Swiss Private Aviation faces grounding?

“after months of intensive investigations and negotiations the board of the Swiss Private Aviation has to consider to liquidate the company” writes Peter Koch, CEO of the Swiss subsidiary to its staff in a circular. SPA started 3 years ago and currently operates 7 airplanes. The project, was initaly initiated by the former Lufthansa CEO Wolfgang Mayrhuber .

Since its founding, the company faced a difficult economic environment. The 2009 economic crisis has exacerbated the situation considerably. The current 61 employees would remain employed where possible within the Swiss group or in the Lufthansa Group. For all other concerned, individual solutions were developed through a social plan. 

Air France receives 200th Boeing Airplane

Courtesy of Boeing

Boeing and Air France celebrated on Wednesday the 200th direct delivery of a Boeing jetliner – a 777-300ER (extended range. With more deliveries in Summer 2011 Air France will be the world’s largest operator of Boeing 777. Pictured here is the new Air France 777-300ER taking off from Paine Field in Everett, Wash.

Continental Boeing 777 flat-bed BusinessFirst seats

Courtesy of Continental Airlines

Continental Airlines announced that all of its Boeing 777 long-haul, international flights now feature new flat-bed seats in its BusinessFirst cabin. CO currently operates the 777-200 on international routes between EWR and Beijing, Delhi, Frankfurt, Hong Kong, London/Heathrow, Mumbai, Shanghai, Tel Aviv and Tokyo Narita, and between Houston and London Heathrow and Tokyo Narita. Customers flying to international destinations on CO 777s are now assured a flat-bed seat.

The flat-bed seats made their operational debut in November 2009 and are also being installed on CO’s fleet of Boeing 757-200 aircraft. CO will begin retrofitting substantially all of its Boeing 767 aircraft with BusinessFirst flat-bed seats in 2011.

Impressive time laps video on United's new livery

Enjoy the 2 minute time laps on the new paint job getting done.

United Airlines from worst to first

DietDetective.com has issued the 2010 Airline Food Survey, rating the healthiness of foods for eight American airlines.

DietDetective.com's editor, Charles Stuart Platkin said in a statement:  "This year United provided the 'healthiest" choices in the sky, while Continental had a fall from grace, US Airways received the lowest rating, and Virgin America and Delta were the least cooperative (and also received a low health rating)."

The new Choice Menu on United with 3 new snackboxes along with a selection of breakfast items, salads, sandwiches & snacks boosted their rating to #1 compared to the year before when UA was last.

Detailed survey results including nutrition facts on meals and snacks tested: Here  

What is the world's best airline?

US based Zagat Survey has published it's annual airline ranking containing 16 US and 74 international carriers. The international top scorers are Singapore Airlines, Air New Zealand and Emirates. Among US carriers Continental is the winner for its premium service product on domestic routes. According to survey results the best economy class experience is found on Jet Blue.Only 2 European carriers are found among the top five of the carriers surveyed. British Airways came in 3rd for best inflight entertainment international and Lufthansa/Swiss is on the 4th place in the category top frequent flier programs.
Zagat also took into account surveyors comments that according to their lawyers are too strong to put in their printed publication. Here some of our favorites: "My bags get better service, but they pay extra", "At least they haven't killed me yet" and "The only difference between economy and business classes is a shrimp on your salad".

Read more outtakes that put a smile on your face here. For detailed survey results click here

First United Airlines owned Boeing 777 in new livery

The first UA plane repainted in the new livery returned to service November 23rd. The B777 was ferried to Los Angeles from the painting facility in Amarillo, Texas. In LAX it returned to revenue service for a flight to Washington Dulles. United has started to repaint another of its 777 in Victorville, California. By the end of 2010 a total of 7 Boeing 777 will have been completed. Currently 32 narrow and wide bodies from Continental have been repainted and another 6 are currently in the paint shop. See earlier blog post on 1st Continental B777 repainted here

Woman wears bikini for airport security screening

Body scanners in place and new pat down procedures by TSA have caused a lot of controversy in the U.S. lately. A woman leaving from LAX airport decided to leave no room for such by simply passing through security in her bikini. Watch for yourself.

Lufthansa introduces slimmer seats which will make room for 2000 more

Courtesy of Lufthansa

Lufthansa will add almost 2000 more seats to it's single aisle fleet by end of 2011 by switching to slimmer seats. The new seat to be introduced during a presentation on December 15th will be more ergonomic and in a new design. It will be very similar to the new seats installed on 2 Austrian Airlines planes earlier this year and legroom will be boosted by up to 5cm according to a Lufthansa spokesperson.
Full story here

Airport tales and annoying airline passengers

Smuggling marijuana into Jamaica or  trying to sneak a dead man in a wheelchair through security are just 2 of several tales CNN writer Jessica Ravitz gathered while traveling 5900 miles through six American airports.We keep it short since the story you are about to read is lengthy but worth the read! Read it