to conclusions. I'm so happy for them that the flight data recorders are sound, because
we've seen too many incidents recently, where they are either not present, or weren’t working,
or unrecoverable. So, this is good news.
[0:18:26] IP: Yeah, absolutely. MD-11 fleet updates. The Boeing company which took over
responsibility for the MD-11 after the merger with McDonald Douglas, issued a recommendation
to operators of the MD-11. There are only three airlines still operating the MD-11; UPS, FedEx
and Western Global Airlines saying, “Please, ground your MD-11 and do not operate any
additional flights until further engineering analysis has been carried out.” That was followed up
by an FAA emergency airworthiness directive that is perhaps, the most vague airworthiness
directive I have ever read.
[0:19:13] IP: How is it vague?
[0:19:15] JR: I'll just read the entire requirements of the AD.
[0:19:19] JR: We're all about reading things verbatim today.
[0:19:21] IP: “This AD prohibits further flight until the airplane is inspected and all applicable
corrective actions are performed using a method approved by the manager, AIR-520 continued
operational safety branch FAA.” Which is to say, inspect your planes and then give us a call.
[0:19:41] JR: Oh, what are they inspecting them for?
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[0:19:44] IP: Yes.
[0:19:46] JR: Oh, okay. These are going to be flying any time soon, by the sound of it. If
obviously at this point they don't even know what they're inspecting.
[0:19:54] IP: The focus right now is on the engine pylon and its attachment to the wing, as far
as the investigation, as far as the physical evidence and as far as what these airlines are
looking at. The FAA makes no mention of how to satisfy these inspections, nor does it make any
mention of what are the methods of compliance and after these aircraft have been inspected
and they've talked to the operational safety branch, can these aircraft fly again?
To date, no MD-11s have flown, basically since Boeing recommended the aircraft were
grounded. The FAA's EAD came after UPS and FedEx grounded their aircraft. Western Global
was still flying theirs at the time the EAD was issued.
[0:20:43] JR: Even they have stopped operating?
[0:20:45] IP: Yeah, they're done. All the MD-11s are currently on the ground. There have been
transponder pings from a bunch of FedEx and UPS aircraft over the past week, but those have
just been on-ground signals. A couple were moved from where they had been parked to various
other areas at the airports they are at, but nothing has flown since.
[0:21:07] JR: Okay. Well, if there's any time of the year, FedEx and UPS and I guess, Western
Global need those aircraft more than ever, it's now-ish. Hopefully, we do see these aircraft come
back and relatively soon. But I feel like this may be the end of the road for them. A non-zero
chance, I would say, and I would hate to see them go like that.
[0:21:27] IP: Ah. I think we'll see things back in service.
[0:21:29] JR: I hope so. But man, what a crash.
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[0:21:33] IP: Let's talk about an incident that happened in 2023 in Melbourne, Australia. This is
from an ATSB report that was released yesterday. If you're like me and you like reading accident
investigation reports as they are released, I always enjoy the thoroughness and visual details
that the ATSB includes.
[0:21:58] JR: Yeah, you know what's better than reading a report, though? Watching a report.
You know what's even better than watching an ATSB report, or any report? A really high-quality,
overly produced final report, because this is just the new gold standard for air accident reports.
[0:22:20] IP: There's wireframe 3D modeling. It has everything you could –
[0:22:24] JR: You don’t care how long it delayed this final report being issued, it was worth
every frame of the video.
[0:22:33] IP: Here's what happened. In September 2023, Melbourne Airport was performing
construction work on runway 34. Because of that construction work, the runway was temporarily
shortened by 1,568 meters. From the far end of the runway, they left a 450 meter safety zone in
front of the construction work, which left a 2,089-meter runway available for departures on
runway 34.
[0:23:09] JR: Okay. It sounds like their due diligence was conducted there, and all the correct
safety margins were put in place. What went wrong?
[0:23:18] IP: Well, it didn't necessarily go wrong once, it went wrong twice.
[0:23:23] JR: Oh, that's twice as bad.
