- United Airlines plans to layoff workers in Guam. A United spokesperson said the airline remains committed to Guam, but plans to close the contact center, outsource cargo operations and reduce airport staffing. The contact center and cargo department employ 48 and 42 people respectively.
- When Apple debuted the iPhone 5 last week and went through the features of Passbook, Delta and American were featured and it was unclear whether United was still committed. I can’t find the specific article last week that mentioned United had “no comment” on the matter, but they were indeed part of the launch now available on iOS 6. Lufthansa and Virgin Australia are also currently supported.
- The Transportation Security Administration and U.S. Customs and Border Protection opened a temporary joint information center for PreCheck and Global Entry at Washington Dulles. It will be staffed for the next 90 days offering information on the two trusted traveler programs.
- This surprised me: Baltimore-Washington Int’l Airport is on track to outrank Washington Dulles as the region’s top airport in passenger traffic. Truth be told, I’ve never flown into BWI, but it still sort of shocks me given the significant international traffic at Dulles.
- Air Canada unveiled its new “Altitude” elite levels for 2013 Aeroplan program year. Seth has a good analysis of the changes from the existing Top Tier program.
- United Airlines announced new routes from its hub in Cleveland, perhaps giving a smidge of hope Cleveland won’t become a “spoke” city. The new service to Nashville and Oklahoma City will be operated by ExpressJet using 50-seater ERJ-145s.
- Two American Eagle flight attendants caused a four-hour delay after having on onboard tiff at JFK. The flight was taxiing when the pilots elected to turn around and head back to the gate due to the bickering. The “American” brand is having a rough, rough week.
You must have never seen WN/FL’s operation at BWI 😉
I very much prefer BWI over IAD, granted concourse C and D are a dump at BWI, but still better than C/D at IAD. Hopefully, after the small renovation work they are doing at A/B right now they will look into overhauling concourses C/D.
Turns out BWI is in fact renovating concourse C along with the work they are doing for A/B [security area and intra terminal connectors] and it should be complete sometime in 2013. Once it is complete WN/FL will occupy concourses A/B/C and I suspect in the long term AA/NK will move from C to D making the three terminals exclusive to WN.
So that leaves us with concourse D [the former MetroJet/US terminal] that needs a facelift.