The two subjects that had you most agitated today were the BA cabin crew strike and New York – the city and its leading airport, JFK. As I said at the start of the programme, the battle lines have been drawn in the bitterest dispute in UK aviation history. British Airways and the cabin-crew union are going to meet again this week, even though the two sides appear as far apart as they have been for over a year. The threat of a cabin crew strike persists. Plenty of people called seeking certainty, but I could not help. “Bill” from Brighton, a BA steward of 30 years standing, said he was prepared to strike in protest against roster changes.
JFK goes from bad to worse tomorrow; last time I was at New York’s leading gateway, the plane was 23rd in line for departure, and it took 90 minutes to get off the ground. The airport has four runways, but the longest and busiest one, the Bay Runway, is to close for repairs tomorrow for four months. The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey was unavailable for comment – but Warren from Northwood, a regular visitor there, was kind enough to talk to me. He said that he hoped there wouldn’t be too much disruption. But later I got an email from Casia saying “Hi Simon, I have just flown back from Newark on Virgin and wanted to let you know how smooth the whole experience was - from getting a train to Newark International from Penn Station, then a monorail to the terminal. Newark is certainly less congested than JFK and I would strongly recommend flying there if you can.”
More heckles even than usual, with Tom of Hammersmith providing the best: The most westerly Canary Island is not La Palma....it's wild and wonderful ' El Hierro' ! This island was the last stop Columbus made on his first Voyage of Discovery and was known as the 'end of the World' “
I’ll be going no further than Oxford airport to see the new flight take off tomorrow to Edinburgh, then hurrying back to see what’s happening with the BA dispute. Let’s hope that this time next week we’ll be talking about normal operations.
Travel well,
Simon