This weeks featured link
Boeing’s new CEO needs to show commitment to deep overhaul – The Seattle Times
A scathing — though early — review of Boeing’s new CEO. The Seattle Times is not impressed. At least the newspaper realized that major change needs to happen, even if the CEO does not.
Two for the road
Delta Air Lines plans new first class seats for A321neo fleet – PAXEX.AERO
It looks like Delta is going with a new First Class seat on its newest narrowbodies. Seth has the photos. These have a more shell-like feel to them with privacy blinders that also function as headrest wings. I can’t tell if I’d like that or not from the mockups.
A look inside the 747 that evacuated Americans from Wuhan – TPG
Just imagine having to be evacuated from a virus epicenter. It’s already stressful. Now imagine being evacuated on this thing. Geez.
14 comments on “3 Links I Love: A Wrong Boeing Turn, New Delta Seats, Flying on a Cargo Aircraft”
The wings on the new Delta seats make the seat remind me of the haunted house seat at Disneyland.
I hope that the MAX never comes back for 2 reasons: 1) People remember how uncomfortable the seats and lavs were and 2) it’s a Frankensteined 60 year old design. Too many issues. I won’t risk my life to help make Doug Parker rich.
Unfortunately, the airlines don’t care about that. They know no matter how difficult they make the flying experience with fees, bad customer service & what ever else they want to do, you’ll come back because you always do. Put another way, whata going to do about it.
Uncomfortable seats and lavs are a function of the airline, not Boeing. Boeing does not determine seat pitch or size of lavs.
I gotta admit, seeing the old Northwest seats on the 747 made me smile. Long live the Red Tail!
Personally I don’t think the Seattle Times article is scathing enough. Some of the comments on that article hit at what’s wrong – plucked from the Board of Directors, Mr. Calhoun is just more of the same. Boeing will not be back on the path of greatness by promoting people that helped create the problem they are currently mired in. I’m sure they have the right leader in the company to right the ship. Odds are it’s an engineer in middle management that might know a thing or two about what went wrong culturally at the company – and how to design an airplane, but I’m not holding my breath on that person ever getting tapped. I wish Boeing well but doubtful there is anything their current leadership can say that’ll make me feel better about the 737MAX..and that’s a problem.
So you made it out to the TWA Airport. Just how geeked out were you and how many photos did you snap?
Doug – Oh shoot, I meant to put a caption down there. I will have a full write-up on my visit to the TWA Hotel, don’t worry!
Well I spent 24 hours there in November and explored every nook and cranny and have the photos to go with it. Our hotel room faced the runways and the takeoffs right in front were nonstop since one of JFK’s runways was still shut down.
BTW that beard makes you look less Cranky…
Regarding the Kalitta charter…
The flight crew remained on the upper deck. I assume flight attendant had to be on board. Where did they come from (Kalitta being cargo only) and what was done to protect them? Also what about emergency evacuation doors?
How would that have been handled?
Jack – this is a great question, and I have no answers, I’m afraid.
First, Boeing needs to move their headquarters back to Seattle. Management needs to be with the engineers and manufacturing bases. Being in Chicago was a dumb move.
Second, I’ve seen plenty of medical device and pharma companies cut back on QA folks in order to make more money only to get Warning Letters and Consent Decrees from the FDA. There is a long term cost to trying to make short term profits in order to make your shareholders happy. Boeing is feeling the same thing on a much larger scale.
QA – what is that?
As for Boeing moving it’s HQ to Chicago, you’re overthinking this. It was nothing more than who was willing to give the biggest corporate welfare package. See Amazon HQ 2 as an example. Why was Amazon’s deal all done in secret? And notice what happened when the cover was blown off. They ran away after a few protests & then quietly returned without the $3-Billion in perks, just not in Long Island City Queens.
Also as far as short term profits go, there are very few companies that ever look beyond the next 3-months. In fact as private equity firms continue to eat up one business after another, expect this trend to get worse. There may come a day where airline route & other day to day decisions will be made based on what private equity firms want regardless of the long term health of the organization. See “Blue Star” the fictional airline in “Wall Street” as an example.
What did you think of the TWA hotel? We were there in mid-October. Luckily they used 4-22 all weekend and rotations were right in front of the pool.