IHeartMedia Aviation Expert Jay Ratliff talks about the week in aviation

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
Time.

Speaker 2 (00:01):
You're channel nine first one wether forecast very hot day
at eighty eight for the high. But you know, well,
very much humid day, got a sunny skies. It's those
tiny chance of afternoon storm, clear of a night, sticky
in sixty eight, sunny hot you tomorrow eighty nine u
clouse over night, remain muggy in seventy and high of
ninety one on Saturday, and of course it'll be hot
and humid seventy two right now. Traffic come from that.

Speaker 3 (00:25):
You see how traffic center that U see health backnick
AND's Fine Center offers innovative treatments to improve quality of
life of convenient locations across Crater, Cincinnati and northern Kentucky.

Speaker 2 (00:35):
Learn more.

Speaker 3 (00:36):
You see how dot com problems continue. He's found two
seventy five a wreck before went in backstraffic to Coal
Raine North. Found there's a wreck before Ward's corner, backing
traffic past the Parkway. The latest is you's found Fort
Washington Way, adding to the delays off of seventy five.
Chuck ingramon fifty five krooz, the talk station.

Speaker 2 (00:57):
A thirty on a Friday Eve, always look for this
moment in time to get to hear from iHeart Needy
aviation expert Jay rat Lift. Jay, Welcome back to the
Morning Show, my friend. Always love having you on the show.

Speaker 1 (01:09):
A very very pleasant good morning, my friend, Thank sir.

Speaker 2 (01:11):
In a mixed bag of topics, We're going to start
with Southwest Airlines. What is all of size policy?

Speaker 1 (01:19):
They have a policy in place.

Speaker 4 (01:21):
They rolled this out a number of years ago where
there was a lot of things that were taking place
with regards to people that were large enough that they
required two seats.

Speaker 1 (01:33):
Yeah, and the thought is do we charge them? Do
we not?

Speaker 4 (01:36):
The industry standard is basically, if you need two seats,
we're gonna have.

Speaker 1 (01:41):
To charge you for two seats.

Speaker 4 (01:42):
That sense, Well, there was a time when they would
charge you a full fare and then fifty percent for
the second seat, but with the flights being pulled, they've
kind of gotten away with away from that. But you know,
as part of Southwest Airlines cost cutting measures, and Southwest
Airlines had a policy that said you could actually request
a refund on that second seat if by the time

(02:04):
the flight leaves there's at least one empty seat on
the aircraft. Okay, so you would buy two seats and
if you would request a refund. Well, now they've kind
of trimmed that back, saying, well, we used to pre
board you, We're not gonna do that. Now you're gonna
have to wait at the gate to see if the
flight's going to be filled. Then you've got less than
ninety days after the travel date to request the refund,

(02:26):
which used to be considerably longer than that. So Southwest
Airlines is slowly shifting to where the policies for other airlines,
and they're going to continue this progression, I believe, until
they're back to the point where if you need two seats,
you're gonna have to pay for two seats. So it's
gonna be interesting to see as we progress how fast
it'll take Southwest to get there. But look, charging for

(02:49):
check luggage, assigned to seats, premium seating, all of these
things are you know, putting Southwest in the line with
how other carriers do things. And this this, you know,
customer of size policy is going to be something that's
just going to continue to be the case about that.

Speaker 2 (03:05):
Well, you know, honestly, it makes perfect sense. You've got
to pay for the second seat, Jay, I mean, come on,
you're depriving the airline of a revenue source, and I
get the idea that if there's at least one seat
open when the plane takes off, that well, refund might
be in order. But you got to get to that point.
You've been talking for hell a couple of years about
how packed the flights have been. They over sell them

(03:26):
on purpose to make sure they're full. So you know,
sorry they.

Speaker 4 (03:30):
Do that, because yeah, they do it because you know,
we don't cancel our reservations and it's a perishable product.
The minute we shut that door, they've lost the opportunity
for revenue. So I'm totally okay. If they base the
overbooking on historical data where every the first Tuesday of
the month we have eight percent in those shows, we'll
overbook it to eight percent. You know, those types of things,

(03:51):
I'm totally okay with. And during the holidays they overbook
less because they know most people are going to show up.
But I've had to have those conversations with passengers explaining
to them that because of their size, they would be
more comfortable in a seat that would best accommodate them.

Speaker 1 (04:07):
And I would always say.

