Qantas has created what is theultimate frequent traveler tool– a mobile phone app which seamlessly schedules a trip from start to finish.
The national carrier’s App goes far beyond the flight itself and even serves as a portal for activities during a holiday and the journey to and from the airport.
Using a “timeline”, the App schedules in every part of the journey, which eliminates the need for manual travel planners or messy calendars.
The experience starts with research for the flight itself.
Using location technology, the best deals departing the nearest airport can be scrolled through with ease and alerts can be set for a traveler’s favorite destination to snap up the cheapest fares.
The check-in tool allows travelers to use a few taps to select their preferred spot on the plane in advance from the seat map.
Travelers can then zip through the airport, while the App sends alerts, including boarding time, departure gate numbers and baggage carousel details at the destination.
It also saves travelers from the last-minute scramble at the departure gate, storing an electronic boarding pass in an easily-accessible place for simple scanning.
Those who want to go a step further can even add their trip to and from their airport into their timeline.
The digital Qantas Frequent Flyer card helps streamline check-in at domestic self-service kiosks and makes it easier for Gold Frequent Flyers and above and customers with Qantas Club membership to access domestic lounges on the day of travel. Members will still require their boarding pass to access international, oneworld® and partner lounges.
The airline has partnered with Uber allowing travelers to earn points for rides to and from eligible Australian airports.
Or those who prefer to hire a car can lock in their vehicle and charges before they arrive.
Hotels and insurances can be purchased without the need to leave the App.
Those who like to plan ahead can even use the App to scroll through and lock in activities which range from a bus ride in Bondi to a cooking class in Bangkok to a day trip to Machu Picchu.
The airline’s frequent flyers are set to get the most use of the App’s ability to keep track of points earned throughout their trip.
Former MH370 search firm Ocean Infinity is looking to build on its success finding a missing Argentine submarine with a new project to locate an iron ore freighter lost in 2017.
The high-tech seabed survey company, which deploys a fleet of autonomous underwater vehicles to search an area more quickly than was previously possible, is working with the South Korean government to find the missing Stellar Daisy.
The freighter was lost with 24 people on board in the South Atlantic Ocean about 2500 nautical miles east of Uruguay on March 31, 2017.
Operations are due to start this month and the company will conduct an extensive survey using 3D imaging technology once it finds the wreck.
“For the sake of all involved, we sincerely hope that we can find Stellar Daisy and be able to collect as much evidence about her loss as we can,’’ Ocean Infinity chief executive Oliver Plunkett said in a statement.
“As always with deep-sea search, there can be no guarantee of success as neither the precise location nor the specific circumstances of her loss are known.”
Although Ocean Infinity failed to find the wreckage of MH370, the search lifted the international profile of both the company and its technology.
It received another boost when it discovered the wreckage of the missing Argentine sub, the ARA San Juan, in November 2018.
The find in a ravine in 920 metres of water about 600km east of the Southern Argentina port of Comodoro Rivadavia came after two months of searching.
The submarine with 44 crew on board was returning from a routine mission to Ushuaia,at the southern end of South American, when it reported a problem with its batteries.
It was ordered to cut its mission short and return to the naval base in Mar del Plata but disappeared after a last message in which the captain reported the crew was well.
Argentinian authorities searched for two weeks without finding the sub and speculation was that a “hydro-acoustic anomaly” detected by the Vienna-based Comprehensive Nuclear Test-ban Treaty Organisation was the sound of the San Juan imploding.
Ocean Infinity took on the search on a “no find. no fee” basis similar to the one offered to the Malaysian government during the unsuccessful second search for MH370.
It committed to conducting the Argentinian search operation for up to 60 days using five autonomous underwater vehicles (AUV) operated by about 60 crew on the Seabed Constructor, the same vessel that searched for the missing Boeing 777.
MH 370 Family members have called on the Malaysian government to mount a further search for MH370, which was lost on March 8, 2014, with 239 people on board.
The most recent call came in November as relatives and debris hunter Blaine Gibson handed over five new pieces of debris believed to have come from the plane and found in Madagascar.
But Malaysian Transport Minister Anthony Loke has said the government would need a “credible lead” to re-open the investigation.
Ocean Infinity’s AUVs are capable of operating untethered at depths of up to 6000 metres and are equipped with an arsenal of detection devices ranging from a multi-beam echo-sounder to a sub-bottom profiler, an HD camera, and synthetic aperture sonar.
The rise and rise of social media is fuelling the public’s perception that flying is not safe with almost every aircraft incident, even the most insignificant, broadcast to the world.