[0:23:24] IP: On the 7th of September, a Malaysia Airlines A330 overran the shortened runway
and passed over the construction crews with just a few meters of clearance.
[0:23:39] JR: Oh, you must mean like, I don't know, a 100 meters.
[0:23:42] IP: No. I meant, few meters, as in 7 meters.
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[0:23:49] JR: Oh, that's a, quick convert to feet.
[0:23:51] IP: 23 feet.
[0:23:53] JR: That's not a lot.
[0:23:54] IP: That’s not a lot.
[0:23:56] JR: Now, that's really, really bad. But surely, it didn't happen again. If it happened
again, it wouldn't have been that close, right? Lessons were learned, corrections corrected.
[0:24:06] IP: Yeah. So, it happened again about 10 days later. That was even closer, passing
only 5 meters above the active work site, which is just 16 feet.
[0:24:17] JR: Ian, that's much worse.
[0:24:19] IP: Oh, boy.
[0:24:20] JR: Yeah. The ATSB goes into a bunch of analysis of what actually happened here.
Even though the correct NOTAMs were filed, but we all at this podcast know the issues with the
NOTAM system, how there could be literally hundreds of NOTAMa all there, issued for a single
airport. It's very, very difficult to figure out what's important and what is bird activity, 7 miles
south southeast from the departure runway. It was also broadcast over ATIS, which is the
Automatic Terminal Information Service, something that departing flight crews listen to and then
confirm back to air traffic control that they have listened to the most recent ATIS broadcast.
However, the quote is neither flight crew identified that the runway was significantly shortened,
despite the relevant NOTAM being provided in their flight briefing packs. While both crews
accessed a version of the ATIS that mentioned the shortened runway, they only noted to air
traffic control the weather information from the ATIS and not the reduced runway length. In
addition, while each airport's flight dispatcher had accounted for the reduced runway length in
their indicative takeoff performance calculations, they did not specifically highlight the shortened
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runway in the flight crews pre-flight briefing packages. This was likely since each aircraft was
able to safely depart from the reduced runway length if appropriate power settings were applied.
Almost a pair of disasters here in the name of saving a couple gallons of fuel for reduced power
takeoffs.
[0:25:52] IP: Yeah. I mean, thankfully, the shortened runway was accounted for in the takeoff
settings. But it seems to me that I feel like, there's something that could be done, just to let folks
know, hey, before you leave, just know that there is construction at the end of the runway that
you are going to be traveling down the runway towards. I feel like, some positive confirmation,
either with air traffic control, I feel like there's something missing there.
[0:26:24] JR: Yeah. So is the ATSB who says, with the release of this investigation report, the
ATSB has issued a formal safety recommendation to ICAO that will review annex 11 to include
procedures for air traffic control communications to increase assurance that flight crews have
received safety critical aerodrome condition information. They go on, changes in response to
this recommendation would improve aviation safety worldwide. Cheers to that. Learning from
mistakes, proposing solutions and making sure they get applied globally. That's how it is done. I
love it.
[0:26:58] IP: I love it.
[0:26:58] JR: Watch the video. It's a good time.
[0:27:00] IP: Yeah. The video is linked in the show notes. Let's head to Europe and talk about
Wizz Air, which has slashed its Airbus A321XL order from a whopping 47 to 11 aircraft.
[0:27:16] JR: Ooh, these go to 11. But that's not particularly good for Airbus, but it's going to be
good for someone else who wants some XLRs, I guess, if it works that way. Because they're not
taking aircraft, they are demoting their order, essentially, to what it says, is basically just the
regular A321neo. Not even the LR. Just, they're going from the XLR to the regular neo, which is
interesting. I guess, yeah, the XLR apparently, according to Wizz Air, just doesn't do what an
ultra-low-cost carrier, like Wizz Air needed to, or it does too much and Wizz Air just doesn't need
that much. We don't really know.
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[0:27:52] IP: Unfortunately for Wizz Air, they're already down one A321XLR. Their first
A321XLR, which has been stuck in Prague, grounded for a wee bit now ever, since it suffered a
tail strike and hard landing. Czech investigators have detailed the circumstances around that
hard landing and tail strike now at a preliminary report. They say that the first officer was the
pilot flying. They had 450 total hours on the A320 family. The captain was the pilot monitoring
and it was the captain's first time in command of an A321.