Speaker 4 (04:08):
You know, your big bone structure is such that these
seats are getting smaller and smaller. It's difficult for anybody
to be comfortable on and you know, sadly, you know
it's going to require you purchasing two seats just so
that you have enough enough room, and we'll do everything
we can to accommodate you. But a lot of people
don't want to spend that extra money. Some people feel

(04:28):
like you should not penalize me because of my size
by charging me double. And I've had those conversations where
people say, you know, you're being discriminatory because of my size,
and sadly, no, it's a seat issue. We can't put
you in one seat, it's going to take two, and yes,
we have to keep the other customers in mind as
we make these policies. It's a very delicate conversation obviously

(04:51):
that you're having, but they have to be made. And
you're not telling anybody this person anything they don't know already.
So you know, some people are just trying to get
out of paying for that second seat, and they'll say
anything they can to try to get.

Speaker 1 (05:03):
Away with it.

Speaker 2 (05:04):
Yeah, I can imagine because it's an expense, but honestly,
the reason, I mean, one of the reasons that you know,
you should have to pay for it, and the number
of seats that are on the airplane, that volume of
travelers allows them to keep the airfare lower, and therefore
you can afford to go on because the number of
people that are providing the airline with profit, you know.

Speaker 1 (05:22):
Yes, I mean. And there have been people in Washington,
DC who said, because.

Speaker 4 (05:25):
We're all getting bigger in size and because the seats
are getting smaller, we should do a study to show
how long it takes all of us rather large people
to get off the plane quickly. Yeah, because if we
don't get them off in ninety seconds, that means the
airlines are putting too many seats on the plane, and
we can force them to make the seats bigger. Never
going to happen, never, never, never, never going to happen.

(05:48):
But that's the avenue they try to take. That exit
ram is not going to work.

Speaker 2 (05:52):
I promise you heard it from Jay Ratlif here the
fifty five case Morning Show, Never gonna happen eight thirty five.
Right now we've got more with Jay coming up. They'll
go away.

Speaker 5 (06:01):
Fifty five car the talk station Cyber attacks and cyber
Jay Ratlift has he's aigheartmedia aviation expert, and he's on
the thing about Taresday Morning show every Thursday, beginning at
a thirty segment number two, Jay Ratlift, My friend, are
you serious a passenger smoked marijuana on the plane before departure?

Speaker 2 (06:20):
Kind of moron is this guy?

Speaker 1 (06:23):
Well, I was a United flight. I think they were
coming out of Cancun.

Speaker 4 (06:26):
They're in the boarding process, the passengers in the forward
laboratory up near the boarding door and also next to
the cockpit. The flight crews in there, the pilots going
through their pre flight briefing, going through everything that they
need to go through before departure, and this somebody's just
smoking away marijuana in that forward laboratory. Well, they leave,

(06:49):
and of course that secondhand smoke goes where everywhere, including
into the cockpit. So the pilot comes on board and says, look,
we had somebody smoking marijuana in the ford laboratory and
we're not going to be flying this flight.

Speaker 1 (07:05):
Because he said, I've got.

Speaker 4 (07:07):
A long career with the United Airlines that I want
to keep having and if I'm drug tested when we
get to Houston on our arrival, I could fail that
based on the second hand smoke that I was exposed to,
and he says, I'm not taking that chance, and the
crew refused to fly.

Speaker 1 (07:24):
So it was.

Speaker 4 (07:26):
It was more a not necessarily an issue of safety
because I don't feel like they were impaired in any way.
But frequently for the airline in the FAA, they're pulled
off of a flight and they're administered random drug tests, right,
and if he were to fail it, and his response
was somebody was smoking marijuana in the laboratory, that be like,

(07:47):
oh right, and it puts his career in jeopardy and
he says, I'm simply not going to do that based
on the actions of one person. So again we have
one person doing something they shouldn't be doing and an
impact not only that flight, that flight's going to Houston
to make up another flight going to somewhere else. Now
you've impacted multiple flights simply.

Speaker 1 (08:08):
By the actions that you've had.

Speaker 4 (08:09):
And uh, yeah, it was unfortunate, and had it been
a different lavatory, probably wouldn't have gone this way. But
the yeah, the captain or first officer, I don't know
which one it was. I suspect it was the first officer,
but the captain probably went along with it simply wasn't
wanting to take that chance.

Speaker 2 (08:26):
You know. And Peccolie, what the hell are you doing
smoking weed inside the airplane lavatory? I mean, even when
it's on the ground. You're not allowed to smoke on
an airplane, are you, Jay, You're not supposed to know.

Speaker 4 (08:36):
And this guy might have thought, or gir out of
who it was, probably thought, well, it's okay to do
it before I leave. You know, some people are scared
to death to fly, so the thought is what can
I do to relax edible, settle down before my flight?

Speaker 2 (08:48):
You know et edible? You know, there are other ways something,
other ways to get THC in your body without firing
one up on a plane.

