December 26, 2025 • 39 mins
Bradley Jay Fills In On NightSide with Dan Rea
Fly away with some great information, tonight at 9, as Bradley chats with Airplane Geek Micah Engber. Explore the world of aviation and get tips and tricks for a safer and more enjoyable flight. From the TSA pat-down to your upgraded seat, learn about proper airport etiquette and more!
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
It's Night Side with Dan Way on WBZ, Boston's news radio.
Speaker 2 (00:06):
Bradley for Dan Tonight on Nightside.
Speaker 3 (00:08):
Thanks to Kelly Leonard of Boston History Company for coming
in and giving us some extra layer of details on
some of these historical events that we know about. I
would definitely take their tour and uh oh, if you're
a social media person you're cruising around, you're instead of
doom scrolling, you might want to go to YouTube and
(00:33):
search Boston History Company. That's where I found them, and
I was very impressed by Daniel, who is I guess
the founder of this. And you know how it is
on YouTube, you're always looking for something new. You've you've
seen everything. You're looking for something worth watching. Those are
those are worth watching. They seem better than most things.
(00:54):
So there you go, Boston History Company. Next on WBZ,
we're going to learn some more things. We're going to
have some more fun. We're going to do uh airline
travel news tips and tricks, And among the things you're
going to find out about is that there's an airline
providing a new service but schedule to go bankrupt. So
(01:15):
there's something there's something to watch out for.
Speaker 2 (01:17):
There.
Speaker 3 (01:18):
We're going to find out what's going to happen if
you try to travel without a real id.
Speaker 2 (01:22):
Do you even know what a real idea is? Some
probably don't.
Speaker 3 (01:27):
There And there are these special credit cards, like super
special credit cards that you can get that offer super
special perks, and if you fly a lot, you might
want to know about that. How to look for deals.
There's kind of a strategy to look for deals.
Speaker 2 (01:43):
We're going to learn about the fact.
Speaker 3 (01:47):
Well, I'm going to explain the statement that there are
no oxygen tanks on airplanes.
Speaker 2 (01:54):
Did you know that?
Speaker 3 (01:55):
And you might say, Bradley Jay, well, why would I
bother to put the little ask on my face if
it pops down?
Speaker 2 (02:01):
If there's no oxygen tanks? Well, we'll explain.
Speaker 3 (02:05):
That airport etiquette. Good grief, Charlie Brown. It seems like
we've all forgotten we people forgot their manners when they
moved to online, to social media, and now people act
that way in person. I thought I used to think
that people would not act that way when when someone
(02:26):
could confront you in person. Not true, people act that way.
But we've got to stop. And there certain airport etiquettes.
There's etiquettes, there's seating rules, as well. There's an aisle,
a middle, and a window, and each of those seats
has things, has perks and responsibilities that go with it
that you need to know. And I'm going to also
(02:50):
lead with this for you for everyone. Do you believe
the TSA is just theater? I myself I liked. I
don't mind the TSA at all.
Speaker 2 (03:00):
But I have an.
Speaker 3 (03:00):
Acquaintance who's thoroughly put out that the TSA makes her
jump through various hoops, pats her down every time, et cetera.
I myself pat me down. I don't care pat away.
As long as you pat everybody else down and get
(03:22):
those weapons and etc.
Speaker 2 (03:24):
That's fine with me.
Speaker 3 (03:26):
But there are those that say that this is just
safety theater. And of course there are those that say, boy,
I'm sure, I'm glad they're doing that. I love the TSA.
Where do you stand on that? And do you have
any interesting.
Speaker 2 (03:41):
Do you have any.
Speaker 3 (03:42):
Interesting anecdotes or stories regarding the TSA at the airport.
So we have our expert, our airplane geek. Indeed, his
name's Micah Ingber and he is part of the Airplane
Geeks podcast, and so let's welcome him. Hello, Micah, tell
me a little about you and tell me about the
Airplane Geeks podcast.
Speaker 4 (04:02):
Bradley, thank you so much for inviting me. It's great
to talk to you. Great to be back on BZ.
And well, the Airplane Geek's podcast is. It's a weekly
audio program where the oldest aviation podcast that's in continuous operations.
It's two thousand and eight. We were doing podcasts, but
before people that what podcasts were.
Speaker 3 (04:22):
And you had the right brothers on your podcast, I
think right, we did.
Speaker 4 (04:26):
We did Rablee, but not Wilbur. He wouldn't come on.
But what we try to do is well, our slogan
is we try to educate and inform you, explore and
expand your passion for aviation, and entertain you a little
bit along the way. And we're just talking about commercial aviation,
military aviation, general aviation. And we often have different prominent
(04:48):
industry guests on with us. We've had oh chief pilots
from from United Airlines, We've had the CEO of Serious Aircraft.
We've had all sorts of people on since two thousand
and eight. You can imagine the number of people we've
had on. And in fact, one of our new regular
part time guest hosts is a woman named Aaron Applebaum
(05:10):
who's with the biggest law firm that handles aviation plaintiff
controls from their crashes, and she handled the Big seven
thirty all the plaintiffs for the seven thirty seven Max
crash Ethiopian three h two, and she's a regular with
us now. So it's a fun program, and we've been
doing it for a long time and we do fun
things too. A couple of years ago, we did our
(05:31):
Favorite Aviation Films and listed over a hundred different aviation
films and the scary part was I had seen all
of them, but nonetheless, well, okay.
Speaker 3 (05:40):
Let me jump in here and ask what was the
most popular. It has to be airplane, right, No.
Speaker 4 (05:46):
Actually, the most popular, I think was Top Gun. But
when we asked our listeners to write it and tell
us what their favorite aviation film was, we said favorite
one that doesn't include Top Gun.
Speaker 2 (05:57):
And so what was the answer to that.
Speaker 4 (06:01):
We got so many it's hard to say.
Speaker 3 (06:04):
Oh. Yeah.
Speaker 4 (06:05):
List of favorites included the Great Waldo Pepper, which you
might have heard of, those magnificent men of their flying machines,
the Memphis Bell Midway, on and on and on. And
on and on. Like I said, I wrote a story
about it, and I had thirty listed as my thirty
favorite to begin with.
Speaker 3 (06:21):
I bet a lot of them answered with esoteric answers
just to show off nobody really wanted to know.
Speaker 4 (06:26):
There were a lot of those. Yeah, And you know,
if we have listeners on bez here, they want to
hear that. That's Airplane Geeks episode seven eighty three. And
you can go back and get a list of great
aviation films with you that you might want to one.
Speaker 2 (06:39):
Then eighty three people.
Speaker 3 (06:41):
All right, Micah, we'll start with real ID because that's
something very important and relevant. A lot of people fly,
a lot of people flew for getting to part of
this holiday. A lot of people are going to fly
again to get home. They've been talking about real ID.
You have to get a real ID. Go get your
real ID. Do it now or you'll be sorry. And
(07:04):
now the rubber is meeting the road. What's going on
with the real ID when it comes to flying? Even
domestically well.
Speaker 4 (07:13):
Real ID people are saying, I didn't know anything about this.
I don't understand what it means. It was proposed and
it's been in effect since well twenty years now, and
they kept putting it off and putting it off to
give the states an opportunity to come up with a
real ID system that meets certain requirements identification requirements, and
each state needed to put it on the driver's license,
(07:34):
and finally all states have so they finally required it
as of last May that you cannot board a flight
unless you have a real ID now. A real ID is,
in particular, a driver's license that is issued by the
state that has identified you to prove that you truly
are who you say you are. Now, if you don't
have a real ID, if you don't want to get
that kind of driver's license, you can still use a
(07:56):
passport or a passport card. You can use one of
ther to traveler cards like Global Entry or NEXUS. A
US Defense Department ID is good. If you're part of
a federally recognized tribe. You know, a Native American tribe,
the tribal ID is perfectly fine. There are all sorts
of different possibilities, but as of February first, if you
(08:21):
don't have a real ID, they will not let you
board the aircraft unless you pay a forty five dollars
fee and go through a complete and total background check
like they do sometimes with banks and credit cards and
things like that, doing an internet check to make sure
that you say who you are. And once you pay
that forty five dollars and you go through that check,
(08:43):
which is going to take up to twenty minutes, then
they'll let you through security twenty minutes.
Speaker 3 (08:48):
Does this seem like they could really do a full
check in twenty minutes?
Speaker 1 (08:52):
You know what?
Speaker 3 (08:52):
It kind of reminds me of as the l L
security check. Let me I know you know about it,
but let me tell people how it's how it was different.
First time I went to Jerusalem, I went to the
l L. I flew out of New York. And when
you before you get to any security machines or anything,
you have to talk to people, and they will and
(09:14):
I was with someone and they will ask you questions.
So where are you from, where's your address? How long
have you lived there? Do you live together? How long
have you lived together? How did you meet her? How
did you meet him? Do you have a dog? Where's
the dog? While you're away? Where this kind of thing?
No kidding? Where are you going to stay? That was
(09:34):
my mistake. I didn't book I had not booked a hotel,
I said, I don't know yet, bee you know they
the woman raised her hand, some guy with a book
and shane to his belt came over and they put
me in a little room. They this is before they
even x ray shoes. They say, take your shoes off,
and they x rayed my shoes. So it's kind of
(09:57):
like that they didn't have the Internet then, But it's
something you don't want to do.