[0:28:28] JR: Oof.
[0:28:28] IP: Not an auspicious beginning.
[0:28:31] JR: No.
[0:28:33] IP: The aircraft between, as it came to land in Prague from 75 down to 30 feet, the
rate of descent rose from 480 feet per minute to 768 feet per minute, a 60% increase.
[0:28:46] JR: Whoops.
[0:28:48] IP: The aircraft leveled the flare at 25 feet and contacted the runway at 6 degrees
nose up with a 2.54G impact.
[0:28:57] JR: Yikes. Then it bounced, and then it was redeployed, and then the pitch went from
7.7 to 9.7 in less than a second. Then you had a tail strike, and that's how that aircraft is taking
a vacation in Prague. Very nice place to take a couple days off.
[0:29:11] IP: Airbus AOG team, I'm sure, assessing the situation and will resolve it accordingly.
But not great for that particular 321XLR.
[0:29:20] JR: No. That's a shame that it was the captain's pilot monitoring, you said, their first
time in a 321.
[0:29:25] IP: Yes.
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[0:29:26] JR: That's rough. It reminds me of, what was this? Pre-COVID, maybe 2020, where a
United, either FO or captain was their first time in a 767 and then they really landed hard at
Newark and crumpled the skin of the aircraft. These things happen.
[0:29:44] IP: Yeah. Hopefully, the aircraft makes it back into service soon. Jason, when you put
this next story in the show notes, I was very confused.
[0:29:54] JR: It usually goes the other way around, but –
[0:29:56] IP: Yeah. I'm glad to say that I'm less confused now. The notes here say that Emirates
wants to add 15 A380s to its fleet by the end of 2026.
[0:30:08] JR: Yes. Re-open the line later this week, crank out more A380s and put them in the
sky. Unfortunately, that is not what is happening. But Emirates, talking with Aviation Week’s
Victoria Moores, confirms that needs to put more A380s than it already has delivered, but
grounded at this time, back into service. They are aiming for 110-ish operational A380s by the
end of 2026, up from apparently, 95 or 96 currently. They have slowly ramped up the number of
A380s in service since COVID, since the majority of that fleet was parked. Apparently, between
the aircraft that were parked and the aircraft it has scrapped in the last few years, Emirates can
do this for the next couple of decades with the A380, which it says, will continue operating until
2041, I believe, which is quite a while from now, and I love to see that.
Unfortunately, there is a hard limit. Sir Tim Clark says that there is a speck of 100,000 hours, or
about 20 years for the A380. Once they hit that, there is really no going beyond that for this
particular aircraft, unfortunately. Really interesting to see Emirates ramping up and not down its
A380s in service. Probably not what they want to do, looking at you Boeing and 777X. But if you
are in a position where you have some A380s lying around to put back into service, good for
you.
[0:31:37] IP: Let's head now to the other end of opulence and talk about Spirit Airlines once
again. What went last week, Spirit executives reached a tentative agreement that still needs to
be ratified by both unions. But a tentative agreement with pilots and flight attendants for pay
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cuts. This week, Spirit executives announced that they will take commensurate pay cuts equal
to, or greater than those being taken by their unions. They haven't said what those pay cuts are,
but they seem to have agreed to them. We'll see if the unions ratify those agreements.
That said, in their 10K filed this week, Spirit says a lot of things. But this one stood out to me,
after listing all of the things that have gone wrong and are going wrong for the airline, “Based on
such evaluation, management believes there is substantial doubt about our ability to continue as
a going concern.” That's not new information.
[0:32:41] JR: We've heard that before. Yeah.
[0:32:43] IP: But the stuff that's ahead of that statement keeps getting longer.
[0:32:48] JR: Uh-oh.
[0:32:48] IP: One of the things is a lack of cash. This is an angle that I had not considered
before. Now that Spirit has rejected the leases on its A320neo fleet, they are no longer getting,
“Sorry, we gave you bad engines payments,” from, well, they were getting the money from IAE,
but from Pratt & Whitney, generally.