Speaker 4 (08:56):
For some people it's a it's a glass of wine
or alcohol some kind. But yeah, in this situation, it
was just you know, you know, this is what the
captain or the first officer made the call on. And
I can't blame you know, the crew for being concerned,
because you know, there are times when airlines, especially when
they're cutting back and United not doing that now. But
if they're looking for excuses to get rid of people,

(09:19):
you don't want to give them one. Corporate America's corporate America.
So I'm telling you, and I can tell you this,
the last thing I would want to do is to
give my employer, you know, a reason to dismiss me,
right uh with with with ground, And I just know
that that kind of that kind of cause I don't
want to give put in their hands for sure. So
I was not against the decision, although I did feel

(09:40):
for all the passengers on.

Speaker 2 (09:41):
Board, oh absolutely, without question on that one. Choose Lorazapam. Anyway,
Spirit Airlines got a problem on its hand in terms
of cash flow. What's going on in this one, Jay Ratlis.

Speaker 4 (09:52):
They just came out of bankruptcy in March, and they
went through the Chapter eleven bankruptcy, reorganization, leaner and meaner debt, reconsolidation,
all of that being done. But this week they announced,
you know, I don't think we've got but maybe a
year's worth of cash left, and we've got to do something.
And it was an announcement to their investors, letting them

(10:13):
know what was going on, as they were trying to
be as transparent as they could, which was was the good.

Speaker 1 (10:18):
Call, the right thing to do.

Speaker 4 (10:20):
But of course southward excuse me, Spirit, it was back
in February twenty two. I believe that the merger with
Frontier was announced, and they were on that path until
jet Blue stepped in and said, we'll give you more money,
and that's when again they pushed Frontier to the side,
went with Jet Blue for a year and a half
till it was decided that merger wasn't going to be approved,
and then Spirit went back to Frontier, who said no,
thank you. And so they're kind of out there.

Speaker 1 (10:42):
On their own.

Speaker 4 (10:42):
They've made a series of unfortunate decisions from a management
standpoint that's put them in this process. Now they've gone
to premium seats and trying to do things that are
going to make them more profitable. But Brian All, this
is coming at a time when we're seeing a slight
reduction in the demand for leisure travel. So they've got
all kinds of headwind here and it's really creating some issues.

(11:05):
So you know, they're telling their investors and obviously their
stock dropped like fifty percent when that announcement came out
because a lot of people said, oh, you know, there's
a chance that they're going to go to business now.
There's a lot of people that listen to us across
the country, and many of them have reservations future reservations
on Spirit. I would not be panicked at this point
if I'm flying over the holidays or certainly beginning of

(11:26):
next year. Now, obviously they're going to continue to kind
of reduce their footprint from the standpoint of a flight
scheduling point, so you may see future flights that are changed,
could be canceled, all these kinds of things that may
or may not happen. If I'm making a future reservation
down the road on Spirit, I would be concerned because
you just don't know what's going to happen. And with

(11:48):
those kinds of unknowns, not only are you worried about
the airline but the employees, because the message that sends
to the employees is, you know, we don't know if
we can pay in a year, right, So okay, if
I'm a pilot mechanic, if I'm a flight attendant, exactly,
so what kind of operational impact will it have when
they start losing employees. So You've got all kinds of

(12:11):
moving parts here. And fortunately, none of this news is
good for either Spirit employees or investors or passengers, and
it's really unfortunate that they didn't merge with Frontier. When
that news came out three years ago, I said, this
is perfect. Their route maps complement each other perfectly. This
is going to make him a mini mega low cost
carrier juggernaut, and it's really going to be a good combination.

(12:33):
But they blew it when they went with Spirit because
or Jet Blue because they thought Jet Blue would pay
more money. But their route maps were not consistent. They
didn't compliment each other. A lot of cities and jobs
are going to be lost in the process, and the
government said no, this is not best for the consumer.

Speaker 1 (12:48):
And they said no to it.

Speaker 4 (12:49):
Well, they'd have called you were you were me, we
gotta told me wasn't going to work for that very reason.

Speaker 1 (12:53):
But for some strange reason they didn't call me.

Speaker 2 (12:56):
Well, not me, but definitely I heard me. The avia
sings very Jay ratlif who will bring back talk about
Spirit Airlines or rather Southwest Airlines having to issue an
apology plus a new power charging device edict on Emirates
plus hub delays. We'll do that next fifty five KRC
dot Com summer is here right here's your final look

(13:20):
at the Channel nine weather forecast. Sunny skys today just
a slight chance of afternoon storms three A to B
are high to be sticky and muggy overnight down to
sixty eight. Another hot, sticky day tomorrow with the tiny
chance of rain eighty nine for the high seventy overnight
again muggy and sticky, and Saturday of the mundy sticky
days ninety one for the high. Closing out at seventy three.
Time for that final traffic got date Chuck from the

(13:42):
UCL Traffic Center.

