Here’s a weird one for you. Yesterday, Southwest flight 2294 diverted to Charleston, West Virginia when a football-sized hole opened up in the top of the fuselage. And thanks to the magic of Twitter, someone had posted a picture from inside the cabin right after it happened. Click at left to blow it up.

Southwest 2294 was supposed to go from Nashville to Baltimore. It appears that as it passed through 34,000 feet on the way to its cruise altitude, the hole opened up and the plane lost pressure. The crew sent the plane into a rapid descent (as required in order to get to breathable air) and 7 minutes later they were at 11,000 feet. In case you were wondering, that descent would normally take at least double that amount of time if not more. About 20 minutes after that, they had an uneventful landing in Charleston, West Virginia.

All accounts that I’ve seen have said that Southwest handled this really well. The plane was on the ground just after 6p, and Southwest was able to find a new plane, get it to Charleston (a place they don’t serve) and get back in the air at 945p. They arrived in Baltimore a little more than four hours after original scheduled arrival. An impressive move, indeed.

Now let’s get back to that airplane. This was N387SW, a 737-300 that was delivered brand new to the airline on June 29, 1994. So it’s only about 15 years old. (Fun fact for me: I actually rode that plane on November 18, 1994 from Phoenix to Burbank.)

I’m sure we’ll hear plenty of speculation that compares this relatively minor incident to Aloha Airlines 243, the plane that became a convertible mid-flight. Don’t remember that one? Maybe this will refresh your memory.

That’s right. This one truly became a convertible. Incredibly, the only person who died was a flight attendant who wasn’t strapped in. The plane landed safely, and it was impressive enough for a cheesy TV movie to be made about it. But let’s not jump to conclusions about this Southwest flight.

The Aloha incident started with a small hole as this Southwest one did, but then something went wrong. The 737 fuselage is designed so that if a hole does develop, it will remain isolated. That’s what happened with the Southwest flight, and the aircraft maintained structural integrity. For that reason, this was effectively a non-event.

The Aloha flight was on a 19 year old 737-200, an earlier version of the 737 than in the Southwest incident. That aircraft had frequent, short flights in salty and humid conditions that ended up causing corrosion. So on that plane, the initial hole, caused by corrosion, quickly created outdoor seating as the fuselage gave way. That led to some major changes in terms of corrosion inspection.

On the Southwest plane, the question is a more simple one. Since the fuselage stayed intact, the only real question is . . . what caused the hole in the first place? That’s what I’ll be interested in finding out.

Uh oh. It looks like United has decided to delay its refurbishment of the premium cabins on the 777 once again. Now they won’t even start until February 2010, so the problem of dramatically different premium cabin experiences is bound to continue for quite some time.

The 767s are complete, and the 747s are almost there. They say 18 out of 24 aircraft are done with the full 747 fleet being finished by October this year. But those 777s, well, they’ll continue to limp along with the old product. Here’s how things will look when the 747s are done in a couple months.

So what’s the excuse this time? Money. In an internal memo, they blame two things, but I’m not buying the first.

While our International Premium Travel Experience (IPTE) aircraft continue to double our customer satisfaction scores, and the modifications continue to progress well, the B777 program is more complex than the B767 and B747 programs, given the three different B777 sub-fleets. In addition,
we are facing a challenging year due to the global recession, changing market demand and increasing fuel prices.

Uh huh. This thing has been delayed so many times that I find it hard to believe that the complexity is still causing the problem here. Instead, I’ll put my bet on the little blurb that followed:

The decision to postpone the start of the work also allows us to better control our costs in 2009, helping us maintain a stronger cash flow through the historical trough period of the fourth quarter.

Ding! Ding! Ding! We have a winner! They say you have to spend money to make money, but how does that work when you don’t have money to spend? Sadly, the 777s make up a bit more than half the fleet, so the cost savings here are likely to turn into revenue pain as people look toward other airlines with better options.

I’m hijacking my usual “This Week on BNET” post with a brief plug. Minnesota Public Radio puts out a weekly podcast called In the Loop, and I was one of the guests for this week’s production. I usually do interviews on the phone, but this time I went downtown to record in a radio booth where they record NPR’s Marketplace. That means you get to hear my voice in all its crystal-clear glory.

We talked about the latest fun with Ryanair, Wizz Air’s busted promotion, and of course, United breaking guitars. Take a listen for yourself. My piece starts at 18:30 if you want to skip ahead, but it’s a fun show that’s worth listening to the whole way through.