[0:33:14] JR: Wait, is that a net negative? I mean, I would have figured that, yeah, you're no
longer getting the, “Sorry, we screwed up so royally, half have your airplanes don't work,”
checks. But also, they're not paying for these aircraft anymore and they're not able to operate.
[0:33:29] IP: I think it's the issue of cash. I think the cash aspect of it.
[0:33:34] JR: Yeah. I just wonder, I guess they were taking in more money from Pratt than they
were spending on the leases themselves. Very interesting.
[0:33:42] IP: I don't necessarily know if that's the case. It's just they're not –
[0:33:47] JR: Significant enough to call out in 10K.
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[0:33:50] IP: Yeah. That was an interesting line and something that I had not considered
previously. We'll keep a look and see if Spirit can continue to shrink itself to profitability, or if
someone can come along and mercifully put the airline out of its misery and acquire it.
[0:34:08] JR: We'll see.
[0:34:09] IP: Now, we go to the dispute between the United States Department of
Transportation and nominally, Aeromexico and Delta's joint venture. As part of all of this,
Aeromexico has responded to the Department of Transportation's nullification of the joint
venture, as well as objections by the Department of Transportation to some of Mexico's handling
of where cargo can operate. The thing here is that Aeromexico makes a strong case that the
DOT's actions are contrary to what is legal. They say that the DOT's actions “rests on
unfounded hope that the drastic discriminatory action it proposes will persuade the government
of Mexico to retract the Mexican presidential decree,” which is the movement of cargo to the
alternate airport.
Aeromexico then goes on to argue that the cuts are not in the public interest, which is what the
law requires and says, “Instead, the department concedes that its proposed actions is clearly
not in the public interest and would disrupt the marketplace for consumers and shippers alike.”
Which the DOT did in fact concede in the order. They said, “We know this is going to cause
disruption. Deal with it.” Aeromexico also points out that the agreement governing the cargo
movements includes a clause that says, “We can move the cargo movements to airports in the
area and those are considered equivalent to this airport.”
[0:35:55] JR: Okay. Man, this saga just keeps going back and forth and back and forth. All of
this could have been avoided almost certainly if they hadn't canceled the new, original new
flavor Mexico City Airport from years ago. But that's probably never coming back as reality, is it?
[0:36:16] IP: No. This is a really interesting document that Aeromexico has filed. Will it make a
lick of difference?
[0:36:24] JR: No.
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[0:36:25] IP: Probably not, but it's something we can definitely have a look at just for fun. Hey,
Jason.
[0:36:31] JR: Let's talk about some legal stuff.
[0:36:33] IP: Yes. When this lawsuit was filed two months ago, we discussed it, where a group
of passengers who had purchased window seats on United and Delta flights found out that their
window seats had no window.
[0:36:53] JR: A traits of, well, every 737 out there, as far as I know. This is such a thing.
[0:37:01] IP: They are suing the airlines for saying, “Here's your window seat,” and not having a
window. Whereas, other airlines are very clear about the fact that you are purchasing a window
seat, or you're being selecting a window seat that has no actual view out the window, because –
[0:37:19] JR: Because there is no window. Yeah. Oh, this is, United has filed a response and it
is just one of those all-time legal responses that you just look at and you read and you say,
“Huh, they really said that. This isn't the joke.” I'm going to be careful in my critique of this,
because I have many interests in this exact kind of work with the United and other airlines, but
I'm just going to read the quote. “The use of the word “window” in reference to a particular seat
cannot reasonably be interpreted as a promise that the seat will have an exterior window view.
Rather, the word window identifies the position of the seat, i.e. next to the wall of the main body
of the aircraft.” Ooh, that's a very lawyery statement right there.
[0:38:06] IP: Are we reasonable people, Jason?
[0:38:07] JR: I like to believe, I have been known to act reasonably on occasion.