Speaker 3 (13:43):
The U see Health Backdenkin's Fine Center offers innovative treatments
to improve quality of life, with convenient locations across Greater
Cincinnati and northern Kentucky. Learn more you see health dot com.
Cruise continue to work with an accident. He's been Fort
Washington Way in the center lane. That's to the delays
on northbound seventy five for an extra fifteen minutes from

(14:04):
Donaldson northbound four to seventy one. Starting to clear out
a bit from Grand Chuck ingramon fifty five krs the
talk station on a Friday, even a happy one too.

Speaker 2 (14:17):
You closing out another segment here with IRT Media aviation
expert Jay Ratliff. Southwest airlines issuing an apology sounds like
one was well well deserved apology. What happened here with
this one?

Speaker 4 (14:29):
Jay had two passengers that were flying from New Orleans
to Orlando. The two women were blind. They were taken
to the gate of departure. Flight was delayed, delayed so
much that Southwestern New Orleans had to move the gate.

Speaker 1 (14:43):
They had a gate change, which happens.

Speaker 2 (14:45):
No, I mean, go ahead, I'm sorry, Yeah, I.

Speaker 4 (14:48):
Can't see this as usual. You're several steps ahead. I mean,
you're exactly right. They did not make an announce what
they put on the departure board that there was a
schedule change. Obviously, if you're visually impaired, you're not gonna
to see that. So they sat there, set there, set there.
The original flight was delayed almost five hours. It eventually
leaves without these two women. They're still in the gate area.

(15:09):
Somebody finally discovers, Oops, you know these women are here.

Speaker 1 (15:12):
Oops. They were supposed to.

Speaker 4 (15:13):
Be on that flight, and oh no, we didn't put
them on there. So what happened was they put them
on a later flight. They apologized. I put that in
quotes because it was one hundred dollars voucher each they
got them to their destination. And of course the story
explodes over social media, as it should have, because you know,
Southwest dropped the ball right. Anytime we had someone with
any sort of a special need, we had what was

(15:35):
called a special service request.

Speaker 1 (15:36):
It's an SSR.

Speaker 4 (15:38):
Let's the ticket counter know what's going on the gate
as well as the lead flight attendant. Everybody's on the
same page as what the specific needs are for that
specific passenger. So either there was not a special service
report generated that would have notified everybody what was going on,
or they were notified and just dropped the ball. But look,
if you and I are working a flight, one hundred

(15:58):
and fifty people are checked in, we get the airplane loaded.

Speaker 1 (16:01):
There's one hundred and forty eight.

Speaker 4 (16:02):
It does not take any time at all for us
to see, okay, our party of two because a lot
of times they'll page them through the airport.

Speaker 1 (16:08):
So and so, socially, your flight's preparing to leave.

Speaker 4 (16:10):
We needed you to get to blah blah blah, and
in that you would see that they were visually impaired.
Everything would stop. You would go and find those individuals.
The ball was dropped here at so many different spots
where they could have saved the day and didn't. You know,
that's one of the reasons it's really embarrassing for Southwest.
And they said, you know, they were asked about refunding
the money. They said, well, you know, we really don't

(16:32):
need to because you paid for us to get you
from New Orleans to Orlando, and we did that. You know,
just you know, sometimes the being counters and the policies
they put in place are absolutely as nine when it
comes to how you're supposed to take care of people,
and had they simply done what was right and done
something beyond I'm not talking about free flights for life,

(16:53):
you know, idiotic like that, but just something that would
be a little bit more compassionate from the standpoint what
you put these people through. And you know, the airlines'
mind is what they paid. We got them there a
little bit later, but no big deal. Yeah, very big deal.
Because you didn't do what you should have.

Speaker 2 (17:08):
Done exactly, and you do it right. You get a
lot of goodwill from that. People have respond by saying, well,
what a wonderful company they handle that matter great.

Speaker 1 (17:17):
Well it is.

Speaker 4 (17:17):
And look, there were times that I was working a flight,
and we would have a passenger that was blind on
an incoming flight that was on the wrong flight. I mean,
we had a fourteen years We had a fourteen year
old girl that was on a flight Orlando to day.

Speaker 1 (17:29):
And she arrives, she's supposed to be going to Omaha.
Oh my god.

