A 24-year-old Australian woman is facing up to 21 years behind bars after being convicted of federal charges in an assault on a flight attendant during a trip from Melbourne to Los Angeles earlier this year, prosecutors said Monday.
Adau Akui Atem Mornyang, of Victoria, appeared to be intoxicated and was verbally and physically abusive to both staff and other passengers aboard a United Airlines flight on Jan. 21, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Central District of California said in a news release.
Evidence presented at trial indicated that, after being in the air several hours, other passengers complained to a flight attendant about Mornyang, who was flailing her arms and shouting obscenities and racial slurs, officials said.
When the attendant then approached Mornyang to check on her, the defendant allegedly yelled at him then slapped him across the face.
The flight attendant tried to restrain Mornyang until federal air marshals could respond. The marshals then had to stay with Mornyang in the plane’s rear galley for the rest of the trip, prosecutors said.
Last Thursday, a jury found Mornyang guilty of one felony count of interference with a flight crew and one misdemeanor count of assault.
She is scheduled to be sentenced June 24, when she’ll face a maximum possible penalty of 21 years in federal prison.
Mortenson used innovative construction technologies and Lean practices to build three major new ground facilities totaling 180,000 square feet for United Airlines at Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport in less than a year. Mortenson fast-tracked the project because United Airlines needed to vacate its previous ground facilities to make way for runway construction at O’Hare.
Completion of the United project is a critical milestone in O’Hare’s massive modernization of its runways, which includes adding and extending some while closing others. The runway work complements the planned $8.5 billion investment to upgrade terminals and other amenities and add the first new gates at the airport in nearly 25 years. “This is a game changer for the city of Chicago,” said Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel, according to a Chicago Tribune story. “I made a pledge that the city of Chicago, O’Hare, will not be measured by the busiest, but by being the best.”
Mortenson broke ground on the $105 million United project, which also included 1.2 million square feet of airside paving, in the last week of December, 2017. The airline received its occupancy certifications for the new Ground Equipment Maintenance and Facilities Maintenance Stores in November, 2018. United uses the buildings for equipment maintenance and storage and to house its facility maintenance personnel, bussing operation, aircraft move team, and aircraft provisioning/cleaning operations.
Ghafari Associates served as architect, Ardmore Roderick as the lead project manager on the apron paving, Thornton Tomasetti as structural engineer, DB Sterlin as the civil engineer for the buildings, Burns McDonnell as civil engineer for the aprons and Jones Lang LaSalle as owner’s representative.
“I am extremely proud of the Mortenson team that successfully delivered the North Airfield project,” said MacAdam Glinn, Mortenson general manager of aviation. “It is a testament to our skill and dedication that we were able to complete these high-quality facilities in such an accelerated time frame. Just as importantly, we are honored that we were chosen to partner with industry leader United Airlines on this transformational project.”
Given the project’s tight turnaround and complexity, Mortenson and its partners relied on a range of Lean and other innovative tools and processes:
Simultaneous drawings for structural steel: The team eschewed the traditional linear process for structural steel, which would have involved Thornton Tomasetti developing designs, then Mortenson’s structural steel subcontractor creating the next level of detail with shop drawings, then waiting for Thornton Tomasetti to review and sign off on them. Instead, the two companies developed their versions of the drawings nearly simultaneously using a shared software platform from Thornton Tomasetti. This approach cut as much as eight weeks from the schedule vs. the standard approach.
Pull planning: This Lean approach optimized coordination and productivity of the many subcontractors. For each phase of the project, such as the exterior work or underground work, a Mortenson project engineer would meet with all the subcontractors to agree on the sequences and duration of each company’s work and resolve any clashes.
Prefabrication: To ensure quality and save time, Mortenson worked with subcontractors to build the doors and hardware as well as all of the process piping offsite.
Staggered permitting: By securing city permits in sequence and for sections of work rather than seeking permits for the entire project at once, Mortenson minimized any schedule impacts while waiting for permits and FAA clearances.
“Mortenson ran this project with an emphasis on collaboration, innovation, and flexibility, which was vital to coordinating and managing the detailed design and buildout under a very compressed time schedule. The new ground facilities have expanded United’s maintenance capacity and capabilities so it can service a wider array of equipment,” said Weston Parker, Vice President who heads up Ardmore Roderick’s Aviation Group.
The O’Hare ground facilities and apron work are the latest in a series of Mortenson projects for United Airlines. It built a massive data center for the airline and renovated its B18 club for frequent flyers at O’Hare. Mortenson also constructed a new flight training facility in Denver.