Now virtually all airline passengers or visitors to an airport are photojournalists or commentators and the spread of in-flight WiFi has just widened their ability to transmit every incident to social media such as Facebook, Instagram or Snapchat.
This year it is estimated that over one trillion digital photos were taken, and 85 percent of them on mobile phones and most are on social media.
Putting that number in perspective, in the history of print film, only 2.5 trillion photos were taken, which means every two years almost as many photos are taken than in the entire history of analog cameras.
And if it’s not a photo, it’s a video with 300 hours uploaded to YouTube every minute and 5 billion videos watched each day.
Many air crash evacuation videos were taken by passengers, when they should be focused on getting off a burning aircraft, are watched tens of millions of times.
According to German airline Lufthansa’s research, up to 70 percent of passengers have some fear of flying, and for more than 30 percent of travelers, it is the key factor when booking.
While not as good as some prior years 16 accidents and 555 deaths from 45 million flights and 4.5 billion passengers is a remarkable record when compared to
Flashback 54 years ago, there were a staggering 87 crashes killing 1,597 when airlines carried only 141 million passengers — just a fraction today’s 4.5 billion.
There is no question flying is safer and one of the reasons is the International Air Transport Association’s Operational Safety Audit introduced in 2003.
Since then, 432 airlines have completed the comprehensive audit and those airlines’ crash rate is around 75 percent better than airlines that do not do the audit.
Completing IOSA every two years is a condition of joining IATA, the leading industry body.
An IOSA audit examines every aspect of an airline’s safety — on the ground and in the air — and ensures it has industry best practice with a continuous expert safety review process. It also ensures the airline has the systems to keep up with the latest safety developments.
Searchers sort through debris from the Lion Air crash. Photo: Seven News
According to Aviation-safety.net, this year has been the worst for fatal airline crashes since 2014 with 16 crashes claiming 555 lives reversing a positive trend of steady improvement.
The worst crash was the loss of the Lion Air Boeing 737 MAX which crashed on October 29 after take-off from Jakarta killing all 189 onboard.
Preliminary reports suggest that the accident was caused by the faulty calibration of an Angle of Attack vane which was replaced just before the fatal flight.
In 2014 the downward trend in fatal airliner deaths was given a tragic jolt by the loss of two Malaysian Airlines 777s with a combined death toll of 537 people.
Despite the higher number of deaths from airline crashes this year the accident rate continues to decline overall with 4.5 billion passenger flights and 45 million flights this year.
That translates into a fatal accident rate of 1 every 2.80 million flights.
And if an airline has passed the International Air Transport Association’s Operational Safety Audit (IOSA) the fatal accident rate improves by around 75 percent.
The accident that attracted most attention was the loss of the Lion Air 737.
Indonesia’s National Transport Safety Committee’s (KNKT) preliminary report states that Lion Air put the 737 back into service despite it having had problems on earlier flights.
It stated that the Lion Air 737 was not airworthy and should have been grounded.
The KNKT has also said that an Angle of Attack (AOA) vane which was replaced, because it was faulty, was not correctly calibrated.
After take-off, the AOA gave the captain flying the 737 incorrect data and caused what is called a “runaway stabilizer trim”.
This is caused by the plane’s computers incorrectly sensing the aircraft is going to have an aerodynamic stall and it compensates by pushing the nose down through the stabilizer trim system.
With continual incorrect data feeding into the aircraft’s computers the nose downforce from the stabilizer trim continues.
This happened on the previous flight and the pilots correctly flicked two switches to disconnect the trim system and continued their flight and reported the problem.
However, on the fatal flight, the pilots did not do this.
The KNKT is yet to find the aircraft’s missing cockpit voice recorder which will shed light on what other issues the pilots have been facing.
The other major airline crashes for 2018 involved airlines that were either banned from Europe, were operating aging aircraft and none of these operators, with the exception of Air Niugini, which lost one passenger, had completed the IOSA audit.
US authorities have extended for another year a warning to US aircraft flying in and out of Pakistan about the possibility of shoulder-fired missile attacks by extremists.
The US Federal Aviation Administration extended a Notice to Airmen (NOTAM) warning of the potential for terrorist attacks using man-portable air defense systems (MANPADS).
It said it would re-evaluate the justification for the decision by December 30, 2019.
The NOTAM applies to all US air carriers and commercial operators, urging them to exercise caution during flight operations and to review the latest security and threat information before flying into, out of or above Pakistan.
