Choke on it, AirTran!

Re: Stay away, AirTran

Lord, I wish these degenerate hillbilly pig-fuckers would stay away from Midwest.

First AirTrannie CEO Joe Leonard said he wouldn't increase his offer unless he got to see Midwest's books. Midwest turned down his offer and made no movement to open its books.

So what does Papa Joe do? Ups his offer. I guess he was lying before when he said he wouldn't increase it without seeing the books.

AirTran's "presentation" of its latest offer today is a masterwork of pure bullshit. According to AirTran, Milwaukee is a city about the same size as Memphis, and Memphis has so many more departures each day. Therefore, Milwaukee's market is underserved.

WTF?

The reason Memphis has so many more departures is that it is one of Northwest's main hubs. You can fly from Memphis to Amsterdam, for chrissakes. People are coming from all over the country to Memphis (or Detroit, another NW hub) and then flying on to someplace else.

Joe Leonard knows this but chooses to ignore it in order to bolster his bid.

The fact is that AirTran has a whole load of new airplanes on order and NO PLACE TO PUT THEM. It has to do something or else its screwed.

 

Re: Stay away, AirTran

I fly AirTran about 70 percent of the time for business, and have never had a lick of chaos. But maybe I just don't fly out of the airports you've seen.

 

Re: Stay away, AirTran

The airline industry has sucked ever since Ozark was bought out by TWA.

 

Re: Stay away, AirTran

There's a great post by a user named Knope2001 at:
http://www.airliners.net/discussions/general_aviation/read.main/3194379/1/#1

Search for it in the thread. It begins:

"AirTran’s presentation seems very geared now at two things

(1) Revenue is concentrated in top 20 markets

AirTran claims that Midwest is exceptionally vulnerable because about 58% of their revenue comes from their top 20 markets. That compares to AirTran and Alaska both with 30% of their revenue from top 20 markets and Southwest with 16% from their top 20 markets."

 

Re: Stay away, AirTran

Just saw it today, as a matter of fact.

It's like a Southwest gate, except there's no one that ever looks like they're in charge. Tons of people just milling about. Just seems unprofessional.

 

Re: Stay away, AirTran

I've flown one roundtrip on AirTran and it was one too many. They couldn't figure out a way to seat my wife and I together. To make it worse, we were the first flight of the morning, and were delayed more than an hour because the plane had too much fuel on board and they had to drain some (apparently they didn't figure that part out when fueling it). And to make it worse, they released seats early to some standby passengers, let them on the plane and had about five extra passengers on the plane, resulting in about 20 minutes of arguing while figuring everything out.

Greyhound would have been a step up.

 

Re: Stay away, AirTran

Man, I feel lucky. Never had an AirTran flight delayed, never had a problem with my bags on AirTran, never had any sense of chaos at a gate.

Sucks to be you guys.

 

Re: Stay away, AirTran



AirTran is indeed the former ValuJet. ValuJet, for the size of its fleet, had more FAA safety violations than any carrier.

IJAG, as someone who was once familiar enough with the airline industry, stay away. Stay far away.

For those listening along on ATC, listening to some of the reliever airports can be more entertaining than some of the bigger approach TRACONS. Check out Teterboro or Centennial for a good mix of everything.

 

Re: Stay away, AirTran

+1 to what IJAG said. AirTran rules, especially compared to USAir, or as some like to call it, Unfortunately Still Allegheny In Reality.

 

Re: Stay away, AirTran

Was that before or after Eastern and Pan Am left the industry?

 

Re: Stay away, AirTran

How do you listen to that stuff? I'm curious.

 

Re: Stay away, AirTran

Unfortunately, my company likes saving money. And since AirTran is roughly $100 or more cheaper than any other carrier from where I live...off I go!