The just-completed O’Hare project consisted of:
Ground maintenance equipment facility
The two-story, 140,000 square foot building features single-story 38-foot bays, with 11 overhead bridge cranes, four different kinds of vehicle lifts, and 54 overhead doors. The building is equipped with paint booth, loading dock, battery storage area, an automated storage and retrieval system and pallet racks with an automated handling system. The GEM also houses two oil water separators, a fuel island for fuel tank storage, a fuel and hydraulic fluid distribution system and air compressor system. It includes administrative offices, conference and training rooms, and employee locker rooms and lounges.
Facilities Maintenance and Stores building
This single-story, 40,000 square foot facility provides storage space and maintenance shops for United’s facility maintenance teams. It includes five overhead doors, a loading dock, pallet rack storage system and secure cage. It also has conference and training rooms and employee break rooms and locker rooms.
Airport Operations Services building
This single story, 40,000 square foot building houses the airline’s operating services, move and positioning crews. It reaches 30 feet at its highest point to accommodate extensive storage for the provisioning teams. The pre-engineered building is equipped with 12 overhead doors, secure cage, and two semi-loading docks. It also has training rooms, break rooms and locker rooms.
Apron work
This significant civil and infrastructure project resulted in 1.2 million square feet of concrete paving including new taxi lanes, concrete aprons and plane and employee parking. The paving is multi-layered, including 15” Portland Cement Concrete Pavement (PCCP), 3/8” choke stone, 5” cement treated permeable base (CTPB), geotextile fabric, 8” P-154M blended aggregate, 12” lime stabilized subgrade and millings produced onsite using recycled materials from the airfield. THE PCCP and CTPB were produced at an onsite batch plant. The work included a new storm and sanitary system as well as electrical switchgear, transformers and switchboards. The team also installed a new duct bank to power new high-mast lighting and power planes on the apron for testing and maintenance.
Weighing factors like airfares, baggage fees, and the possibilities of cancellations or delays, The Points Guy, a website for travelers, put together its latest “best and worst airlines’ report.”
The delays, the lost bags, the long lines for coffee—any day at the airport can mean a frustration or two. Wouldn’t it be nice to see a friendly face during a trudge down the concourse? Make that a friendly furry face, and suddenly a hectic travel day feels a little bit easier.
That’s the idea behind Denver International Airport’s Canine Airport Therapy Squad’s (CATS) program, the largest organization of its kind, among airports in more than 30 U.S. cities, including Los Angeles, Cincinnati, Salt Lake City and Charlotte, where similar programs have proven wildly popular.
(Courtesy Denver International Airport)
With 121 therapy pups and, yes, one actual cat, DEN trotted out the CATS effort three years ago as a way to “provide passengers with an elevated experience,” says Lisa Dittberner, who manages the airport’s volunteer programs. “Seeing a dog immediately takes them out of their current state of mind, thinking about seat assignments or whether their bags are going to make it,” Dittberner says. “Seeing an animal that you can actually pet in an airport is something special.”
On a recent connection through Denver, frequent flier Callie Langton of Omaha, Nebraska, paused briefly to love on CATS dog Shelby, a golden retriever. It was the perfect pick-me-up as Langton boarded a flight for a business meeting, happily “covered in dog hair” afterward.
“I spend a lot of time in airports for work, and the therapy dogs are such a bright spot in a day where almost everyone you encounter is, at best, grumpy,” she says.
(Courtesy Denver International Airport)
Staffed by volunteers and their certified therapy pets, CATS handlers and their loyal companions work in two-hour shifts, wearing matching vests and circulating at various gates, making new friends and passing out trading cards featuring fun facts about each pet. More than 50 breeds, including Newfoundlands, Jack Russell terriers, dachshunds, German shepherds, poodles and border collies, make up the CATS roster.
There’s Cody, a carrot-loving goldendoodle; Shogun, a Bernese mountain dog who enjoys both hiking and napping; and Violet, a plucky French bulldog who can’t stand squirrels. Each animal delivers a happy little dose of personality while prompting smiles and sniffing out the people who need them most. Whether it’s someone returning home from a funeral, a passenger fearful of flying or a traveler who just said goodbye to a friend, these intuitive pets often know right where to go.
(Courtesy Denver International Airport)
“They just sense it,” says Jim Stimson, 70, who volunteers twice a month at DEN with Martha, his 5-year-old cream golden retriever. He acknowledges that during some visits, the CATS members simply lift spirits among harried travelers, but on certain days, the therapy animals work a remarkable sort of magic.