“There are continuing risks to US civil aviation operations in the territory and airspace of Pakistan due to extremist/militant activity,’’ it says.
“These risks include attacks against airports and aircraft, particularly for aircraft on the ground and aircraft operating at low altitudes, including the departure and arrival phases of flight.
“While there have been no reports of man-portable air defense systems (MANPADS) being used against civil aviation in the territory and airspace of Pakistan, there is potential risk for extremists/militants to target civil aviation with MANPADS.”
US advisories or prohibitions are also current for other areas including the Sinai Peninsula, Iran and Kenya as well as obvious trouble spots such as Syria, Ukraine, Yemen, Afghanistan, Libya, Iraq and North Korea.
There have been a number of missile attacks launched by terrorists or military forces against commercial aircraft over the decades.
They include Korean Air Flight 007, a Boeing 747 shot down by a Soviet fighter in 1983 with the loss of 269 passengers and crew, and Iran Air Flight 655, An Airbus A300 destroyed by the USS Vincennes in 1988 with 290 passengers and crew on board.
More recently, Malaysia Airlines Flight 17, a Boeing 777 flying from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur in 2014, was hit over Ukraine by a Soviet-made Buk surface-to-air missile launched from rebel-held territory.
Passengers already confused about boarding procedures in the US are about to grapple with a color-coded process at Delta Air Lines that “simplifies” boarding but adds two more categories.
Due to start globally from January 23, the airline will discard the tradition of boarding by zones in favor of a process that boards according to the “branded” fare purchased.
Most airlines do this to some extent: travelers in the cheap seats are asked to hang back while passengers in business class and those with premium status are invited to board first.
But Delta has taken this a new a level with eight color-coded categories it argues will “encourage fewer customers to line up in the gate area at any one time”.
The carrier previously had six categories with premium and Sky Priority customers boarding first followed by four zones.
Under the new system, Delta One customers get to board first followed by Delta Premium Select or first class ticket holders and then those with Delta Comfort + fares.
This is followed by Sky Priority Platinum and Gold Medallion members, those with Sky Elite Plus status and members of other eligible loyalty programs who haven’t bought pricier tickets.
Then come three Main Cabin categories followed by those that have opted for the airline’s basic economy cheap tickets.
Out with the old and in with the New: Delta’s color-coded boarding system. Graphic: Delta.
The airline says each of the categories will have a specific color attached to them “inspired by Delta’s primary brand palette” and the passport Plum shade used for its uniforms.
The colors will be used in its online shopping (although only to some initially), on boarding passes and in the airline’s app as well as on Jetway screens and gate boarding signs.
According to Delta, the branded boarding concept emerged from its decision to add zone 4 in early 2018 for basic economy customers.
The change produced dramatically improved customer satisfaction scores in zone 3 and improvements in every other zone, including by double digits for the main cabin zones.
Every customer values consistency and a sense of knowing what to expect when they’re traveling,” Delta senior vice president and chief marketing officer Tim Mapes said in the airline’s announcement.
“We have been listening to our customers about the stress they often feel at the gate before boarding, and implementing small changes for years.
“This latest enhancement further refines how Delta’s process works and is designed to better link the Delta product they purchased to differentiated experiences throughout their journey.”
The airline says it will continue to notify Basic Economy passengers that their carry-on bag may need to be checked free of charge at the gate.
Delta has been investing in a number of technologies to help smooth the customer journey including RFID baggage handling, automatic check-in and bag tracking via its mobile app and biometric terminals.
First three Vickers Viscounts on the production line at Hurn in the UK. Colorized by Benoit Vienne.
This picture is chilling: these three Vickers Viscounts that once flew for Trans Australian Airlines would all crash in Australia killing a total of 45.
The first was VH-TVA, called John Batman, after the founder of Melbourne, which would crash in a training accident at Mangalore just 18 days after delivery on October 31, 1954, killing all three crew.
The second was VH-TVB, delivered in late 1954 and named Gregory Blaxland, after the man who conquered the Blue Mountains.
In 1962, it was leased to Ansett-ANA and then purchased by the airline and then leased to MacRobertson Miller Airlines on September 10, 1968, and renamed Quininup.
It crashed on December 31, 1968, killing all 26 aboard.
The third in the picture is VH-TVC which was named John Oxley, after another Australian explorer.
This Viscount was also leased to Ansett-ANA in 1960.
It crashed into Botany Bay in November 1961 when it encountered gust loads from a severe thunderstorm well in excess of the design limits of the aircraft. All 15 aboard were killed.