Speaker 2 (10:01):
It's a lot easier to just get a real ID.
Speaker 4 (10:05):
Right, And what the TSA is telling us currently, about
ninety four percent of all the passengers that are flying
right now a compliant They have the correct ID. So
we're only dealing with six percent of the people flying.
That's still a lot of people. And I suspect, although
I don't know exactly how they're going to do it,
and I'm sure we've all gone through this where we've
called a bank or a credit card company or some
(10:27):
organization that needs to identify us on the phone and
they say we're going to ask you some random questions
that from a service that's provided by the Internet, and
they may ask you questions of what kind of car
did you own in this year, or what of these
street addresses, which one did you live to or do
you have a relative named so and so and that
kind of thing, and it takes time. What they'll do
(10:50):
is they'll pull you out of line and pull you aside.
And that maybe not you know, for you and me,
who gets to an airport early, that wouldn't be a problem.
But there are a lot of people that think they're
going to get to the airport ten minutes before the
flight and get pulled aside and they're going to miss
their flight. So if you don't have a real ID,
be prepared to pay this forty five dollars and be
(11:10):
prepared to be pulled aside and take the time to
go through this beginning February first. But it's a lot
easier to get a real ID. It only takes a
few minutes to go through.
Speaker 2 (11:18):
T you just hold everybody else up while they're doing it.
Speaker 4 (11:21):
No, it shouldn't at all, because and that's why. Originally
they thought the charge was going to be less. They
thought it was going to be about twenty dollars, but
they realized it was going to take more time, and
they've announced it's going to be forty five dollars to
do this, and by the way, that clearance is going
to be good for ten days, so if you're going
someplace and you're coming back, you won't have to pay
it twice. But what they'll what they'll do is just
(11:45):
like and I'm sure you've seen this. I know I've
had to do it at different times. I've had additional
screening where they saw something in my bag. In fact,
one time, I won't lie about it. I forgot I
had a bottle of water in my bag, so they
had to pull the bag aside and open it up.
And it's additional screening, and that what will happened with this.
You'll go through the line. You'll see they don't have
you have ever real id. They'll set you aside and
(12:07):
let the person behind you continue on through for twenty minutes.
Speaker 2 (12:10):
Though, that's pretty interesting.
Speaker 3 (12:12):
All right, we're gonna break on the other side of
this break.
Speaker 2 (12:15):
We're not going anywhere, but we'll still be here.
Speaker 3 (12:17):
But we're going to find out about this statement and
why it's true. Here comes to statement there are no
oxygen tanks on airplanes. So you may be wondering, why
what am I going to breathe in that little yellow mask? Well,
we'll find out. But that's all about. After this on WBZ.
Speaker 1 (12:36):
Night Side with Dan Ray on WBZ Boston's news radio.
Speaker 3 (12:41):
We continue with michaeh Engber of Airplane Geys podcasts, and
I'm gonna ask him to explain what he meant when
he told me Bradley Jay, there are no oxygen tanks
on airplanes, And I said, what explain? So why don't
you explain it to everybody?
Speaker 4 (13:00):
Well, people think about oxygen tanks when they think about
the oxygen masks when they listen to the flight attendants
make their announcements at the beginning, and I hope that
everybody listens to that because it's important information. You should
actively listen and not just be passive about it. But
when they talk about and decompression, if there's an emergency
and there's a decompression, that the ocgen masks are going
(13:20):
to fall from the ceiling and you pull on a
cord and you put that mask over your nose and mouth,
adjustice traps, make sure it's tight on your face, and
you continue breathing normally. So people assume they are great,
big oxygen tanks overhead, and you're going to get all
that oxygen from those tanks. But that's not how they
do it, not for passengers anyway. Because those oxygen tanks
and Bradley and I'm sure you've seen them, and our
(13:42):
listeners have seen great big green oxygen tanks and hospitals
or in other locations. They're huge, and they're heavy, and
they take up a lot of space and we don't
have a lot of space on their Well, they are
definitely combustible, or at least the oxygen will certainly make
a fire burn faster and hotter, and it makes it
much more difficult to put a fire out. So what
(14:05):
do you do because you don't have a lot of
space on an airplane. Well, what it is, it's called
an oxygen generator. It's a chemical oxygen generator, and there's
a couple of chemicals inside. And what happens is when
you pull on that mask and you've got to pull
it down so that you yank a little pin out,
that tin actually fires a small percussion cap, and that
(14:27):
percussion cap starts what's known as an exothermic reaction. That
means that it generates heat. But these chemicals that mix
together when it sets them not really on fire, but
starts that reaction. Starts generating oxygen that goes down the
tube and into the masks that you can breathe, and
it'll do that for all between ten and twenty minutes,
(14:48):
which is more than enough time for the pilot to
bring the plane down to an altitude where you can
breathe normally sore because the plane's what.
Speaker 2 (14:56):
If planes cruise that now, thirty five thousand something like.
Speaker 4 (14:58):
That, Yeah, thirty five to thirty seven thousand, any place between,
you know, twenty and thirty five thirty seven thousand. Some
of the small private jets will be up at forty
thousand feet, So yeah, how long?
Speaker 2 (15:10):
Excuse me?
Speaker 3 (15:11):
How far do you have to get down before you
can there's enough oxygen for you to breathe through the
through the broken glass in the in the in the plane.
Speaker 4 (15:20):
Well, usually I should be ten twelve thousand feet. I
can't remember exactly what it is, but you're usually okay,
I mean, Bradley, I'm sure if you've slung gone up
the cow Railway to Pike's Peak out in Colorado at
some point or another, and I think that's a thirteen
thousand feet and frankly, when I was up there was
a little dizzy.
Speaker 3 (15:37):
Yeah, but you get used to it by then and
you're feet eleven thousand feet would be okay. So my
point is that if there's only twenty minutes of oxygen
and you have to descend twenty thousand feet in twenty minutes,
that's one thousand feet a minute. So you're really going
to feel that kind of a roller coaster. Rag it's
you're going down fast, right.
Speaker 4 (15:57):
It's certainly going to be a lot faster than what
you normally feel. It might be a little frightening, but
you know those planes are designed to do it, and
the pilots are in control, and we've got great people
flying our aircraft for the airlines these days.
Speaker 3 (16:09):
Okay, I mean yes, in the best of situations, I
know that that you're very much a booster for the
excellence in all those categories. Let's I all myself. I'm
going to hope all those things. I hope this aircraft
was made for this. I hope the pilot's a good one,
et cetera. Your words will give me comfort, though well.
Speaker 4 (16:34):
As you're going down, you could say, we think to yourself, well,
Mike has said this is going to be fine, right,
You'll be just perfect.
Speaker 1 (16:41):
Okay.
Speaker 2 (16:41):
So when you pull the little plastic tube.
Speaker 3 (16:48):
You really have to pull it to fire a percussion
cap to start the chain reaction. I don't think they
are clear enough that you really need to pull us down.
Speaker 2 (16:56):
Or it ain't gonna work. They don't make it.
Speaker 3 (16:58):
They don't make it very clear why and that you
need to probably do some sort of sharp tug. They should, really,
you think that it's too much information for a passenger
to absorb what's really going on, or at least they
should say pull it hard or pull it tightly or
something like that.
Speaker 4 (17:16):
And usually that's what I hear anyway, and maybe not
paying more attention than most, but they say to tug
it down to make sure that it's a tube pull straight,
and that way you have enough tubing to get it
over your nose and mouth. You don't just wear it
over your nose. You're not going to get enough oxygen.
You'll end up reading through your mouth and not just
over your mouth and leave your nose open. It's big
enough to cover your nose and mouth and the other
(17:39):
thing to do. And they say this every time. If
you're traveling with someone that needs assistance, put your oxygen
mask on before you go to help anybody else, because
if you pass out, you certainly won't be able to
help the person next to you if they need help,
or your child.
Speaker 3 (17:53):
So if there's a decompression, that means that this actual
atmosphere getting into the plane, and that.
Speaker 4 (17:58):
That if you're leaving the plane Bradley, Yeah, but.
Speaker 3 (18:02):
It's being refilled with something. There's air from the outside
coming in after a while.
Speaker 2 (18:06):
Right.
Speaker 3 (18:07):
The point is it's going to get really cold because
it's sixty degrees below zero up there.
Speaker 4 (18:12):
It's going to be very cold for a little bit,
depending on where you are in the plane, that's for sure,
you know, and you'll and you'll feel the air moving.
You know. When the Southwest flight had the door fall off,
the person next to it was afraid he was going
to get sucked out. He was buckled in, and thank
god he was, because if he wasn't, that's an explosive
decompression and you're going to be pulled right out as
(18:32):
the air flows out of the aircraft.
Speaker 3 (18:35):
So that the door fell off, that was one of
those plans that you mentioned that are made made correctly.
Speaker 2 (18:42):
What happened.
Speaker 4 (18:43):
He has had considerable difficulty for quite some time. That
has been corrected and the NTSB and the FAA has
made sure that that's working well.
Speaker 2 (18:51):
Yay, okay.
Speaker 3 (18:53):
There are rules about how to behave depending on whether
you sit in the aisle, the middle or the window,
and Mike is going to spell those rules out after
this on WBZ You're.