Spirit is Not Buying Air Jamaica
It’s rumored that Spirit is buying Air Jamaica, but that’s not true. There could be some unique opportunities ahead, however.

US Airways Sees Further Unit Revenue Erosion in June
June numbers are starting to trickle in, and US Airways appears to have had a rough June.

Official: Boeing Buys Vought’s 787 Operation
Last week it was a rumor, and this week it’s official. Boeing is bringing some 787 work in-house.

United Feels the Pain When Complaints Go Viral
United broke Dave Carroll’s guitar and they wouldn’t pay for it. Now he’s written a song and it’s gone viral. United can’t be happy.

June 2009 Monthly Traffic Numbers
June was a mixed bag for the airlines with some improving loads and others falling back. One constant theme, however, was lower capacity.

Virgin America Gets New Funding
Meet Virgin America’s new investors, same as the old investors? What’s going on here?

I love covering new airline startups, because the chances that most of them go anywhere are slim to none. It’s fun to pick these apart and to see if anyone actually puts money into them (see: JetAmerica). The latest effort we have is called Viza Air, and I’ll bet this one doesn’t go anywhere at all.

I think the Viza Air name is appropriate. They’re trying to fly out of Gary, Indiana, so they could easily borrow Visa’s tagline and tweak it to say “It’s nowhere you want to be.” Maybe that’s not fair. At least Gary does serve the Chicago metro area. That’s better than I can say for Toledo. The plan is for flights to both Newark and Washington/National airport.

If you believe the airline reps, they say they have now secured slots at both National and Newark. If that’s true, then great. It’s better than JetAmerica has done. But I’m not such a quick believer. For what it’s worth, at least Gary is being smart about this one. They have been in discussions for a few months, but they still haven’t seen a business plan. Gary does make it clear that there won’t be any marketing funds offered here. They’ve been burned too many times by now.

So is there a need for this? No, I doubt it. I do like the idea of Gary in better economic times, but I would still focus on more leisure destinations like Florida than business destinations like DC and New York.

You know all those low fares we’ve seen on US to Australia routes lately? That’s because with two new entrants, there’s way too much capacity out there and everyone involved is bleeding as they fight for traffic. Now, those two new entrants, Delta and V Australia/Virgin Blue have decided to get together a form a joint venture. Smart move.

I actually touched on this possibility when I interviewed Virgin Blue CEO Brett Godfrey in February. When talking about Delta, he alluded to this . . .

You might say, well, does Delta want to put their traffic on Qantas in Australia? A lot of the market flies beyond Sydney, so maybe that’s an opportunity for us to say, well, quid pro quo . . . . There’s some opportunity there. No discussions held in that regard . . . but that’s an opportunity.

And here we are five months later with a deal in hand. This partnership will have frequent flier reciprocity, codesharing, and it will ask for antitrust immunity so they can discuss routes and fares. This seems like it should be an easy one for the DOT to approve, because up until this year, only 2 airlines flew the route. If this doesn’t get approved, my bet is that Delta’s days to Sydney are numbered, so there is a clear benefit to consumers to approving this deal.

It also allows Delta to feed people into Los Angeles from around the US and Virgin Blue to feed people into Sydney (and other gateways) from around Australia. I would hope that we’ll see some serious frequency cuts in order to try to get back to a more normal level of capacity on the route.

I was emailing with Dan Webb over at Things in the Sky last night about this, and he was very interested in what this means for Virgin America. This type of joint venture certainly diminishes Virgin America’s importance to V Australia. If it weren’t for space constraints, I wonder if V Australia would even rather move over to Delta’s terminal at LAX and leave Virgin America behind.

This also raises the question about what happens to the Virgin Blue/United partnership. Right now, Virgin Blue shares United’s code on flights beyond Sydney in Australia. I can’t imagine Virgin Blue would cancel this deal, but I wonder how United will feel about it. They may very well need the traffic, so it’s possible it could stay, but that would make for an odd arrangement.

I also find myself wondering if eventually Air France could join this agreement with its LAX to Tahiti flight. Virgin Blue subsidiary Pacific Blue doesn’t fly to Tahiti yet, but this could be another interesting twist.

I like this move. It should help to stabilize the routes between the US and Australia, though it should mean fares will rise for consumers. Considering that fares are too low to be sustainable right now, that’s a good thing.