After the loss of Quininup, the Australian government grounded Viscount 700s in Australia, although the type was being phased out as DC-9-30s from the Douglas Aircraft Company were being delivered.
Mrs Jane Rushton, daughter of Captain Brian Bayly with his log books. Credit Laurie Benson Albany Advertiser.
On the fiftieth anniversary of Australia’s second worst airliner crash, a Vickers Viscount that claimed 26, the thoughts of Jane Rushton, the daughter of Captain Brian Bayly, are with others impacted by the tragedy.
“My thoughts are with everyone who was affected by the crash,” said Mrs. Rushton.
There were many families devastated by the crash such as the wife and eight children of 34-year old Gordon Collins, who told his wife just before he boarded that he didn’t want to go.
And there was Dorothy Weir, whose husband, Gordon, was a passenger, who told researcher Anthony James that she “had a strange sensation” about the flight.
“My legs suddenly buckled under me and I could not walk. I just sat there and watched the plane until it disappeared,” she told Mr. Jones.
There were many families left without a breadwinner and there was no formal investigation to prosecute those Ansett-ANA staff responsible for the damaged repair to the Viscount, so relatives could get compensation.
In 2005, the widow of the first officer Michael Nelson, Jeanette tried unsuccessfully to have a formal inquest conducted by the Coroner but it was rejected.
In a Sunday Times article at the time, Mrs. Nelson lamented the tremendous hardship of those left behind.
“The personal hardship and tragedies would make you weep,” she said.
For Mrs. Rushton and her two older brothers, Tony and Ian the anniversary brings back memories of a father who was a “gentle giant” who would regale them with stories of flying around the Northwest.
“Dad loved flying and he loved the Northwest,” said Mrs. Rushton.”
Captain Bayly’s widow Joan died in June last year aged 94.
“Mum was always positive despite everything and she said that she had a good life.”
When the tragedy occurred Mrs. Rushton, then 14, and her mother were at home in Nedlands.
A haunting 1957 photo of MMA pilots and hostess Marion Dawson. Second from left is Jack Murray, who was supposed to fly the Viscount on December 31, 1968 and to his right Brian Bayly who died in the crash. Credit: A Dodds via the late Captain Reg Adkins.
“As I recall, Captain Jack Murray was actually rostered on for the flight and he came to the house to tell us,” said Mrs. Rushton.
“My brother Tony heard the news on the radio of the Viscount crash and Ian was overseas at the time,” said Mrs. Rushton.
MMA's Viscount "Quininup" at Perth Airport. Credit Merv Prime
Quininup, a 48-seat Vickers Viscount, gleamed like near new in its MacRobertson Miller Airlines color scheme of blue and green, a stark contrast to the burning red earth she flew over as she took miners north to make their fortunes as Western Australia’s first iron ore boom gathered momentum.
But she carried deep in her wing a deadly flaw that had started some five years earlier during a botched modification performed at Essendon Airport.
Quininup was a Vickers Viscount 720C and had started life in 1954 as the second of a new fleet for Trans Australian Airlines. A series of leases then purchase saw her owned by Ansett-ANA, which transferred her to its WA subsidiary MMA as VH-RMQ a few months prior to the crash.
For her five crew, she was the darling of the fleet and with a passenger capacity of 48 passengers almost twice the size of her stablemate the Fokker F27 Friendship.
Tuesday, December 31, 1968, dawned a typical summer day in Perth: warm with wind out of the north-east.
Being New Year’s Eve, the passenger load was light – just 22 including Kelmscott man Keith Dyke, 67, who was flying for the first time.
VH-RMQ’s captain, was Brian Bayly, a WW11 bomber pilot who had the right stuff in spades and was the fourth most senior pilot at MMA with over 19,000 hours.
Captain Brian Bayly. Photo colorized by Benoit Vienne
Captain Bayly was a legend, suave, engaging, and humorous and always smiling.
His crew for Flight 1750 to Port Hedland was First Officer Michael Nelson 31, senior training hostess Georgette Bradshaw, 24, Gail Sweetman 23, who had been WA’s entrant in the 1965, Miss Australia Quest. With them was 23-year-old trainee hostess Kay Aubery, who had joined the airline only a month earlier and was making her fourth flight.
According to researcher Anthony James, Miss Aubery, an only child, was originally rostered on a flight to Kalgoorlie and was a last-minute inclusion.