Speaker 1 (19:05):
On Night Side with Dan Ray on WBZ Boston's news Radio.
Speaker 3 (19:10):
My Friends Bradley Jay in for Dan tonight on Night's Side.
The number six one seven. If you'd like to answer
any well, actually, these two questions I'm about to pose
I posed one earlier. Do you do you feel comfortable
with the TSA when you go through the airport? Are
you glad to see them? Do you think they're making
me safer? Or do you think this is just a hussle,
(19:32):
This is just theater. I wish they'd go away. Where
do you stand on that? The other thing is this
what's happening more and more is that people will pay
for an extralegrum seat and someone will come over and
say something like, my family sitting beside you can we
trade seats and they don't have the extra legrum. They
didn't pay. You'd be giving up seat that you paid
(19:54):
for out of guilts or in some cases someone will
say I have a I need to use the men's
room often whether the restroom often?
Speaker 2 (20:09):
Will you trade seats? Would you trade seats?
Speaker 3 (20:13):
You paid money for that seat, like good hardcare, a
lot of money.
Speaker 2 (20:17):
Would you trade seats?
Speaker 3 (20:18):
All right, let's get back to micah Anger from airplane
geeks dot com or an airplane Geeks podcast. Excuse me,
and we're going to get into the seating rules there.
There are rules in different situations. For example, if you're hiking,
say up the Kinsman Trail and the Lafayette Range or.
Speaker 2 (20:40):
In that area.
Speaker 3 (20:41):
If you're the rule is if there's a single lane
trail and someone's coming up and someone's coming down, the
person going down steps aside. This is a rule of
the trail. There are also rules of the plane when
it comes to whether you're sitting in the eye or
a middle or windows seat. So Mike's gonna run those
(21:03):
rules down, and I expect you to listen, learn, and.
Speaker 2 (21:08):
And do this.
Speaker 4 (21:09):
Go ahead, Micah Now, Bradley, if I may, Before I
give you the rules, I want to say. The airplane
Geeks podcast at airplanegeeks dot com is an aviation podcast
that also deals with airlines and travel tips and tricks.
But I also do another podcast that you've been with
me on with Brian Coleman called The Journey is Thereward
dot org the podcast, and that's travel tips and tricks
(21:32):
and airlines that also does a little aviation, And this
would be with that podcast. And I wanted our listeners
to know because they may not be quite as geeky
as I am about aviation, but they may want to
know about travel and these kinds of tips, travel.
Speaker 3 (21:44):
Tips, like how to get deals, et cetera like that. Okay,
so hit these rules now.
Speaker 4 (21:50):
Now these are the rules, just like the rules of
the trail. They're not written down. There's nobody that's going
to enforce them, but it's the way it's supposed to work.
The person that sits in the windows seat has control
of the shade. They decide if the shade is going
to be up and down. Now, if you're sitting next
to them, you could say, hey, I prefer the shade down.
Do you mind pulling it down? And they have every
right to say no. Or I really look like to
(22:13):
look out the window, would you leave it up? And
they have the right to say no. But that's the
window seat responsibility. Now, if you're sitting next to them
and you're in the middle seat. If you are in
a three seat configuration, middle seat is a most uncomfortable
seat on the plane. You got people on either side
of you. It's miserable. I try to avoid the middle
seat at all stages, but if I get it, I'm
(22:33):
entitled to both armress.
Speaker 3 (22:36):
Did anybody know that? Do you have to tell them?
Excuse me, sir, I'm in the middle seat. I am
entitled to both armress and needs to be written down,
needs to be codified. Maybe you can have a little
business guard made up or something, but nobody knows that, do.
Speaker 4 (22:48):
They They don't, But that's the way it's supposed to be.
And if it were me, I would say, you know,
I'm in the middle seat and these armrests are supposed
to be mine. Now I understand that you might want
to use it, and if I'm in the front of it,
you can use the back, but would you mind letting
me have it? And they if you're courteous, And we
don't have as much courtesy in this world as we
(23:09):
should these days. Typically people are pretty good about that.
Sometimes they won't be, and you might get into an argument,
and the airlines aren't going to These aren't airline rules.
These are traveler rules and this these are courtesy rules,
and we need more courtesy in this world.
Speaker 2 (23:24):
Okay, now you're in the aisle seat, what do you get?
Speaker 4 (23:27):
What do you have to the aisle seat which is
a cream seat because you can decide when you want
to get up and walk and stretch your legs. But
the aisle person is responsible to let the other people
out whenever they want to get up because they they're
the king of the isle. They have control over the aisle.
So if you sit in the aisle person sitting next
(23:47):
to you want to get up, you need to let
them out. Now. If you're a big guy like me,
that probably means I'm gonna have to get out of
my seat and stand up myself. But if you're you know,
fortunate enough to be smaller, you can probably just slip
to the side, move your legs to the side, and
even a big guy like me has been able to
get around some people like that.
Speaker 2 (24:04):
I have a real beef with the rule.
Speaker 3 (24:06):
I have one of a big beef with one of
the rules, and that's the window seat rule.
Speaker 2 (24:09):
I don't like that rule. And let me explain.
Speaker 3 (24:14):
I don't think that the window seat person should be
the arbiter of whether the window stays up or down,
or the window shades stays up or down, because so
many other people are affected by that. There should be
a standing rule or something like this. If you know
above a certain altitude, should close the window. If there's
something interesting to see on the ground, say you're below
(24:37):
five thousand feet or something, okay, you can look out.
But if there's somebody that just has got the window open,
there's nothing to see but cloud cover and the sun
is burning a hole in your face, and you're trying
to watch a movie. It not only affects you, it
affects probably ten or twelve people in the general area
(24:59):
of that window. So I think the rules should be, Hey,
unless it's something to see, shut the window.
Speaker 2 (25:07):
But that's not the way it is.
Speaker 4 (25:10):
It's not the way it is, and I disagree with you.
I get the window because I'm looking out all the time.
The last time I flew Traine Geek, I don't turn
on the movies. I I'll listen to a podcast, I'll
listen to you, I'll watch you on YouTube. But I
got the window open, and I'm watching the moving map
and uh and and that's what I'm doing.
Speaker 2 (25:32):
Clouds.
Speaker 4 (25:34):
Last time I flew, I flew to London. I was
in a beautiful seven eighty seven flying NonStop from San Francisco,
and it was an overnight flight. And on the seven
eighty seven. I don't know if you knew this, Bradley,
but the flight attendants can control that there aren't any
windows shades. The flight attendant controls the darkness of the
lightness of the windows electronically. I love that they're dimmed
(25:54):
or brightened electronically, and they usually do them all at once.
But even at night, I could see out and see
the stars, and I could look down and I could
see ships. And I asked the flight attendant, because I
was at the window, is it possible for you to
be able to let me control my own shade? And
she said sure, And I looked out all night long.
Speaker 3 (26:14):
Okay, because you are an airplane geek. You love flying folks,
Mike I, Micah and his pals, they don't care where
they go. The destination is, like he says, the journey
is the destination. They just want to fly, They just
want to be in the airplane, and sometimes, like your
friend Brian, will just go to an airport all the
(26:36):
ways like South Africa, just hanging around in the airport
and come home.
Speaker 2 (26:40):
Am I correct?
Speaker 4 (26:41):
That's exactly what he did. He did that in Singapore
several times. He flew from LA to San Francisco to Singapore.
The plane landed, the plane got turned around, ready to
go back in San Francisco. He got back on the
plane and flew back.
Speaker 2 (26:55):
It's because he loves being in an airplane.
Speaker 4 (26:57):
He loves he certainly does. And that trip that I
took to London that I just told you about, I
flew with my friend Brian, and we were supposed to
meet in Chicago. That didn't quite work out based on
the airlines, but we were able to work with the airline,
and so I left here Portland, Maine at six am
on one morning, flew to Newark to change planes to
fly to San Francisco to meet Brian, and then fly
(27:19):
all the way to London from there. So my journey
to London started in Portland, Maine, all in one day.
Speaker 3 (27:25):
All right, Mike is going to have some more tips
tips on travel. But I have two rules that I
no actually one tip and one rule. My rule is
when it's boarding time, when they say okay, ro you
know area section C. When it's your turn to board,
you better have your act together. Everything you need better
(27:48):
be where it needs to be by that time. No
getting on the plane and fumbling around for two minutes,
two huge, long, very bad minutes while you're bumbling around
in your bag in the overhead compartment. Here's what you do.
If you're going to be a pro or even just
a considerate traveler. They make all kinds of travel vests
(28:12):
with a lot of pockets. Before you go, while you're
waiting around at the gate, you should ahead of time
know what you want, what you're gonna need. Maybe you
want some ear plugs, maybe you want some eye shades,
or your neck bellow or some medications.
Speaker 2 (28:29):
Have them all on.
Speaker 3 (28:30):
Your person in these little like a travel vest has
a bunch of pockets. Think about it, and don't you're
really causing a problem. You're gonna make the plane leave late.
Speaker 2 (28:43):
Because you are bumbling around you in your carry on.
Don't do that. Be cool.
Speaker 3 (28:51):
You see your seat, say oh there's seat seventeen. D
boom up there, sit down and watch be quiet.
