...well, fairly lamented. I had a sorta-kinda good experience with Zoom and I knew deep down the whole thing was too good to be true. Anyway, the show's over. Zoom are blaming fuel costs and the US economy - but I'm sceptical as to whether they'd have made it long-term anyway.
Coincidentally the day after I mentioned Aeroflot's new European PR campaign I was on the receiving end of its opening burst. As you can see below, Ogilvy PR think I am so important that they sent me a copy of the press release that they had already exclusively offered to the travel editor of The Sun. Mind you, she has her own problems, and probably needs all the help she can get.
Pity Katharina Winkler of Ogilvy PR in London (that's not her pictured left BTW). August gets off to a nice bright start for her as she gets the Aeroflot pan-European account at a time when the airline actually has some good stuff to talk about. Shiny new fleet with more to come, strong growth, reasonably serious hopes of Sheremetyevo getting sorted out.
The days tick by and then this happens. Since Aeroflot was apparently in the process of hiring an agency while the Kremlin was in the process of getting ready to go to war, it seems the airline is not quite as deep in the government's pocket as generally reckoned. Or maybe it was, in a very Western way, doing the only thing it could in the light of events.
Anyway, Katharina has got her work cut out.
After a few quiet months air safety is suddenly smack-bang back on the news agenda. The Spanair crash in Madrid and the 737 loss in Kyrgyzstan over the weekend have seen that. And so it's hard luck on Ryanair to have a depressurisation a couple of days later, and make-your-own-luck for Air Canada Jazz for going public with plans to take lifejackets out of some aircraft. Expect more of this for a while anyway.
So BA, American and Iberia have finally bitten the bullet and are are asking for anti-trust immunity for their alliance - with Finnair and Royal Jordanian thrown in for good measure. This one will run and run, but an interesting development on day one is that they are banking on public support through a new campaigning website with the provocative url www.MoreTravelChoices.com
First question now will be to see who actively opposes this. Virgin we know all about - but how will Star Alliance and SkyTeam address this? Very tricky for them I think.
In the great, and generally successful, tradition of Unusual Attitude off-the-cuff predictions here's one more: this application will be approved.
Comments very welcome.
I've been on holiday, so this is just an aviation travelogue (avialogue?), but it's a bit offbeat, so here goes. We were in Croatia, one of the places in Europe where I still get a passport stamp, though when the Croatians negotiate their way into the EU I won't anymore. We flew into Pula Airport with you know who and mixed it with the Carelesses, Cambers, and Fishbeds.
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