Stimson recalls Martha meeting a passenger who, he later learned, was flying through Denver for the first time since losing two friends in the 2017 shooting tragedy in Las Vegas.
“She gave us ‘the eye,’” Stimson says of the distinct glance that signals a passenger’s interest in meeting a CATS animal. “We talked to her, and pretty soon she was sitting on the floor, and Martha’s head was in her lap. She said, ‘This dog really senses me.’”
“It’s amazing to me how dogs can detect pain,” Stimson says. “And they’re just naturally good at easing it.”
(Courtesy Denver International Airport)
While the CATS partners do sometimes encounter exceptional situations that call for a little extra care, they’re always good at distracting travelers from the typical hassles of a day at the airport.
Carol O’Saben, a psychologist in Flagstaff, Arizona, says the stressful and unpredictable airport atmosphere benefits significantly from the comfort of CATS and programs like it.
“Therapy animals in an airport setting can be beneficial for travelers with emotional and mental health concerns, as well as the broader population, because travel is anxiety-provoking,” she says. “Having therapy animals available is one way to divert a person’s focus from the chaos of the environment to the interaction with an animal and help the traveler better manage their own anxiety.”
(Courtesy Denver International Airport)
And the simple act of petting an animal, O’Saben says, has proven therapeutic advantages, including lowered heart rate, slowed breathing and reduced blood pressure—all physiological responses that can minimize tension.
“Airports also can be a place of heightened emotions because of the stress created by traveling,” she says. “It is possible that having therapy animals available to interact with travelers can help to lower some of those emotions and create a more friendly and amicable airport environment.”
Dittberner says that’s one reason volunteers are encouraged to study departure information and head to gates where flights are delayed—particularly in areas where families are traveling with children.
(Courtesy Denver International Airport)
“It’s a huge thing—you’ve just found out your flight isn’t leaving when you thought it would, but you look over and see a dog, and maybe you forget about that for a minute,” says Dittberner.
For Stimson, watching those interactions, large and small, between his Martha and airport travelers is always rewarding.
“It’s like when your kid comes home with straight A’s or hits the winning homerun,” he says. “You just feel so proud and amazed to see them do the things they can do.”
United Airlines launched services between Denver and Santa Rosa on 8 March, with the Californian airport hosting a small gate celebration to herald the new service. The Star Alliance member will serve the route daily.
United Airlines launched its newest route from Denver (DEN) on 8 March, with the carrier initiating a daily service to Santa Rosa (STS) in California. The Star Alliance member will serve the 1,566-kilometre airport pair daily using its fleet of CRJ 200s. No other airline presently operates between the two US airports. This becomes United’s second route to Santa Rosa, with it already serving the airport from San Francisco. In 2018, a reported 440,644 passengers travelled through Santa Rosa Airport, with this representing an 11% increase versus 2017 when 397,787 people used the facility. In total, the airport has non-stop service to 10 destinations by four airlines, with the other three serving operators being Alaska Airlines, American Airlines and Sun Country Airlines. An 11th destination will be added in June, with American starting flights from Dallas/Fort Worth.
Have you ever wondered how an airline decides when to start a new route and why it might choose to compete on some routes but not others?
In a note to employees picked up by the Crain’s Chicago Business, which I’ve also had a chance to review, United Airlines has provided more insight on the process.
It all starts with hours upon hours of research. The Domestic and International Network Planning groups continually analyze passenger load and fare data for routes we don’t currently support before determining where opportunities for new service lie.
They’ll take 100 city combinations, for example, then slowly whittle that list down until they reach 10-15 that are viable for us based on customer demand and profitability forecasts. Then they measure the impact of introducing new service versus adding more flights between cities we already serve. It’s a constant negotiation between dozens of variables, and there’s a lot of consideration that goes into those decisions, since we never want to launch a route that ultimately fails.
There are practical matters as well—
Do we have existing capacity in the fleet to support it? If not, can we move equipment from an underperforming route? Or, would it be better served by United Express.
United is not a “point-to-point” airlines but a hub-and-spoke carrier. New routes are examined not simply on the basis of the new flight itself, but how that flight will feed connecting traffic throughout the network.
Before building a segment into the schedule, Network Planning estimates customer demand by evaluating connection options, the route’s popularity and what the competition offers, among other things. Finally, planners look at different aircraft capabilities, things like number of seats, range, and takeoff and landing limitations, then decide if the route should be flown with mainline or regional equipment.
