Reconfigured A321s

I know this question has been asked a million times..but what are Parkers and anyone elses email addresses that passengers can contact with complaints?
 
No correction necessary, since you're got the right idea - T/O and climb may not burn over 50% of the total trip fuel but it burns an inordinate amount it. On the 737, T/O and climb burn varied between 35 & 50% of trip fuel, but we didn't fly anything much over 3 hours.

The longer the flight, the lower percentage of the total burn is used in T/O and climb - but also the lower % of trip distance spent in T/O and climb.

The three most expensive abnormal things for a flight are probably divert, fuel stop, or hold.

Jim

Jim,

This has always been my argument against management's argument about why they don't offer non-stop flights from the northeast to Florida in the winter, when that's where everybody is going.

They always say, "We lose money on flights to Florida."

So why do they still sell tickets from the northeast to Florida; and then use two aircraft, two crews, and the personnel and equipment at three ground stations to get that family to Florida with the obligatory connection at a hub?

Throw in the much higher extra fuel burn going in and out of the hub, and the Philly Factor -- misconnects, oversold flights resulting in more give-aways, lost bags, etc., especially in winter -- and how much money did the company lose to provide that $199 fare from BOS or LGA to Florida?

No, instead let's use a mainline aircraft to make an inefficient 55-minute flight every hour from BOS to PHL, instead of offering one flight a day to each Florida city to which the customers on that BOS-PHL flight are really going.

Having said all that, I'm still willing to give management another mulligan for this winter.

Last winter, I realize they had just taken over at the end of September, and the winter schedules were pretty much set. This winter, as we all know, they were "singularly focused" on the Delta merger, and the last thing they wanted to show was any more overlap flights with Delta (who regularly fill wide-bodies between Florida and BOS and NYC).

But hopefully, when next winter rolls around, they will realize that repeats of the Christmas '04 and Valentine's Day '07 meltdowns could be avoided, or certainly minimized, if the Gangwal-era philopsophy that everybody has to go through PHL to get to Florida is finally, mercifully abandoned.

(Acquaintance: "How much is a ticket on 'USAir' from Boston or Manchester to Florida?"

Me: "'USAir' doesn't go to Florida out of Boston or Manchester. They only go to Philadelphia. Try Delta, or American, or JetBlue, or AirTran, or Southwest...")
 
Jim,

This has always been my argument against management's argument about why they don't offer non-stop flights from the northeast to Florida in the winter, when that's where everybody is going.

They always say, "We lose money on NON-STOP flights to Florida."

note correction

So why do they still sell tickets from the northeast to Florida; and then use two aircraft, two crews, and the personnel and equipment at three ground stations to get that family to Florida with the obligatory connection at a hub?

Throw in the much higher extra fuel burn going in and out of the hub, and the Philly Factor -- misconnects, oversold flights resulting in more give-aways, lost bags, etc., especially in winter -- and how much money did the company lose to provide that $199 fare from BOS or LGA to Florida?

No, instead let's use a mainline aircraft to make an inefficient 55-minute flight every hour from BOS to PHL, instead of offering one flight a day to each Florida city to which the customers on that BOS-PHL flight are really going.

Everyone on a BOS-PHL flight is headed for Florida? Really? No one goes to Philadelphia or changes planes to go anywhere else but Florida?

Having said all that, I'm still willing to give management another mulligan for this winter.

Last winter, I realize they had just taken over at the end of September, and the winter schedules were pretty much set. This winter, as we all know, they were "singularly focused" on the Delta merger, and the last thing they wanted to show was any more overlap flights with Delta (who regularly fill wide-bodies between Florida and BOS and NYC).

But hopefully, when next winter rolls around, they will realize that repeats of the Christmas '04 and Valentine's Day '07 meltdowns could be avoided, or certainly minimized, if the Gangwal-era philopsophy that everybody has to go through PHL to get to Florida is finally, mercifully abandoned.

(Acquaintance: "How much is a ticket on 'USAir' from Boston or Manchester to Florida?"

Me: "'USAir' doesn't go to Florida out of Boston or Manchester. They only go to Philadelphia. Try Delta, or American, or JetBlue, or AirTran, or Southwest...")

US certainly does service Florida, just not non-stop.