Speaker 2 (29:02):
Just get out of the way.
Speaker 4 (29:04):
I completely agree with you, Bradley. And you know, and
some people may say, I don't want to wear a vest,
We're gonna look like a real geek. But you know what,
I often don't wear a vest, but I get a
travel blazer and they make those two you can get
them at lled with all those pockets, and you look sharp.
And you should look sharp. I think when you go
into an airport and in front of all those people
and everything in the pocket, you're not gate lice. You
(29:26):
wait for your row to be called, and then you
go up to the gate. Gate lice is a technical term,
or those people little congreg congregate around the gate when
they haven't been called yet. You get on the plane,
you put your carry on in the overhead bag, you
sit down, you buckle up, and that's it. Did you say, everybody,
let everybody else board?
Speaker 2 (29:44):
Gate lice?
Speaker 4 (29:45):
Gate lice, that's the term that we call people. You know,
you've seen people and they may be in row fifty
four and they're calling row you know twenty, and they
just hang it out of the gate walking away for
everybody else. Stay seated, stay out of the way until
until you your row is called. You know, syd away
with people.
Speaker 3 (30:04):
Okay, both Michah and I have a couple tips coming up.
I'm gonna go first after this break, just so I
don't forget. But it is a complete, complete game changer.
There's a cheap piece of paraphernality you can get that
will make your trip so much better, unbelievably better. I
can't think of a bigger improvement that you can make
(30:28):
to your flight on your own. It requires very little
money for.
Speaker 2 (30:31):
What you get.
Speaker 3 (30:33):
It's once you do it, once you try this, you
will never go back. And Micah also has some news
about well some information about these, particularly credit cards that
have crazy, crazy advantages. So we'll get to both of
those after this.
Speaker 2 (30:48):
On w b Z.
Speaker 1 (30:51):
It's Night Side with Dan Ray. On w Boston's news Radio.
Speaker 3 (30:57):
We continue with the airline travels tips tricks with Micah
from the Airplane Geek's podcast.
Speaker 2 (31:03):
I'm gonna go first. I have a really great, great tip.
Speaker 3 (31:07):
You folks have. You're all aware of Apple AirPods. They're
the little podgy stick in your air to listen to music. However, Apple,
and this is important, Apple Pro two, not regular Apple two.
Apple Pro two maybe above Apple Pro two, but at
least the level of Apple Pro two has noise cancelation
(31:29):
in it that is unbelievable. You can have no you
can switch it from zero noise cancelation to adaptive noise cancellation,
which is really good for concerts and stuff, and if
you want, you can do complete noise cancelation and it
practically it cuts up ninety percent of the noise.
Speaker 2 (31:48):
It is unbelievable.
Speaker 3 (31:50):
So that's a very They seem very expensive, and they
are for AirPods AirPods, but what they do for you
is fantastic.
Speaker 2 (32:00):
And if you don't lose them, you can use them
over and over again.
Speaker 3 (32:04):
One danger when you're in an airplane is that you
go to sleep with them on and you move your
head and one falls.
Speaker 2 (32:10):
Out and goes under the seat. You'll never get it again.
Speaker 3 (32:12):
They also make these little kind of little junior lanyards
that go on them so you won't lose them. Now
to take it up a notch, Shannon, my wife is
real good at finding gadgets that are super helpful and
as a matter of fact, she does everything.
Speaker 2 (32:31):
Now I don't do anything on that trip, she just
does it all. She found this dongle which you place
into the mini.
Speaker 3 (32:42):
Plug splot that you would usually plug in your earphones
into the TV screen the movie screen to watch movies.
And what that does is connects. It can connect to
these noise canceling air pods. So what you have is
a practically silent airplane and crystal beautiful sound from the
(33:06):
movie It is another world. A lot of the tiredness
from going on a flight, the fatigue is from big
noise for seven hours, and that removes it.
Speaker 2 (33:18):
So that's that's my offering.
Speaker 3 (33:20):
Now, how about you, Mike, what do you have that cool,
cool credit card?
Speaker 2 (33:24):
Talk about that?
Speaker 4 (33:26):
Well? At first of all, I was going to say
that those Bluetooth dongles are wonderful, and you're right to be.
Those wonderful noise canceling headphones of any kind really make
the flight much more pleasant. And I love the fly
and I love the sound, but it really relaxes you. Now,
what I was going to talk about with credit cards
is a lot of people like to get airline credit cards.
At first, I want to say that before you get
(33:48):
a credit card, I firm believer use it responsibly. I
never use a credit card unless I have the money
in the bank. I never pay interest on it. And
I'm not condoning people using credit cards just to buy
something on a credit card, but if you're going to
use a credit card, you might as well get one
that offers rewards. And a lot of people will get
an airline credit card, a Delta credit card, a United
(34:09):
credit card, a Southwest credit card, and some of those
do offer benefits, but they're gonna collect points on them,
and you can only use them on Delta or on
United or on Southwest. And yeah, there are certain families
within those groups that you can use it on. But
your best VET is a credit card that has what's
known as transferable points that you can use on any airline,
(34:30):
a bank credit card like Chase or Capital One or Annex,
and some of these cards they charge you an annual fee.
But I have never believed in those kinds of cards
and paying a fee for a card until I got
one personally that I'm paying a very large fee on.
But it gives me so many benefits that I'm getting
that feedback.
Speaker 3 (34:53):
Then this is something that might be great. Describe the
fee and the benefits.
Speaker 4 (34:58):
Well, this particular card gave me one hundred and twenty
thousand points if I spent six thousand dollars on it
in the first three months. I had to buy something
that was going to be that much money, and so
I was able to use it. I got the one
hundred and twenty thousand points, which is worth the nine
hundred dollars a year fee because I can fly first
(35:18):
class if I sorted out the right way almost any
place I want to. For one hundred and twenty thousand points,
it cost me far more than nine hundred dollars.
Speaker 3 (35:26):
So basically, you're paying the fee of nine hundred bucks,
which will allow you to get what is probably a
twelve thousand dollars flight. You know, first class costs a
lot of money exactly now.
Speaker 4 (35:40):
It also gives me a three hundred dollars credit when
I bought it. Whenever you buy a ticket three hundred
dollars in credits when you buy an airline ticket, So
even if you don't get the full points you paid
nine hundred dollars, you get three hundred dollars back when
you buy a ticket on a flight, So that was
only cost you six hundred dollars.
Speaker 2 (35:56):
Every time you play it. Buy a ticket on a
flight every time, one.
Speaker 4 (35:59):
Time three hundred dollars a year and time, right, one time,
every year, one time, So it gives you that travel credit.
It gives me a five hundred dollars credit with certain
hotels two hundred and fifty dollars every.
Speaker 2 (36:13):
Six months months, okay, right.
Speaker 4 (36:19):
It gives me every five years. It gives me one
hundred and twenty dollars I sorry, one hundred twenty dollars
every four years for my global entry or tsa PreCheck payment.
It gives me a Priority Pass membership, which would normally
be a priority pass. Is a lounge system, and also
certain lounges that they're associated with a credit card that
(36:40):
would cost me four hundred and sixty nine dollars for
the year by itself. So I'm getting a lot of
benefits with it. Plus every time I use the card,
I'm collecting more points. When I use it at a restaurant,
I get three times if I for every dollar I spend,
I get three times of points. When I use it
for buying flights, I get four times a point. So
(37:01):
I'm accumulating points all the time and it ends up
being a big benefit for me, especially if you fly
a lot. But even if you only use it for
the first year, get to accumulate the one hundred and
twenty thousand points, pay the fee for the first year
you got the points. Before you cancel it. You can
go to the cheaper version of the card, which is
ninety five dollars a year, keep the points and use
(37:21):
them the next year if you can't use them the
first year.
Speaker 2 (37:23):
It's pretty complicated.
Speaker 3 (37:24):
But if you fly a lot and I know that
you're not pushing this card, it's what you're trying to
say is hey, sometimes it may be better for you
to get a card that's good on any airline. It
doesn't restrict you to one or two airlines or their family.
Speaker 4 (37:41):
And do your research and find out what's going to
work best for you. No, I'm not talking to any
particular card at all. I found one that worked for me.
You need to find one that works for you. But
if you find the right one with the right tools,
you can get some incredible deals for very little money.
Speaker 2 (37:56):
Boys, here is great to talk to you, Michaeh.
Speaker 3 (37:58):
As always, we didn't even it's everything that we planned on,
but that that means things went very well.
Speaker 2 (38:04):
So I thank you, thanks a lot and all the
best to you.
Speaker 3 (38:07):
And you know after a while, as aviation info and
incidents pile up.
Speaker 2 (38:14):
We'll keep people up to date with it and have
you back.
Speaker 4 (38:16):
Thanks, Thanks so much, Bradley. Always great to be with
you in Happy New Year.
Speaker 2 (38:22):
All right, one minute till the top of the news
and all. What's coming up next? Well, I'm a.
Speaker 3 (38:27):
Word person, a lot of your word people, and we're
going to well it's pretty This is a very difficult
one to explain what it's going to be without actually
doing it. But let me give you this little teaser.
Do you know what an egg corn is? An egg
corn is a is a type of phrase and it
(38:49):
has nothing to do with eggs or corn. And there
are a bunch of these words called egg corns, and
we're going to learn those words, some of them, and
words from other categories.