The Contentious Part
But what about the high-demand leisure and business routes that United has simply abandoned? I’m talking about routes like Los Angeles (LAX) to Portland (PDX) or Dallas (DFW). LAX-PDX is a huge market for Alaska and Delta. LAX-DFW is a huge route for American and is also served by Delta. Why not at least a couple daily flights between these important cities?
The simple answer is, we can’t be everything to everyone, everywhere. No, we don’t have LAX-PDX (Portland, Oregon) like Delta (DL), for instance, but we do great with our LAX to IAH, IAD and ORD routes, which is why DL doesn’t offer those flights. As mentioned above, we operate within constraints. A new segment requires assets, like airport gates and airplanes, not to mention paying customers. We’re not going to cannibalize assets being used for more profitable routes just to compete with a competitor in places where we would be operating at a deficit.
And while I hear United President Scott Kirby loud and clear in that explanation, I wonder if he has fully learned the lesson of JFK. Kirby is often quick to point out that by pulling out of JFK, United lost several lucrative corporate contracts that primarily flew to other destinations. The hint, and the understandable rationale, is that United should have kept certain routes that were “losers” because they helped to make other routes much better “winners”.
That seems easy enough to follow, yet it seems almost mind-boggling that United doesn’t serve Oakland, San Jose, Portland, or Dallas (effective in a few weeks) from its hub in Los Angeles.
United’s only retort is that Delta doesn’t offer nonstop flights between Los Angeles and Houston, Chicago, or Washington Dulles.
CONCLUSION
Our overall strategy is about leveraging the network in the right ways to ensure United’s long-term success.
Of course. And I’m not here to be the armchair CEO (too much). But wouldn’t United want to lose a little money on the LA to Dallas route simply to keep loyal customers on other United routes?
The petition cites incidents where they claim religious men and even a single mother and baby were insulted, and in some cases were asked to deplane for “security reasons.”
As of Wednesday, a little more than 100 people had signed the petition.
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Copyright 2019 CNN The Pan Am Experience is one-part re-enactment, one-part dinner theater and one-part memorabilia overload. The attraction mixes top-quality food with elaborate detail to recreate what it was like to fly a Boeing 747 with one of the world’s most beloved airlines long before its bankruptcy and dissolution in 1991. Copyright 2019 CNN The Pan Am Experience is one-part re-enactment, one-part dinner theater and one-part memorabilia overload. The attraction mixes top-quality food with elaborate detail to recreate what it was like to fly a Boeing 747 with one of the world’s most beloved airlines long before its bankruptcy and dissolution in 1991.
(CNN) – It’s a Saturday in the outskirts of Los Angeles, and about 50 people are ready to board an airplane for a colorful and memorable journey back to the 1970s.
Compared to most international flights, this one is short — only four hours. And though the flight will transport everyone on the passenger list to another place and time, it logs a whopping total of zero air miles, as it never actually leaves the ground.
Welcome to the wild and wonderful world of the Pan Am Experience. One-part re-enactment, one-part dinner theater and one-part memorabilia overload, the attraction mixes top-quality food with elaborate detail to recreate what it was like to fly a Boeing 747 with one of the world’s most beloved airlines long before its bankruptcy and dissolution in 1991.
“People always talk about how it’s not the destination but the journey that’s important,” says Talaat Captan, who co-founded the experience with Anthony Toth back in 2014.
“We believe that. People come to us to travel somewhere and not go anywhere. To them, the value is in the experience.”
This summer marks the five-year anniversary of the attraction, and it has gotten more elaborate every year. Props have become more authentic. Actors have developed characters. There’s also now a fashion show, and the uniforms represent one of the largest collections of vintage flight attendant uniforms anywhere in the world.
The Pan Am Experience is as close as you can get to experiencing Pan Am without engaging in actual time travel, which is why people are so keen to climb aboard they book their seats months in advance.
Cleared for take-off
The experience begins outside a row of warehouse buildings in Pacoima, an L.A. suburb near Burbank. Guests enter from the parking lot on a red carpet and find a studio decked out like a 1960s airplane terminal. In one corner: A series of airline ticket counters, including an exact replica (computer and all) of a Pan Am desk from the era. On the other side: A lounge that comprises circular bars surrounded by stools and furniture made from old airplane parts.
The back of the room is lined with a screen depicting the exterior of a Pan Am 747, circa 1971.