[0:38:12] IP: Because when I hear window, or window seat, I assume that I'm seated next to a
window. If I'm not going to be seated next to a window, because I understand that aircraft do
need electrical ducting, they need air-conditioned ducting, they need other structural things that
might necessitate not having a window in a particular piece of sidewall, I totally understand that,
I would like to be informed. If I'm told that the seat I'm sitting in is an aisle seat, I expect it to be
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next to an aisle. If I'm told the seat that I'm going to be sitting is a middle seat, I would be very
surprised if it was not in the middle of other seats.
[0:38:49] JR: And delighted, perhaps.
[0:38:51] IP: Certainly. Maybe this is an argument I can use. I can sit in a window seat in the
middle of the cabin, and then I can make the argument that the middle described the position
within the cabin, not necessarily the position within the row. That'll go over well, right?
[0:39:09] JR: Yeah. Honestly, I feel like the lawsuit here has a pretty good merit that it will
continue. I honestly don't think reading this that the court will toss it out, because there is very
incontrovertible evidence that other airlines have figured this out. When you go to book a flight
on their seat map, you can see that this is a windowless window seat. Even Norse Atlantic has
figured that out on its seat map. If Norse Atlantic can do it, I think United and Delta can and
should be doing it. It's a very complicated ecosystem. I know it all too well. It's the bane of my
existence right now at my actual day job. It's going to be real interesting to see how this goes
and what precedent it sets in the future, because I think this is an actual legitimate problem. If I
buy a window seat –
[0:39:54] IP: Oh, yeah. Absolutely.
[0:39:55] JR: - I want there to be a damn window. I don't think I, or the person who brought up
this cost action lawsuit is alone in that.
[0:40:02] IP: I mean, it would be one thing if that Brazilian law goes into effect and you don't
have to pay to select a seat anymore. That would be one thing. I'd be mildly disappointed if that
happened. But if I'm paying on some United flights, hundreds of dollars and I end up not being
able to sit next to a window unknowingly, I'm going to be more than disappointed.
[0:40:26] JR: Yeah. it's not just about the fact that you are paying to select a seat that may not
actually have a window. I believe, at least for United, there are several rows on the 737-800 and
900, maybe the 700 that do not have windows, but are actually marketed as an upgrade as
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economy plus. You're not just paying $20 for a seat assignment. You are paying potentially
hundreds of dollars for extra legroom marketed as an upgrade, where there's no actual window.
[0:41:00] IP: We'll see what the judge says about this particular filing.
[0:41:03] JR: Yeah. Speaking of upgrading to economy plus, this is – I just found this fun and
interesting. Qantas is launching economy plus on its 737s A220s and A321XLRs. But there's an
interesting wrinkle. It happens to be that United registered the trademark economy plus, even in
Australia, way, way, way, way, way, way back when. But apparently, it expired, but they renewed
it and it's under investigation. Now, Qantas might have to come up with a new name if it can't
get that trademark for economy plus. That's just a fun twist.
[0:41:42] IP: I mean, at some point, you're going to run out of names, for what do we call this?
Economy more.
[0:41:47] JR: Unfortunately, there are an endless stream of names for what is essentially the
same thing, and then the endless seeming way of how to market the same thing, whether it is
just a seat assignment, or if you’re Delta, or another case is United, or sometimes and/or
American and/or JetBlue, it's sold as its own cabin. The whole thing is real strange. But hey,
good on United for protecting its intellectual property way back when, apparently, all the way in
Australia.
[0:42:15] IP: It's important.
[0:42:15] JR: Yeah.
[0:42:17] IP: Our last bit of legal news comes to us from the long running saga between the
United States government and Boeing. In 2021, following a long investigation into the crash of
the two 737 next aircraft and how that aircraft was certified by the FAA. The Department of
Justice filed suit against Boeing, alleging that the aircraft manufacturer committed fraud during
the certification process, saying that Boeing had hid important information about the aircraft
systems and misled FAA staff who were certifying the aircraft. As part of that allegation, Boeing
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agreed to a deferred prosecution agreement, where it would pay millions of dollars in fines,
compensation, and a promise to do better and not do anything bad again.