Speaker 2 (39:03):
Coming up on WBZ News Radio ten thirty
It's Night Side with Dan Way on WBZ, Boston's news radio.
Speaker 2 (00:06):
Bradley for Dan Tonight on Nightside.
Speaker 3 (00:08):
Thanks to Kelly Leonard of Boston History Company for coming
in and giving us some extra layer of details on
some of these historical events that we know about. I
would definitely take their tour and uh oh, if you're
a social media person you're cruising around, you're instead of
doom scrolling, you might want to go to YouTube and
(00:33):
search Boston History Company. That's where I found them, and
I was very impressed by Daniel, who is I guess
the founder of this. And you know how it is
on YouTube, you're always looking for something new. You've you've
seen everything. You're looking for something worth watching. Those are
those are worth watching. They seem better than most things.
(00:54):
So there you go, Boston History Company. Next on WBZ,
we're going to learn some more things. We're going to
have some more fun. We're going to do uh airline
travel news tips and tricks, And among the things you're
going to find out about is that there's an airline
providing a new service but schedule to go bankrupt. So
(01:15):
there's something there's something to watch out for.
Speaker 2 (01:17):
There.
Speaker 3 (01:18):
We're going to find out what's going to happen if
you try to travel without a real id.
Speaker 2 (01:22):
Do you even know what a real idea is? Some
probably don't.
Speaker 3 (01:27):
There And there are these special credit cards, like super
special credit cards that you can get that offer super
special perks, and if you fly a lot, you might
want to know about that. How to look for deals.
There's kind of a strategy to look for deals.
Speaker 2 (01:43):
We're going to learn about the fact.
Speaker 3 (01:47):
Well, I'm going to explain the statement that there are
no oxygen tanks on airplanes.
Speaker 2 (01:54):
Did you know that?
Speaker 3 (01:55):
And you might say, Bradley Jay, well, why would I
bother to put the little ask on my face if
it pops down?
Speaker 2 (02:01):
If there's no oxygen tanks? Well, we'll explain.
Speaker 3 (02:05):
That airport etiquette. Good grief, Charlie Brown. It seems like
we've all forgotten we people forgot their manners when they
moved to online, to social media, and now people act
that way in person. I thought I used to think
that people would not act that way when when someone
(02:26):
could confront you in person. Not true, people act that way.
But we've got to stop. And there certain airport etiquettes.
There's etiquettes, there's seating rules, as well. There's an aisle,
a middle, and a window, and each of those seats
has things, has perks and responsibilities that go with it
that you need to know. And I'm going to also
(02:50):
lead with this for you for everyone. Do you believe
the TSA is just theater? I myself I liked. I
don't mind the TSA at all.
Speaker 2 (03:00):
But I have an.
Speaker 3 (03:00):
Acquaintance who's thoroughly put out that the TSA makes her
jump through various hoops, pats her down every time, et cetera.
I myself pat me down. I don't care pat away.
As long as you pat everybody else down and get
(03:22):
those weapons and etc.
Speaker 2 (03:24):
That's fine with me.
Speaker 3 (03:26):
But there are those that say that this is just
safety theater. And of course there are those that say, boy,
I'm sure, I'm glad they're doing that. I love the TSA.
Where do you stand on that? And do you have
any interesting.
Speaker 2 (03:41):
Do you have any.
Speaker 3 (03:42):
Interesting anecdotes or stories regarding the TSA at the airport.
So we have our expert, our airplane geek. Indeed, his
name's Micah Ingber and he is part of the Airplane
Geeks podcast, and so let's welcome him. Hello, Micah, tell
me a little about you and tell me about the
Airplane Geeks podcast.
Speaker 4 (04:02):
Bradley, thank you so much for inviting me. It's great
to talk to you. Great to be back on BZ.
And well, the Airplane Geek's podcast is. It's a weekly
audio program where the oldest aviation podcast that's in continuous operations.
It's two thousand and eight. We were doing podcasts, but
before people that what podcasts were.
Speaker 3 (04:22):
And you had the right brothers on your podcast, I
think right, we did.
Speaker 4 (04:26):
We did Rablee, but not Wilbur. He wouldn't come on.
But what we try to do is well, our slogan
is we try to educate and inform you, explore and
expand your passion for aviation, and entertain you a little
bit along the way. And we're just talking about commercial aviation,
military aviation, general aviation. And we often have different prominent
(04:48):
industry guests on with us. We've had oh chief pilots
from from United Airlines, We've had the CEO of Serious Aircraft.
We've had all sorts of people on since two thousand
and eight. You can imagine the number of people we've
had on. And in fact, one of our new regular
part time guest hosts is a woman named Aaron Applebaum
(05:10):
who's with the biggest law firm that handles aviation plaintiff
controls from their crashes, and she handled the Big seven
thirty all the plaintiffs for the seven thirty seven Max
crash Ethiopian three h two, and she's a regular with
us now. So it's a fun program, and we've been
doing it for a long time and we do fun
things too. A couple of years ago, we did our
(05:31):
Favorite Aviation Films and listed over a hundred different aviation
films and the scary part was I had seen all
of them, but nonetheless, well, okay.
Speaker 3 (05:40):
Let me jump in here and ask what was the
most popular. It has to be airplane, right, No.
Speaker 4 (05:46):
Actually, the most popular, I think was Top Gun. But
when we asked our listeners to write it and tell
us what their favorite aviation film was, we said favorite
one that doesn't include Top Gun.
Speaker 2 (05:57):
And so what was the answer to that.
Speaker 4 (06:01):
We got so many it's hard to say.
Speaker 3 (06:04):
Oh. Yeah.
Speaker 4 (06:05):
List of favorites included the Great Waldo Pepper, which you
might have heard of, those magnificent men of their flying machines,
the Memphis Bell Midway, on and on and on. And
on and on. Like I said, I wrote a story
about it, and I had thirty listed as my thirty
favorite to begin with.
Speaker 3 (06:21):
I bet a lot of them answered with esoteric answers
just to show off nobody really wanted to know.
Speaker 4 (06:26):
There were a lot of those. Yeah, And you know,
if we have listeners on bez here, they want to
hear that. That's Airplane Geeks episode seven eighty three. And
you can go back and get a list of great
aviation films with you that you might want to one.
Speaker 2 (06:39):
Then eighty three people.
Speaker 3 (06:41):
All right, Micah, we'll start with real ID because that's
something very important and relevant. A lot of people fly,
a lot of people flew for getting to part of
this holiday. A lot of people are going to fly
again to get home. They've been talking about real ID.
You have to get a real ID. Go get your
real ID. Do it now or you'll be sorry. And
(07:04):
now the rubber is meeting the road. What's going on
with the real ID when it comes to flying? Even
domestically well.
Speaker 4 (07:13):
Real ID people are saying, I didn't know anything about this.
I don't understand what it means. It was proposed and
it's been in effect since well twenty years now, and
they kept putting it off and putting it off to
give the states an opportunity to come up with a
real ID system that meets certain requirements identification requirements, and
each state needed to put it on the driver's license,
(07:34):
and finally all states have so they finally required it
as of last May that you cannot board a flight
unless you have a real ID now. A real ID is,
in particular, a driver's license that is issued by the
state that has identified you to prove that you truly
are who you say you are. Now, if you don't
have a real ID, if you don't want to get
that kind of driver's license, you can still use a
(07:56):
passport or a passport card. You can use one of
ther to traveler cards like Global Entry or NEXUS. A
US Defense Department ID is good. If you're part of
a federally recognized tribe. You know, a Native American tribe,
the tribal ID is perfectly fine. There are all sorts
of different possibilities, but as of February first, if you
(08:21):
don't have a real ID, they will not let you
board the aircraft unless you pay a forty five dollars
fee and go through a complete and total background check
like they do sometimes with banks and credit cards and
things like that, doing an internet check to make sure
that you say who you are. And once you pay
that forty five dollars and you go through that check,
(08:43):
which is going to take up to twenty minutes, then
they'll let you through security twenty minutes.
Speaker 3 (08:48):
Does this seem like they could really do a full
check in twenty minutes?
Speaker 1 (08:52):
You know what?
Speaker 3 (08:52):
It kind of reminds me of as the l L
security check. Let me I know you know about it,
but let me tell people how it's how it was different.
First time I went to Jerusalem, I went to the
l L. I flew out of New York. And when
you before you get to any security machines or anything,
you have to talk to people, and they will and
(09:14):
I was with someone and they will ask you questions.
So where are you from, where's your address? How long
have you lived there? Do you live together? How long
have you lived together? How did you meet her? How
did you meet him? Do you have a dog? Where's
the dog? While you're away? Where this kind of thing?
No kidding? Where are you going to stay? That was
(09:34):
my mistake. I didn't book I had not booked a hotel,
I said, I don't know yet, bee you know they
the woman raised her hand, some guy with a book
and shane to his belt came over and they put
me in a little room. They this is before they
even x ray shoes. They say, take your shoes off,
and they x rayed my shoes. So it's kind of
(09:57):
like that they didn't have the Internet then, But it's
something you don't want to do.
Speaker 2 (10:01):
It's a lot easier to just get a real ID.
