New low cost carrier Flydubai will have a familiar face running the show: Former Skybus COO Kenneth Gile. He's been tapped to tackle the same job for the nascent airline, which hopes to be flying by summer of next year.
It won't be the first time in the Persian Gulf for Gile, as he started his commercial career with Saudi Arabian Airlines before joining Southwest, eventually become the Texas LCC's chief pilot and director of flight operations.
He's not the only Skybus refugee moving overseas, either, it seems. Marla Matzer Rose at the Columbus Dispatch reports that some of the defunct airline's pilots are now working in China. Maybe they'll get rated to fly those nifty new ARJ21s?
Our last few trips have been sorely lacking in British reality TV quotient, so we're seriously considering booking a flight on CelebAir, the star-stocked charter carrier making flights between the UK and Southern Europe this fall for a new show on ITV2.
Monarch Airlines is handling booking for the CelebAir flights, which are jetting to Cyprus, Portugal and Spain out of Gatwick. A seat between LGW and Malaga in September is a competitive £86 ($168) and getting from London to Tenerife will only run you £117 ($231).
There's no guarantee of which C-lister you might bump into at 34,000 feet, but you'll definitely get to ask at least one flying celeb to bring you an extra pillow. Plus, if you act ridiculous enough, you'll be on a reality TV show in Britain, and who wouldn't want that as a vacation souvenir?
The new airline Flydubai just announced that it bought 50 737-800s, a deal worth almost $4 billion at list prices. The carrier, owned by the government of Dubai, plans to start service by summer of 2009, meaning those Boeings will have to come off the assembly line soon. Rumor has it Flydubai is jumping the production queue by snapping up aircraft deliveries that American airlines have deferred.
Where will those 50 new planes fly?
To Dubai from the whole Middle East region, North and East Africa, Southeast Europe and the Indian subcontinent.
Specific routes still haven't been announced. As for fares, Flydubai says ticket prices will be "extremely competitive."
A British TV network is planning a reality show featuring 12 celebs working as flight attendants and gate agents on a carrier they're calling CelebAir.
The eight-part series, set to debut this fall, will follow the stars as they work actual flights carrying paying customers. They'll have to pass requirements set down by the UK's Civil Aviation Authority to work the cabin, though none of the celebs are slated to pilot the single CelebAir plane.
While no names have been confirmed just yet, Gridskipper is hoping that Paris and Nicole will be on board. We can only assume that's because of this.
Billionaire and serial airline starter Richard Branson now wants a piece of Brazil. He just announced that he's in talks with partners in the country to launch what we can only assume will be called Virgin Brazil.
He'll certainly need the help of locals: The nation only allows foreign investors to control 20 percent of a given domestic airline. That's a problem David Neeleman was able to avoid with his own new airline because the JetBlue founder has Brazilian citizenship.
Branson says talks are ongoing, which makes sense: It took Virgin America years to get off the ground because of foreign ownership concerns, hyped by already-established airlines in the US. We can't imagine TAM and Gol will be too keen to compete with him on their South American turf.
Can you keep a secret? Someone out there can, because details on a new Australian low cost carrier are very sketchy. There's no name yet, but we do know that it's part German-owned and based in Melbourne at the moment. It's planning to start flying in November this year.
With initial flights between Sydney, Melbourne and the Gold Coast, the mystery airline plans to expand around the entire eastern half of Australia. And it's planning to grab customers by providing free meals and drinks while still selling tickets at budget airline prices. Sounds too good to be true.
And in case they need any help with a name we've always wondered why nobody's ever tried "Flying Koalas." Might have better luck than "Jet America."
Flying around South Korea is about to get cheaper and a whole lot cooler, after the weekend's announcement that Jin Air will be the promised budget offshoot of Korean Air. Flights start on July 17, and major routes will include flights from Seoul to the southwest city of Busan, and on to the holiday capital of Jeju Island.
The powers that be were going to call the new airline Air Korea but they must've had a marketing consultant in, because they have a ton of good reasons for going with Jin Air instead. One: Jin can mean "truth" and "sincerity"--nice qualities for an airline. Two: Jin also means jeans, and that's what the flight staff will be wearing, plus T-shirt. Very hip.
And three: By extension, the airline's already calling the crew jini because it makes them sound like magical genies who can do everything.
David Neeleman's new Brazilian airline, Azul is chugging right along. The latest word is that the first flights will happen in January of 2009, and to tide us over, the carrier has released its new "corporate identity."
Yet again, we're seeing a lot of JetBlue in Azul. For starters, the livery on these Embraer jets looks familiar. B6 paints its E190s the same way, with blue on the bottom, white on top and a fancy tail pattern. Both airlines also have their web addresses stamped on the sides of their planes. Azul uses the Helvetica typeface--you've seen it at American Apparel, on American Airlines and on the NYC subway--while JetBlue works a slightly different sans serif face--called DIN--to get that jet-set look.
Inside, the similarities continue. Two-by-two leather seats are standard, and Azul plans to be the first Latin American airline with live TV in-flight. (Which JetBlue subsidiary company is providing it? LiveTV.)
Now, we're not saying all this copying is a bad thing; if the JetBlue model ain't broke, don't fix it. Want to join us in Brazil around, say, January 2009 to give Azul a try?