In 2024, following the Alaska Airlines mid cabin exit door plug blowout, the DOJ revisited that
agreement and said Boeing had breached the agreement and then brought Boeing up on
criminal charges and brought them to court. That lasted through the back half of 2024, when the
Department of Justice switched over. By then, Boeing had pleaded guilty to the charges. The
question was, what is the agreement going to look like upon Boeing pleading to these charges,
which included an independent compliance monitor, additional monetary fines, and
compensation to the victims of the two MAX crashes.
Then, after the 2024 election, that was all put on hold as the new Department of Justice staff
came onboard. The judge in the case, Judge Reed O’Conner, rejected the initial compliance
monitor appointment for a variety of reasons, including the selection of that monitor and how
that would actually work. Then, the DOJ this year said, it would drop the case after reaching a
non-prosecution arrangement with Boeing. That agreement that they reached did not include
any independent compliance monitoring, included a additional payment, additional fine, and a
few hundred million dollars in improved compliance with existing regulations from the FAA.
Victims, families from the max crashes, sued and argued to say, that this should not happen,
that Boeing has pleaded guilty, and that they should be held to account for this. The judge in the
case agreed with that, but said he had no legal authority to override the prosecution's decision
to drop the case. Judge Reed O’Conner said that the victims’ families and their lawyers seeking
to continue the case are “correct that this agreement fails to secure the necessary accountability
to ensure the safety of the flying public.” But he had absolutely no authority to countermand the
agreement that has been reached. Victims' families' lawyers say that they are going to appeal in
the hopes of continuing this case.
Sticking with Boeing, let's talk about some interesting orders that they've racked up in the past
week or so. Jason, take it away.
[0:46:10] JR: Yeah, in the same week, this news that a lot of people aren't too happy about,
about the DOJ, and that ruling came out, but two very interesting orders. Interesting, I guess.
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Kazakhstan's Air Astana, committed to an order of up to 15 787-9, growing its fleet all the way
up to 18, if all are delivered. That's a pretty big fleet for little Air Astana. That's pretty cool.
Tajikistan's Somon Air, I guess that's how that's pronounced, also committed to order four 787s
and 10 737 MAX 8. Some real orders, some maybe coming in the future orders, but those are
two airlines you don't hear all that much about.
[0:46:52] IP: No. Well, I mean, hey, 787 orders are 787 orders, which is why Boeing has just
begun the expansion of its Charleston facility, spending, I think, a billion dollars to expand that
facility in the hopes of growing the 787 production rate above 10 per month. Good for them.
[0:47:11] JR: Hey, good one. We didn't have that in the show notes. That just came off the top
of your head.
[0:47:13] IP: Off the top of my head right there.
[0:47:15] JR: Good work. Good work.
[0:47:16] IP: Let's go to Dulles, where I didn't know this could happen, but apparently, it
happens more often than you think.
[0:47:23] JR: Oh, if you've ever been to Dulles and experienced a ride in one of the mobile
lounges, or moon buggies, or whatever you might call them, wouldn't be all that shocking that
they crash every now and then, because they're just zipping all over the field, going back and
forth. They're vehicles based – I mean, not based on. They are very old deck. I think half-
century old vehicle at this point, but they've got 19 of these mobile lounges, which either
transport people between Concorde’s A&D or actually connect to the aircraft and shuttle them
over in the most unpleasant way possible over to a CPP processing.
Last week on November 10th, one of them crashed, or came in at an angle a little too extreme
and hit the terminal. Unfortunately, I think there were some injuries, nothing really substantial.
Just another incident where apparently, according to this New York Times article, which itself
references a 2017 investigation by NBC4 Washington that the moon buggies have been
involved in at least 16 collisions and mishaps since 2007, including one fatal accident. Another
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that cause injuries, that's going to happen with any manually driven large aircraft that's, yeah,
they're on fixed routes, but airports are chaotic. If you've ever been on one of these, you know
they pull into these loading bays between the other people movers, and it's just a lot. Even
when they open the new midfield concourse, these things are still going to be around
indefinitely. I don't know.
[0:48:57] IP: All right.