Speaker 4 (10:05):
Right, And what the TSA is telling us currently, about
ninety four percent of all the passengers that are flying
right now a compliant They have the correct ID. So
we're only dealing with six percent of the people flying.
That's still a lot of people. And I suspect, although
I don't know exactly how they're going to do it,
and I'm sure we've all gone through this where we've
called a bank or a credit card company or some
(10:27):
organization that needs to identify us on the phone and
they say we're going to ask you some random questions
that from a service that's provided by the Internet, and
they may ask you questions of what kind of car
did you own in this year, or what of these
street addresses, which one did you live to or do
you have a relative named so and so and that
kind of thing, and it takes time. What they'll do
(10:50):
is they'll pull you out of line and pull you aside.
And that maybe not you know, for you and me,
who gets to an airport early, that wouldn't be a problem.
But there are a lot of people that think they're
going to get to the airport ten minutes before the
flight and get pulled aside and they're going to miss
their flight. So if you don't have a real ID,
be prepared to pay this forty five dollars and be
(11:10):
prepared to be pulled aside and take the time to
go through this beginning February first. But it's a lot
easier to get a real ID. It only takes a
few minutes to go through.
Speaker 2 (11:18):
T you just hold everybody else up while they're doing it.
Speaker 4 (11:21):
No, it shouldn't at all, because and that's why. Originally
they thought the charge was going to be less. They
thought it was going to be about twenty dollars, but
they realized it was going to take more time, and
they've announced it's going to be forty five dollars to
do this, and by the way, that clearance is going
to be good for ten days, so if you're going
someplace and you're coming back, you won't have to pay
it twice. But what they'll what they'll do is just
(11:45):
like and I'm sure you've seen this. I know I've
had to do it at different times. I've had additional
screening where they saw something in my bag. In fact,
one time, I won't lie about it. I forgot I
had a bottle of water in my bag, so they
had to pull the bag aside and open it up.
And it's additional screening, and that what will happened with this.
You'll go through the line. You'll see they don't have
you have ever real id. They'll set you aside and
(12:07):
let the person behind you continue on through for twenty minutes.
Speaker 2 (12:10):
Though, that's pretty interesting.
Speaker 3 (12:12):
All right, we're gonna break on the other side of
this break.
Speaker 2 (12:15):
We're not going anywhere, but we'll still be here.
Speaker 3 (12:17):
But we're going to find out about this statement and
why it's true. Here comes to statement there are no
oxygen tanks on airplanes. So you may be wondering, why
what am I going to breathe in that little yellow mask? Well,
we'll find out. But that's all about. After this on WBZ.
Speaker 1 (12:36):
Night Side with Dan Ray on WBZ Boston's news radio.
Speaker 3 (12:41):
We continue with michaeh Engber of Airplane Geys podcasts, and
I'm gonna ask him to explain what he meant when
he told me Bradley Jay, there are no oxygen tanks
on airplanes, And I said, what explain? So why don't
you explain it to everybody?
Speaker 4 (13:00):
Well, people think about oxygen tanks when they think about
the oxygen masks when they listen to the flight attendants
make their announcements at the beginning, and I hope that
everybody listens to that because it's important information. You should
actively listen and not just be passive about it. But
when they talk about and decompression, if there's an emergency
and there's a decompression, that the ocgen masks are going
(13:20):
to fall from the ceiling and you pull on a
cord and you put that mask over your nose and mouth,
adjustice traps, make sure it's tight on your face, and
you continue breathing normally. So people assume they are great,
big oxygen tanks overhead, and you're going to get all
that oxygen from those tanks. But that's not how they
do it, not for passengers anyway. Because those oxygen tanks
and Bradley and I'm sure you've seen them, and our
(13:42):
listeners have seen great big green oxygen tanks and hospitals
or in other locations. They're huge, and they're heavy, and
they take up a lot of space and we don't
have a lot of space on their Well, they are
definitely combustible, or at least the oxygen will certainly make
a fire burn faster and hotter, and it makes it
much more difficult to put a fire out. So what
(14:05):
do you do because you don't have a lot of
space on an airplane. Well, what it is, it's called
an oxygen generator. It's a chemical oxygen generator, and there's
a couple of chemicals inside. And what happens is when
you pull on that mask and you've got to pull
it down so that you yank a little pin out,
that tin actually fires a small percussion cap, and that
(14:27):
percussion cap starts what's known as an exothermic reaction. That
means that it generates heat. But these chemicals that mix
together when it sets them not really on fire, but
starts that reaction. Starts generating oxygen that goes down the
tube and into the masks that you can breathe, and
it'll do that for all between ten and twenty minutes,
(14:48):
which is more than enough time for the pilot to
bring the plane down to an altitude where you can
breathe normally sore because the plane's what.
Speaker 2 (14:56):
If planes cruise that now, thirty five thousand something like.
Speaker 4 (14:58):
That, Yeah, thirty five to thirty seven thousand, any place between,
you know, twenty and thirty five thirty seven thousand. Some
of the small private jets will be up at forty
thousand feet, So yeah, how long?
Speaker 2 (15:10):
Excuse me?
Speaker 3 (15:11):
How far do you have to get down before you
can there's enough oxygen for you to breathe through the
through the broken glass in the in the in the plane.
Speaker 4 (15:20):
Well, usually I should be ten twelve thousand feet. I
can't remember exactly what it is, but you're usually okay,
I mean, Bradley, I'm sure if you've slung gone up
the cow Railway to Pike's Peak out in Colorado at
some point or another, and I think that's a thirteen
thousand feet and frankly, when I was up there was
a little dizzy.
Speaker 3 (15:37):
Yeah, but you get used to it by then and
you're feet eleven thousand feet would be okay. So my
point is that if there's only twenty minutes of oxygen
and you have to descend twenty thousand feet in twenty minutes,
that's one thousand feet a minute. So you're really going
to feel that kind of a roller coaster. Rag it's
you're going down fast, right.
Speaker 4 (15:57):
It's certainly going to be a lot faster than what
you normally feel. It might be a little frightening, but
you know those planes are designed to do it, and
the pilots are in control, and we've got great people
flying our aircraft for the airlines these days.
Speaker 3 (16:09):
Okay, I mean yes, in the best of situations, I
know that that you're very much a booster for the
excellence in all those categories. Let's I all myself. I'm
going to hope all those things. I hope this aircraft
was made for this. I hope the pilot's a good one,
et cetera. Your words will give me comfort, though well.
Speaker 4 (16:34):
As you're going down, you could say, we think to yourself, well,
Mike has said this is going to be fine, right,
You'll be just perfect.
Speaker 1 (16:41):
Okay.
Speaker 2 (16:41):
So when you pull the little plastic tube.
Speaker 3 (16:48):
You really have to pull it to fire a percussion
cap to start the chain reaction. I don't think they
are clear enough that you really need to pull us down.
Speaker 2 (16:56):
Or it ain't gonna work. They don't make it.
Speaker 3 (16:58):
They don't make it very clear why and that you
need to probably do some sort of sharp tug. They should, really,
you think that it's too much information for a passenger
to absorb what's really going on, or at least they
should say pull it hard or pull it tightly or
something like that.
Speaker 4 (17:16):
And usually that's what I hear anyway, and maybe not
paying more attention than most, but they say to tug
it down to make sure that it's a tube pull straight,
and that way you have enough tubing to get it
over your nose and mouth. You don't just wear it
over your nose. You're not going to get enough oxygen.
You'll end up reading through your mouth and not just
over your mouth and leave your nose open. It's big
enough to cover your nose and mouth and the other
(17:39):
thing to do. And they say this every time. If
you're traveling with someone that needs assistance, put your oxygen
mask on before you go to help anybody else, because
if you pass out, you certainly won't be able to
help the person next to you if they need help,
or your child.
Speaker 3 (17:53):
So if there's a decompression, that means that this actual
atmosphere getting into the plane, and that.
Speaker 4 (17:58):
That if you're leaving the plane Bradley, Yeah, but.
Speaker 3 (18:02):
It's being refilled with something. There's air from the outside
coming in after a while.
Speaker 2 (18:06):
Right.
Speaker 3 (18:07):
The point is it's going to get really cold because
it's sixty degrees below zero up there.
Speaker 4 (18:12):
It's going to be very cold for a little bit,
depending on where you are in the plane, that's for sure,
you know, and you'll and you'll feel the air moving.
You know. When the Southwest flight had the door fall off,
the person next to it was afraid he was going
to get sucked out. He was buckled in, and thank
god he was, because if he wasn't, that's an explosive
decompression and you're going to be pulled right out as
(18:32):
the air flows out of the aircraft.
Speaker 3 (18:35):
So that the door fell off, that was one of
those plans that you mentioned that are made made correctly.
Speaker 2 (18:42):
What happened.
Speaker 4 (18:43):
He has had considerable difficulty for quite some time. That
has been corrected and the NTSB and the FAA has
made sure that that's working well.
Speaker 2 (18:51):
Yay, okay.
Speaker 3 (18:53):
There are rules about how to behave depending on whether
you sit in the aisle, the middle or the window,
and Mike is going to spell those rules out after
this on WBZ You're.
Speaker 1 (19:05):
On Night Side with Dan Ray on WBZ Boston's news Radio.