Guests check in at the Pan Am desk with Captan, who gives them paper boarding passes exactly like the originals from back in the day. A gate agent ushers them to the lounge, where drinks are complimentary.
About an hour in, a voice blares over the crackling loudspeaker: “Would the flight crew please report to the ticket counter?”
Without missing a beat, “Captain” Toth and 14 “flight attendants” dressed in vintage garb enter and head to the ticket counter for their “assignments.” Crew members then proceed up a jet bridge toward the plane screen in the back of the studio, open a cabin door and invite guests to join them. Their message is clear: All aboard!
The main event
Flight attendants seat guests in one of three sections of the plane: Clipper Class, which was the original business class; First Class; and the Upper Deck Lounge, which historically was part of First.
Once everyone is comfortable, the “purser” gives a series of announcements, and flight attendants go through safety demonstrations. The script is a mix of throwback warnings and modern wit: “Unless we have an earthquake tonight, there won’t be much movement, so your seat belt isn’t really necessary.”
After a welcome video from Toth, flight attendants wheel out magazine carts, distribute magazines, take drink orders and bring hot towels in buckets of dry ice, creating an almost magical smoke.
Finally, the meal begins. A white-jacketed maître-d brings out menus. Flight attendants pull out retractable tables and set them with Pan Am-branded tablecloths, dishes and silverware. Upper Deck Lounge guests get a caviar course first. Then everyone chooses between appetizers of shrimp cocktail and caprese salad.
Following a fashion show of Pan Am uniforms from the late 1960s and early ’70s, a throwback dinner is served: Chateaubriand sliced tableside or roast chicken, both served with carrots, green beans and potatoes. (There’s a pasta option for vegetarians, too.) As guests eat, disco plays on the cabin speaker system.
Trivia and another fashion show of uniforms from the 1980s follow dinner, leading into a wine-and-cheese course, Cognac, coffee and chocolate mousse cake or fruit tart for dessert.
A third and final fashion show of airline uniforms from all over the world closes the night.
Cigarettes and other details
Throughout the experience, it’s clear that Toth and Captan have spared no expense to make the flight authentic.
That means the seatbelt buckles are original, complete with the Pan Am globe logo etched into the top. It also means each of the table floral arrangements has sprigs of baby’s breath, just like the arrangements of the 1970s.
Even the cigarettes — props that puff smoke when you blow them — are eerily lifelike.
“Back in the 1970s, everybody on board airplanes smoked,” says Toth. “There was no way we were going to recreate this experience without trying to recreate that.”
Drink offerings include 1970s-approved Harvey Wallbangers and Tab soda. Hot towels smell the way they used to: Flight attendants soak them in some of the same scents as Pan Am used historically. The seat fabrics reflect the fading sun and moon designs of the day.
Another mind-boggling detail from the original Pan Am planes: The “nose wall,” a needlepoint artwork at the front of the First-Class cabin that depicts a sailboat on the water on a sunny afternoon.
For guests who have a history with the airline — former flight attendants or family members of former Pan Am employees — these tiny touches are more than an appreciated detail; they’re a link to the past.
“As soon as I saw the First-Class cabin, I started crying,” says Michelle Fedder, who started her career as a flight attendant with Pan Am and recently met three former colleagues here. “It was like they took my memories out of my brain and brought them back to life.”
Brice Cooper, creative director at Pan American World Airways, the New Hampshire company that licenses Pan Am trademarks worldwide, agrees.
“What they’ve done here in recreating the vibe and feel of flying on Pan Am is nothing short of remarkable,” he says.
Evolution of a dream
The Pan Am Experience is really Toth’s brainchild.
The 52-year-old has been obsessed with planes since his childhood, and fell in love with Pan Am while flying to Europe one summer to visit his grandparents in Italy. He acquired his first pair of airplane seats when he was 16, and started making trips to the airplane graveyard in the Mojave Desert to buy airplane parts in his 20s.
Eventually, he had enough parts to build the ground floor of the 22-foot-long Pan Am set in his garage. He moved the set to a storage facility so he could break out his prized spiral staircase and create a second floor.
That first set forms the bones of the Pan Am Experience today.
Sometime around 2014, after the ill-fated television show, “Pan Am,” mutual friends connected Toth and Captan, who had heard about the set and wanted to see it up close. He was blown away.