[0:48:57] JR: Hold a handle or something? If you can reach it. It’s not like you're crammed on to
one of these.
[0:49:04] IP: Always solid advice. This one, I don't even know what to make of it, because it just
keeps getting the more you read about what's happening here, the stranger it becomes. New
Pacific Airlines, which –
[0:49:16] JR: Didn't expect to ever hear about them again.
[0:49:17] IP: Right? Which started out as a reincarnation, or a split off of a second airline, which
then they had to change their name, because they were called Northern Pacific and they got
sued and then they became new Pacific and then they went away because they weren't making
any money. But now, they're back and they're going to operate not the 757s that they had, but a
320-family aircraft for beyond, which is a premium leisure-focused airline serving the Maldives.
[0:49:51] JR: I understood all of those words individually, but put together in that order, in that
sentence, I do not understand them. is this just beyond wanting to move into the US and new
Pacifics out here just with the valid AOC and says, “We'll do it for you.”
[0:50:08] IP: I think so.
[0:50:11] JR: Why do all of that, I guess? Because New Pacific, I believe, still operates at 757s
as charger aircraft. Quite lucratively, I believe, that they pop in here to LaGuardia quite often.
But this twist, beyond I didn't think was going to be a thing in and of itself very long. But to move
into the US and have new Pacific do it. Yeah.
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[0:50:31] IP: Basically, they need a US AOC and they need a US owner to get around
ownership rules.
[0:50:37] JR: Every time you think you have this industry figured out, you get a curve ball like
this, and you just scratch your head and go, “Huh. I didn’t see that coming.”
[0:50:45] IP: We'll see what happens. Then finally, Jason, this one really is for folks who make it
to the end of the podcast.
[0:50:52] JR: Yes. Only the true listeners who got to the end of this almost hour-long podcast
will know that if you fly, I guess, it's technically Alaska Airlines, but really seemingly only the
Hawaiian version of Alaska Airlines, they have introduced trading cards, aircraft trading cards,
which you may be familiar of for decades of history. More recently, really came back into vogue
with [inaudible 0:51:19]. I don't think American, but United and Delta have put out some really
nice, specifically Delta, because those cards are really nice, trading cards.
[0:51:26] IP: I've got some on my desk right now.
[0:51:28] JR: Yeah. They're shiny, which is great. We love shiny things.
[0:51:31] IP: I love shiny things.
[0:51:32] JR: Aircraft trading cards are back in Alaska/Hawaiian. I really think this was a thing
that Hawaiian was probably doing and then Alaska happened, but it really seems limited to
Alaska. They have trading cards for the 787, A330, A321neo, and Boeing 717. But there is an
interesting, interesting twist, Ian. With the 717, they will launch digital trading cards for all 66
Hawaiian Airline aircraft with unique digital designs inspired by the name given to each aircraft.
Onboard the aircraft, I've never flown Hawaiian, but apparently, there is a plaque or bolted to the
airplane that has the name of the aircraft and I am not even going to dare to attempt the name
of N389HA, an A330. Just going to skip right over that. But there's a picture of the plaque
describing the name behind it and also, a little NFC tag that when you board the aircraft, you
can tap your phone to it and it brings up a digital trading card for that specific aircraft, which
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goes into a new account-based system where you can have them all in an account on your
phone and I guess, presumably trade them.
Otherwise, if you can't, what's the point of this? Apparently, there are 66 individual digital trading
cards. If you are crazy enough to collect all 66 of them somehow, we would like to talk with you.
I'm sure Hawaiian Airlines, or Alaska Airlines, whatever it is these days, would also like to talk to
you, because that's an impressive, interesting twist on a very old tradition.
[0:53:10] IP: That is neat and also impressive if someone managed to do that. Yeah, absolutely.
We would love to talk to you.
[0:53:16] JR: Cool.
[0:53:17] IP: All right. Well, good luck. Go out there and get all 66. This has been episode 345
of AvTalk. I am Ian Petchenik, here, as always with –
[0:53:30] JR: Jason Rabinowitz. Thanks for listening.
[END]
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