Speaker 3 (19:10):
My Friends Bradley Jay in for Dan tonight on Night's Side.
The number six one seven. If you'd like to answer
any well, actually, these two questions I'm about to pose
I posed one earlier. Do you do you feel comfortable
with the TSA when you go through the airport? Are
you glad to see them? Do you think they're making
me safer? Or do you think this is just a hussle,
(19:32):
This is just theater. I wish they'd go away. Where
do you stand on that? The other thing is this
what's happening more and more is that people will pay
for an extralegrum seat and someone will come over and
say something like, my family sitting beside you can we
trade seats and they don't have the extra legrum. They
didn't pay. You'd be giving up seat that you paid
(19:54):
for out of guilts or in some cases someone will
say I have a I need to use the men's
room often whether the restroom often?
Speaker 2 (20:09):
Will you trade seats? Would you trade seats?
Speaker 3 (20:13):
You paid money for that seat, like good hardcare, a
lot of money.
Speaker 2 (20:17):
Would you trade seats?
Speaker 3 (20:18):
All right, let's get back to micah Anger from airplane
geeks dot com or an airplane Geeks podcast. Excuse me,
and we're going to get into the seating rules there.
There are rules in different situations. For example, if you're hiking,
say up the Kinsman Trail and the Lafayette Range or.
Speaker 2 (20:40):
In that area.
Speaker 3 (20:41):
If you're the rule is if there's a single lane
trail and someone's coming up and someone's coming down, the
person going down steps aside. This is a rule of
the trail. There are also rules of the plane when
it comes to whether you're sitting in the eye or
a middle or windows seat. So Mike's gonna run those
(21:03):
rules down, and I expect you to listen, learn, and.
Speaker 2 (21:08):
And do this.
Speaker 4 (21:09):
Go ahead, Micah Now, Bradley, if I may, Before I
give you the rules, I want to say. The airplane
Geeks podcast at airplanegeeks dot com is an aviation podcast
that also deals with airlines and travel tips and tricks.
But I also do another podcast that you've been with
me on with Brian Coleman called The Journey is Thereward
dot org the podcast, and that's travel tips and tricks
(21:32):
and airlines that also does a little aviation, And this
would be with that podcast. And I wanted our listeners
to know because they may not be quite as geeky
as I am about aviation, but they may want to
know about travel and these kinds of tips, travel.
Speaker 3 (21:44):
Tips, like how to get deals, et cetera like that. Okay,
so hit these rules now.
Speaker 4 (21:50):
Now these are the rules, just like the rules of
the trail. They're not written down. There's nobody that's going
to enforce them, but it's the way it's supposed to work.
The person that sits in the windows seat has control
of the shade. They decide if the shade is going
to be up and down. Now, if you're sitting next
to them, you could say, hey, I prefer the shade down.
Do you mind pulling it down? And they have every
right to say no. Or I really look like to
(22:13):
look out the window, would you leave it up? And
they have the right to say no. But that's the
window seat responsibility. Now, if you're sitting next to them
and you're in the middle seat. If you are in
a three seat configuration, middle seat is a most uncomfortable
seat on the plane. You got people on either side
of you. It's miserable. I try to avoid the middle
seat at all stages, but if I get it, I'm
(22:33):
entitled to both armress.
Speaker 3 (22:36):
Did anybody know that? Do you have to tell them?
Excuse me, sir, I'm in the middle seat. I am
entitled to both armress and needs to be written down,
needs to be codified. Maybe you can have a little
business guard made up or something, but nobody knows that, do.
Speaker 4 (22:48):
They They don't, But that's the way it's supposed to be.
And if it were me, I would say, you know,
I'm in the middle seat and these armrests are supposed
to be mine. Now I understand that you might want
to use it, and if I'm in the front of it,
you can use the back, but would you mind letting
me have it? And they if you're courteous, And we
don't have as much courtesy in this world as we
(23:09):
should these days. Typically people are pretty good about that.
Sometimes they won't be, and you might get into an argument,
and the airlines aren't going to These aren't airline rules.
These are traveler rules and this these are courtesy rules,
and we need more courtesy in this world.
Speaker 2 (23:24):
Okay, now you're in the aisle seat, what do you get?
Speaker 4 (23:27):
What do you have to the aisle seat which is
a cream seat because you can decide when you want
to get up and walk and stretch your legs. But
the aisle person is responsible to let the other people
out whenever they want to get up because they they're
the king of the isle. They have control over the aisle.
So if you sit in the aisle person sitting next
(23:47):
to you want to get up, you need to let
them out. Now. If you're a big guy like me,
that probably means I'm gonna have to get out of
my seat and stand up myself. But if you're you know,
fortunate enough to be smaller, you can probably just slip
to the side, move your legs to the side, and
even a big guy like me has been able to
get around some people like that.
Speaker 2 (24:04):
I have a real beef with the rule.
Speaker 3 (24:06):
I have one of a big beef with one of
the rules, and that's the window seat rule.
Speaker 2 (24:09):
I don't like that rule. And let me explain.
Speaker 3 (24:14):
I don't think that the window seat person should be
the arbiter of whether the window stays up or down,
or the window shades stays up or down, because so
many other people are affected by that. There should be
a standing rule or something like this. If you know
above a certain altitude, should close the window. If there's
something interesting to see on the ground, say you're below
(24:37):
five thousand feet or something, okay, you can look out.
But if there's somebody that just has got the window open,
there's nothing to see but cloud cover and the sun
is burning a hole in your face, and you're trying
to watch a movie. It not only affects you, it
affects probably ten or twelve people in the general area
(24:59):
of that window. So I think the rules should be, Hey,
unless it's something to see, shut the window.
Speaker 2 (25:07):
But that's not the way it is.
Speaker 4 (25:10):
It's not the way it is, and I disagree with you.
I get the window because I'm looking out all the time.
The last time I flew Traine Geek, I don't turn
on the movies. I I'll listen to a podcast, I'll
listen to you, I'll watch you on YouTube. But I
got the window open, and I'm watching the moving map
and uh and and that's what I'm doing.
Speaker 2 (25:32):
Clouds.
Speaker 4 (25:34):
Last time I flew, I flew to London. I was
in a beautiful seven eighty seven flying NonStop from San Francisco,
and it was an overnight flight. And on the seven
eighty seven. I don't know if you knew this, Bradley,
but the flight attendants can control that there aren't any
windows shades. The flight attendant controls the darkness of the
lightness of the windows electronically. I love that they're dimmed
(25:54):
or brightened electronically, and they usually do them all at once.
But even at night, I could see out and see
the stars, and I could look down and I could
see ships. And I asked the flight attendant, because I
was at the window, is it possible for you to
be able to let me control my own shade? And
she said sure, And I looked out all night long.
Speaker 3 (26:14):
Okay, because you are an airplane geek. You love flying folks,
Mike I, Micah and his pals, they don't care where
they go. The destination is, like he says, the journey
is the destination. They just want to fly, They just
want to be in the airplane, and sometimes, like your
friend Brian, will just go to an airport all the
(26:36):
ways like South Africa, just hanging around in the airport
and come home.
Speaker 2 (26:40):
Am I correct?
Speaker 4 (26:41):
That's exactly what he did. He did that in Singapore
several times. He flew from LA to San Francisco to Singapore.
The plane landed, the plane got turned around, ready to
go back in San Francisco. He got back on the
plane and flew back.
Speaker 2 (26:55):
It's because he loves being in an airplane.
Speaker 4 (26:57):
He loves he certainly does. And that trip that I
took to London that I just told you about, I
flew with my friend Brian, and we were supposed to
meet in Chicago. That didn't quite work out based on
the airlines, but we were able to work with the airline,
and so I left here Portland, Maine at six am
on one morning, flew to Newark to change planes to
fly to San Francisco to meet Brian, and then fly
(27:19):
all the way to London from there. So my journey
to London started in Portland, Maine, all in one day.
Speaker 3 (27:25):
All right, Mike is going to have some more tips
tips on travel. But I have two rules that I
no actually one tip and one rule. My rule is
when it's boarding time, when they say okay, ro you
know area section C. When it's your turn to board,
you better have your act together. Everything you need better
(27:48):
be where it needs to be by that time. No
getting on the plane and fumbling around for two minutes,
two huge, long, very bad minutes while you're bumbling around
in your bag in the overhead compartment. Here's what you do.
If you're going to be a pro or even just
a considerate traveler. They make all kinds of travel vests
(28:12):
with a lot of pockets. Before you go, while you're
waiting around at the gate, you should ahead of time
know what you want, what you're gonna need. Maybe you
want some ear plugs, maybe you want some eye shades,
or your neck bellow or some medications.
Speaker 2 (28:29):
Have them all on.
Speaker 3 (28:30):
Your person in these little like a travel vest has
a bunch of pockets. Think about it, and don't you're
really causing a problem. You're gonna make the plane leave late.
Speaker 2 (28:43):
Because you are bumbling around you in your carry on.
Don't do that. Be cool.
Speaker 3 (28:51):
You see your seat, say oh there's seat seventeen. D
boom up there, sit down and watch be quiet.
Speaker 2 (29:02):
Just get out of the way.