Speaker 4 (17:32):
You know, you know, you've got to get a hold
of the parents and let them know she's okay, and
all this kind of stuff.

Speaker 1 (17:38):
And then a lot of times.

Speaker 4 (17:39):
You'll throw an agent on the plane with them to
take them back to Orlando and to make sure they
get on these I mean, you're doing all kinds of
things to apologize, but to kind of shrug your shoulders
is apparently Southwest Airlines did here.

Speaker 1 (17:50):
No, not what you should have done.

Speaker 2 (17:51):
All right, Emirates restricting the use of power chargers. Do
this have anything to do with lithium ion batteries or we
move them past that.

Speaker 1 (17:58):
Oh, it has everything to do with that.

Speaker 4 (18:00):
They're saying as of October first, when you bring a
battery charger on board the flight, A, you're not allowed
to use it. B you're not allowed to put it
in the overhead storage compartment. It has to fit in
a bag. And put underneath the seat in front of
you so that if it starts to overheat, we can
know about it soon and then the flight attendants can
then become firefighters and put out the fire. If it's
in the overhead storage compartment, can't do it. We don't

(18:22):
want you using it on board the flight because of
what takes place. And I think it was air boussan
busa n. You can do a Google image search on
that and you can see what was left of the
airplane after a lithium battery fire broke out and at
the gate, thank god, and burn the entire.

Speaker 1 (18:39):
Top of the airplane off. Oh my lord.

Speaker 4 (18:42):
The FAA has said, I think we've had round numbers here,
maybe off a bit. Forty four instances this year of
lithium battery issues. Last year was eighty some. These are
situations that broke out on the plane and they're increasing
in number, and we know it's an issue. Airlines are
are waiting for some sort of industry you know, decision.

(19:03):
It's not being made. So we're seeing Emirates and we're
seeing a lot of other airlines around the world, including
here in the United States, take precautions saying we've got
to restrict these in one fashion or another because they're
bringing on electronic devices that are powered by these lithium
batteries and it's creating problems.

Speaker 1 (19:21):
But Brian, the biggest issue we've talked about this.

Speaker 4 (19:24):
Is people in the gate area that are encouraged to
give up their check luggage and a lot of times
the gate agent as they quickly take it, and there's
a lot of things going on. Jivinty items in here, electronics, No,
I don't have anything in there, and off it goes
a toothbrush. It can be several different things that are
powered by a lithium battery that breaks out in a.

Speaker 1 (19:43):
Fire in the whole cargo compartment right now.

Speaker 4 (19:46):
There are fire suppression systems on these aircraft, but the
lithium battery fires burn so hot they can't adequately put
out the fire.

Speaker 1 (19:53):
So this is a big, big, big, big.

Speaker 2 (19:56):
Problems life and death right there.

Speaker 1 (20:00):
But we're not acting like it though.

Speaker 4 (20:01):
And you know what it's gonna take is something happening
before something is done, and there's no way it should
go that far.

Speaker 2 (20:07):
That's too much of a risk to let that happen.
Jay Ratliffe, in the remaining moments, short abbreviated hub delay
please Charlotte it and.

Speaker 4 (20:19):
Look, I'm really reaching. If I was paid per hub delay,
I'd be hurting today because I think delays might be
fifteen minutes there, and other than that, I think it's
gonna be the best day of the.

Speaker 1 (20:27):
Week to fly.

Speaker 2 (20:28):
Thanks for your time today, Jay Rattler, very interesting. As always,
I enjoy our exchange. I'll look forward to next Thursday
and another aviation report. Have a great week, my friend.

Speaker 1 (20:37):
Thank you.

Speaker 2 (20:37):
Eight fifty five coming to fifty six Corey Bowman's Institute
for a full hour. He's a good guy. Please consider
Corey Bowman as mayor of the Citycincinnati. Coreybowman dot com.
Jay Ratliffe of course there with the immediate update or
the aviation update fifty five cars dot Com for that
tomorrow on the fifty five Cassee Morning Show. Of course
Tech Friday with Dave Hatter and looking forward to this

(20:58):
the return of Sarah herring who's really kind of been
the the face and the voice of reform in downtown
Cincinnati since she lost her husband. That just awful attack
and they're over the Rhine apartment Sarah Herringer tomorrow. I
hope you have a wonderful day, folks. Thank you Joe
Strecker for all that you do produce in the program. Folks,
enjoy your day and don't go away. Glenn Beck's next

(21:18):
news happens fast. Stay up to date. At the top
of the hour.

Speaker 1 (21:22):
We're moving very quickly.

Speaker 2 (21:24):
Fifty five KRC the talk station.

Speaker 3 (21:27):
This reap