Ryanair threatening legal action against Aviation Herald

Apparently Ryanair is upset about the coverage in Simon Hradecky's site.

This is specific to an September 23 incident at Memmingen, Germany.

http://avherald.com/h?article=459fa8f6&opt=0

Here is a link to the discussion of the threatened legal action.

http://avherald.com/h?article=45a1cb11&opt=0

Personally, I suspect this will back-fire against Ryainair. But I will be interested to see the discussion here.

In general, does Ryanair have an unusually poor safety record? Over here in the U.S., we hear all about their shady fees but have never heard anything about them safety-wise.

Please follow this discussion in the Budget Travel Forum.
Thanks..
Obscure2k
TravelBuzz Moderator

No Ryanair has an excellent safety record. Incredibly modern fleet, albeit with high utilisation, they shift some serious numbers here in Europe. And like your good selves they are subject to incredibly tight scrutiny safety wise. I suspect that some countries would actually enjoy highlighting any issues Ryanair have as well. They have made a few enemies along the way!

I would say they are Marmite, but that would probably be lost in translation - you love them or hate them. They are cheap, normally. They are rude, normally. They have spawned an industry in trying to avoid their supplementary charges, whilst the unwary can get absolute stung rotten (nickel and diming, but many times multiplied). Surprisingly good timekeepers.

I fly them if needbe, but would not fly my family with them - not because of safety issues, as I have none, but just because I do not want to put them through the Ryanair ordeal. Fundamentally 1 incident could destroy Ryanair as people are waiting to say that their low fares reflected poor safety /maintainence. But it wouldn't surprise me if in terms of numbers carried vs incidents, they are the safest airline out there... possibly in the world.

But they are incredible self-publicists, and bullies. They make accusations left right and centre, but obviously happy to throw their lawyers to tear apart a great aviation site.

If you havn't seen this, this is Ryanair encapsulated (infact Ryanair linked to this video!!): http://www.google.co.uk/url?sa=t&rct...7pE7AOc--EB6Dg

I reckon they are as safe as an airline can be. However, if you read around the internet, the public opinion seems to think they are unsafe. Perhaps Ryanair are responsible for that image themselves with their strange publicity campains. Suggesting standing places instead of seats? Claiming that seatbelts aren't necessary? Also the way they are agressively cutting costs and asking money for everything they can think of doesn't exactly go with positive vibes. It all doesn't help to create a safe image imho.

Now they are trying to do damage control by legal submission of a party that probably doesn't have a dime to spare for an expensive lawsuit. It wouldn't surprise me if they have made similar threats before with success on their side. All very inapropriate imho, and this case may indeed back-fire on them.

This is another publicity stunt. Ryanair will do anything for media coverage, positive or not.

Looks, smells, & (probably) tastes like feline hair ball remedy

http://marmite.co.uk/

Gosh. The Ryanair guys are well-known for public posturing that seems a LITTLE bit too extreme to be taken seriously just so they can get press, but this set of e-mails almost sounds serious.

You can't just go threatening to sue people because someone posted defamatory and hard-to-prove things about your airline in their blog's comments page! That would be madness (and some of FlyerTalk's airline forums would suddenly get very, very quiet).

It's not just Simon's site. The folks over at pprune are under attack as well.

http://www.pprune.org/rumours-news/5...-us-court.html

Maybe FR is trying to quell the discussion of a number of recent safety related incidents on blog sites.

I am not trying to say that FR is an inherently unsafe airline. But any LCC would be devastated by any significant perception of being unsafe and this may be how they are trying to deal with it.

IMO in the long term this kind of legal bullying does not pay off.

Spot-on imho. They are trying to do damage control on a public opinion that has turned sour, and they are using evil ways to do that.

I doubt they are significantly better than any other European airline.

They have the youngest fleet in Europe, so I would say they are safer.

Wikipedia lists only 2 minor safety incidents in their entire history.

come off it. quote some proper stats, if you must make this argument.

I'm sorry to be rude a little, but regardless the fact, I would consider this as another act of arrogance by Ryanair

furthermore,this time, made in a clumsy way.

I've used FR many times, and I would consider their service as simple and fair , but, everytime i get in touch with FR, I always felt a bit of arrogance in their attitudes. That's my impression!

Having a young fleet doesn't make an airline safe.

Safety is made up of many factors. Equipment. Maintenance. Staff training. Attitude. Safety culture. To name just a few.

I'm sure that equipment and maintenance wise Ryanair are as safe as any other Western European airline, but I'm not so sure about some of the rest.

I went right off them after what I still consider the scariest landing I've been in, ever (and I've had some pretty scary ones, especially in light aircraft). 1800m of WET tarmac. 5 knot tailwind. We came in high and fast, landed more than half-way down the runway and nearly ran off the end. This was at a quiet provincial airport late at night, with no other traffic. and I very much suspect the choice of runway was the pilot's, not ATC's. Straight in, to save a few minutes and a few gallons of fuel - rather than fly round the circuit and land into wind.