Speaker 4 (29:04):
I completely agree with you, Bradley. And you know, and
some people may say, I don't want to wear a vest,
We're gonna look like a real geek. But you know what,
I often don't wear a vest, but I get a
travel blazer and they make those two you can get
them at lled with all those pockets, and you look sharp.
And you should look sharp. I think when you go
into an airport and in front of all those people
and everything in the pocket, you're not gate lice. You
(29:26):
wait for your row to be called, and then you
go up to the gate. Gate lice is a technical term,
or those people little congreg congregate around the gate when
they haven't been called yet. You get on the plane,
you put your carry on in the overhead bag, you
sit down, you buckle up, and that's it. Did you say, everybody,
let everybody else board?
Speaker 2 (29:44):
Gate lice?
Speaker 4 (29:45):
Gate lice, that's the term that we call people. You know,
you've seen people and they may be in row fifty
four and they're calling row you know twenty, and they
just hang it out of the gate walking away for
everybody else. Stay seated, stay out of the way until
until you your row is called. You know, syd away
with people.
Speaker 3 (30:04):
Okay, both Michah and I have a couple tips coming up.
I'm gonna go first after this break, just so I
don't forget. But it is a complete, complete game changer.
There's a cheap piece of paraphernality you can get that
will make your trip so much better, unbelievably better. I
can't think of a bigger improvement that you can make
(30:28):
to your flight on your own. It requires very little
money for.
Speaker 2 (30:31):
What you get.
Speaker 3 (30:33):
It's once you do it, once you try this, you
will never go back. And Micah also has some news
about well some information about these, particularly credit cards that
have crazy, crazy advantages. So we'll get to both of
those after this.
Speaker 2 (30:48):
On w b Z.
Speaker 1 (30:51):
It's Night Side with Dan Ray. On w Boston's news Radio.
Speaker 3 (30:57):
We continue with the airline travels tips tricks with Micah
from the Airplane Geek's podcast.
Speaker 2 (31:03):
I'm gonna go first. I have a really great, great tip.
Speaker 3 (31:07):
You folks have. You're all aware of Apple AirPods. They're
the little podgy stick in your air to listen to music. However, Apple,
and this is important, Apple Pro two, not regular Apple two.
Apple Pro two maybe above Apple Pro two, but at
least the level of Apple Pro two has noise cancelation
(31:29):
in it that is unbelievable. You can have no you
can switch it from zero noise cancelation to adaptive noise cancellation,
which is really good for concerts and stuff, and if
you want, you can do complete noise cancelation and it
practically it cuts up ninety percent of the noise.
Speaker 2 (31:48):
It is unbelievable.
Speaker 3 (31:50):
So that's a very They seem very expensive, and they
are for AirPods AirPods, but what they do for you
is fantastic.
Speaker 2 (32:00):
And if you don't lose them, you can use them
over and over again.
Speaker 3 (32:04):
One danger when you're in an airplane is that you
go to sleep with them on and you move your
head and one falls.
Speaker 2 (32:10):
Out and goes under the seat. You'll never get it again.
Speaker 3 (32:12):
They also make these little kind of little junior lanyards
that go on them so you won't lose them. Now
to take it up a notch, Shannon, my wife is
real good at finding gadgets that are super helpful and
as a matter of fact, she does everything.
Speaker 2 (32:31):
Now I don't do anything on that trip, she just
does it all. She found this dongle which you place
into the mini.
Speaker 3 (32:42):
Plug splot that you would usually plug in your earphones
into the TV screen the movie screen to watch movies.
And what that does is connects. It can connect to
these noise canceling air pods. So what you have is
a practically silent airplane and crystal beautiful sound from the
(33:06):
movie It is another world. A lot of the tiredness
from going on a flight, the fatigue is from big
noise for seven hours, and that removes it.
Speaker 2 (33:18):
So that's that's my offering.
Speaker 3 (33:20):
Now, how about you, Mike, what do you have that cool,
cool credit card?
Speaker 2 (33:24):
Talk about that?
Speaker 4 (33:26):
Well? At first of all, I was going to say
that those Bluetooth dongles are wonderful, and you're right to be.
Those wonderful noise canceling headphones of any kind really make
the flight much more pleasant. And I love the fly
and I love the sound, but it really relaxes you. Now,
what I was going to talk about with credit cards
is a lot of people like to get airline credit cards.
At first, I want to say that before you get
(33:48):
a credit card, I firm believer use it responsibly. I
never use a credit card unless I have the money
in the bank. I never pay interest on it. And
I'm not condoning people using credit cards just to buy
something on a credit card, but if you're going to
use a credit card, you might as well get one
that offers rewards. And a lot of people will get
an airline credit card, a Delta credit card, a United
(34:09):
credit card, a Southwest credit card, and some of those
do offer benefits, but they're gonna collect points on them,
and you can only use them on Delta or on
United or on Southwest. And yeah, there are certain families
within those groups that you can use it on. But
your best VET is a credit card that has what's
known as transferable points that you can use on any airline,
(34:30):
a bank credit card like Chase or Capital One or Annex,
and some of these cards they charge you an annual fee.
But I have never believed in those kinds of cards
and paying a fee for a card until I got
one personally that I'm paying a very large fee on.
But it gives me so many benefits that I'm getting
that feedback.
Speaker 3 (34:53):
Then this is something that might be great. Describe the
fee and the benefits.
Speaker 4 (34:58):
Well, this particular card gave me one hundred and twenty
thousand points if I spent six thousand dollars on it
in the first three months. I had to buy something
that was going to be that much money, and so
I was able to use it. I got the one
hundred and twenty thousand points, which is worth the nine
hundred dollars a year fee because I can fly first
(35:18):
class if I sorted out the right way almost any
place I want to. For one hundred and twenty thousand points,
it cost me far more than nine hundred dollars.
Speaker 3 (35:26):
So basically, you're paying the fee of nine hundred bucks,
which will allow you to get what is probably a
twelve thousand dollars flight. You know, first class costs a
lot of money exactly now.
Speaker 4 (35:40):
It also gives me a three hundred dollars credit when
I bought it. Whenever you buy a ticket three hundred
dollars in credits when you buy an airline ticket, So
even if you don't get the full points you paid
nine hundred dollars, you get three hundred dollars back when
you buy a ticket on a flight, So that was
only cost you six hundred dollars.
Speaker 2 (35:56):
Every time you play it. Buy a ticket on a
flight every time, one.
Speaker 4 (35:59):
Time three hundred dollars a year and time, right, one time,
every year, one time, So it gives you that travel credit.
It gives me a five hundred dollars credit with certain
hotels two hundred and fifty dollars every.
Speaker 2 (36:13):
Six months months, okay, right.
Speaker 4 (36:19):
It gives me every five years. It gives me one
hundred and twenty dollars I sorry, one hundred twenty dollars
every four years for my global entry or tsa PreCheck payment.
It gives me a Priority Pass membership, which would normally
be a priority pass. Is a lounge system, and also
certain lounges that they're associated with a credit card that
(36:40):
would cost me four hundred and sixty nine dollars for
the year by itself. So I'm getting a lot of
benefits with it. Plus every time I use the card,
I'm collecting more points. When I use it at a restaurant,
I get three times if I for every dollar I spend,
I get three times of points. When I use it
for buying flights, I get four times a point. So
(37:01):
I'm accumulating points all the time and it ends up
being a big benefit for me, especially if you fly
a lot. But even if you only use it for
the first year, get to accumulate the one hundred and
twenty thousand points, pay the fee for the first year
you got the points. Before you cancel it. You can
go to the cheaper version of the card, which is
ninety five dollars a year, keep the points and use
(37:21):
them the next year if you can't use them the
first year.
Speaker 2 (37:23):
It's pretty complicated.
Speaker 3 (37:24):
But if you fly a lot and I know that
you're not pushing this card, it's what you're trying to
say is hey, sometimes it may be better for you
to get a card that's good on any airline. It
doesn't restrict you to one or two airlines or their family.
Speaker 4 (37:41):
And do your research and find out what's going to
work best for you. No, I'm not talking to any
particular card at all. I found one that worked for me.
You need to find one that works for you. But
if you find the right one with the right tools,
you can get some incredible deals for very little money.
Speaker 2 (37:56):
Boys, here is great to talk to you, Michaeh.
Speaker 3 (37:58):
As always, we didn't even it's everything that we planned on,
but that that means things went very well.
Speaker 2 (38:04):
So I thank you, thanks a lot and all the
best to you.
Speaker 3 (38:07):
And you know after a while, as aviation info and
incidents pile up.
Speaker 2 (38:14):
We'll keep people up to date with it and have
you back.
Speaker 4 (38:16):
Thanks, Thanks so much, Bradley. Always great to be with
you in Happy New Year.
Speaker 2 (38:22):
All right, one minute till the top of the news
and all. What's coming up next? Well, I'm a.
Speaker 3 (38:27):
Word person, a lot of your word people, and we're
going to well it's pretty This is a very difficult
one to explain what it's going to be without actually
doing it. But let me give you this little teaser.
Do you know what an egg corn is? An egg
corn is a is a type of phrase and it
(38:49):
has nothing to do with eggs or corn. And there
are a bunch of these words called egg corns, and
we're going to learn those words, some of them, and
words from other categories.
Speaker 2 (39:03):
Coming up on WBZ News Radio ten thirty
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