The boarding call came at 8.10am and one passenger Gordon Collins, a 34-year-old father of eight, was heard to tell his wife: “I don’t want to go”.
The Viscount took off at 8.36am.
According to Mr. James, “moments later, Dorothy Weir, whose husband, Gordon, was a passenger, had a strange sensation.”
Mrs. Weir said “my legs suddenly buckled under me and I could not walk. I just sat there and watched the plane until it disappeared.”
Aside from some turbulence early in the flight, the flying conditions were fine.
The flight route was north-east over Mount Magnet with a turn due north at Meekatharra, abeam Wittenoom Gorge at 11.14am
At 11.20am, FO Nelson advised that they would be commencing their descent from FL190 (19,000ft) in three minutes.
And precisely three minutes later Captain Bayly eased back the throttles on the four Rolls Royce Dart turboprops and Quininup left the cruise level of FL190 and commenced the descent into Port Hedland — a procedure he had done hundreds of times
At 11.34am, FO Nelson reported that Quininup was 30 miles (48km) south of Port Hedland and had left 7,000 ft.
This was the final transmission.
Just four seconds later the starboard (right) wing outboard of the inner or No. 3 engine – and including the No. 4 engine – snapped off and hit the tail as it separated sending Quininup into uncontrollable dive, impacting the ground 26 seconds later.
But the impact of this disaster is still painful 50 years on.
On the huge Indee station, owner Colin Brierly heard two big explosions and observed a huge, black smoke cloud rise in the distance.
In Port Hedland, air traffic controller Pat Seymour saw the same ominous smoke.
Mr. Seymour told Mr. James: “When I didn’t get a response from the crew, I knew something had gone terribly wrong with the aircraft. Crews always respond promptly during this stage of flight.”
Search and rescue efforts were launched immediately.
Mr. Brierly was first to the sickening crash site but there were no survivors.
All that was left were twisted pieces of metal, scattered over a wide area blackened by the inferno that engulfed the wreckage.
The tragedy started the most comprehensive investigation in Australian aviation history at the time.
The wing that separated was sent to Melbourne for forensic examination and it was discovered after nine months of forensic investigation that shoddy maintenance work was to blame.
Engineers in Melbourne at Ansett performing an upgrade to the wing in 1964 “butchered” pre-drilled holes in a metal plate that was being bolted to the underside of a wing spar so that they lined up with holes in the spar.
Incredibly, none of the three involved were ever brought to account and thus the relatives were denied proper compensation.
Two drones found near Gatwick Airport have been ruled out as responsible for pre-Christmas travel chaos as Sussex Police say they are continuing throw “all available resources” at the investigation.
Sussex Police Chief Constable Giles York issued a statement Saturday emphasizing the push to identify and bring to justice those involved in the illegal drone activity and calling for more information from the public.
The airport was shut down over three days and the travel plans of 140,000 people were disrupted after reports of illegal drones.
Saturday’s statement, issued after York had early admitted some sightings could have been of police drones, said it was established that the incident, which led to widespread travel disruption, was caused “by numerous instances of illegal drone activity”.
This was not a police drone, it said.
However, the police confirmed that two drones recovered from an intensive search of the area had now been ruled out of the inquiry.
They said they were currently examining relevant sightings by 115 witnesses – 93 from credible witnesses, people used to working in the busy airport environment, including a pilot, airport staff and police officers.
This included further information generated as a result of a public appeal for information and more than 1,000 house-to-house inquiries.
“Public safety remains a priority and what we are dealing with is both unprecedented and challenging,’’ York said.
“There will be information relevant to this enquiry within the community and, with a £50,000 reward on offer for information from Gatwick Airport Limited, it is vital that people come forward so we can bring to justice the person responsible for this criminal act.”
The Chief Constable had earlier told the BBC some of the sightings could have been police drones investigating the incident but added that he was “absolutely certain that there was a drone flying throughout the period that the airport was closed.”
York said a Sussex officer who suggested last week that police were not sure whether there was a drone flying at Gatwick at all was simply trying to explain the investigative approach taken by the force.
He also defended the move to arrest a middle-aged couple who were held for questioning for 36 hours before being released without charge.
Paul Gait and Elaine Kirk said they felt “violated” after their home was searched and their identities exposed.
“I’m really sorry for what [Gait] has experienced and the feeling of violation around it,” the BBC quoted York as saying.
“[But] what might have been worse as an experience for him would have been to be released under investigation still.
“We were able to exhaust all our lines of inquiry on that first instance and were able to release him from police custody saying he was no longer a suspect.”
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