Captan, a long-time movie producer who immigrated to the US from Lebanon when he was 17, had the idea to use the set to host an event, and a trial dinner sold out at an aviation memorabilia collectors’ show in a matter of minutes. Demand was so high, the duo ended up hosting more events. Later that year, Captan moved Toth’s set into Air Hollywood, his aviation-themed film studio here. The Pan Am Experience has been flying high ever since.
Vegas, here we come?
Nowadays, the Pan Am Experience takes off every Saturday at 6 p.m. sharp, and about half are open to the public. Tickets for the dinners are sold in pairs and range in price from $475 to $875, depending on seating class.
The next two public dinners scheduled for March 9 and March 23 are sold out, and there’s a waiting list for dinners later in the year.
Captan and Toth hope to open an outpost in Las Vegas.
Details of the expansion are still under development, but Captan says the new experience likely would include turbulence and white noise. More seats on the set and a separate bar and gift shop open to the public throughout the week also are likely.
“My hope is that people who never got a chance to fly Pan Am get an opportunity to see how fantastic air travel was back in the era, while those who might have been able to experience it bring back memories that remind them of the good old days,” says Toth. “This is a part of our history worth celebrating.”
Data on mishandled wheelchairs and scooters first appeared in the Air Travel Consumer Report issued in February, the same monthly Department of Transportation report that relays information on flight delays, passenger complaints and animal deaths involving U.S. airlines.
Advocacy groups, including the Paralyzed Veterans of America, have pressed for years that the information be included in the report. The February summary covers the period from Dec. 4-31, 2018. In all, 701 chairs, or roughly 2 percent of the 32,209 transported, were reported damaged.
Shaun Castle, a retired Army sergeant who serves as PVA deputy executive director, said the information is crucial for persons with disabilities in deciding which airlines “will take care of them.”
“This is important, not only to the 20,000 members of our organization, but to all people who use a wheelchair or mobility device,” Castle said. “When you are trying to decide which airline to fly as a consumer, you want to know if it’s friendly to those with disabilities.”
Those who require a wheelchair or scooter usually are allowed to travel to their gate in their own chairs but then must be transferred to a special chair to transfer to the aircraft. Their personal devices may be stored in the cabin, if they are collapsible. More often, however, they are stowed with the baggage.
And that’s where the damage can occur, according to Castle.
“I’ve had to deal with my wheelchair rims being bent or hubs missing parts, side guards damaged,” he said. In one instance, he added, his titanium wheelchair’s crossbar was broken, requiring a $2,000 repair.
Damage to power chairs, the type used by many quadriplegics, can run upward of $10,000.
“Knowing which airline is going to take care of me, take care of my equipment, is very very important. … My wheelchair is my legs. If you break my wheelchair, I can’t go anywhere,” Castle said.
Disabled passengers are protected by the Air Carrier Access Act, which prohibits airlines from refusing to transport a passenger based on a disability. But under the ACAA, disabled passengers also cannot take legal action against an airline they believe has violated their rights — they can only file a complaint with the airline or the Transportation Department.
In 2016, more than 26,000 complaints were filed against U.S. airlines by passengers with disabilities. The majority of the complaints involved failures by the airlines to provide assistance or inadequate seating. But nearly 1,200 complaints involved the airlines’ handling of an assistance device, including wheelchairs, according to the Department of Transportation.
In his blog on WheelchairTravel.org, John Morris noted that the data published for December doesn’t provide a full picture of damage caused to wheelchairs during the month, as the information submitted by Southwest Airlines and American Airlines was incomplete.
“As more data is received and the sample size grows, we should gain a clearer picture of which airlines are treating wheelchairs and scooters with the greatest care and respect and which would be best to avoid,” said Morris, who uses a power chair for mobility.
A spokeswoman for Delta Airlines said the company’s advisory board on disability has been actively engaged in developing and refining policies affecting customers with disabilities.
“Delta is committed to providing the highest level of care and service to all our customers,” Olivia Mayes said. “We are acutely focused on continuous improvement in our assistive device-handling processes, as we know they are critically important to many of our customers.”
According to the data, Delta transported the highest volume of wheelchairs and scooters of any of the 12 airlines in the December report: 11,838. It recorded 105 mishaps, the second-to-lowest damage rate reported at .89 percent.
Castle says he looks forward to future reports, which will contribute significantly to protecting consumers with disabilities.
“We hope this accountability will inspire airlines to improve procedures to accommodate the more than 20 million Americans who have mobility disabilities,” Castle said.
— Patricia Kime can be reached at Patricia.Kime@Military.com. Follow her on Twitter @patricia.kime.
