Catbert10

Based out of Austin, 25% of my CO flight are from IAH-AUS. Almost all of my IAH-AUS flights are in the evening. It seems that in the last 2 years, some sort of meteorological anomaly has formed between Houston and Austin, causing "expected turbulence" on almost all of my IAH-AUS flights. This means that the most professional men and women in the industry do not perform a beverage service. Strangely enough, even though turbulence is always expected, in almost all cases, the flight is as smooth as glass. Even more strangely, there doesn't seem to be "expected turbulence" in the opposite direction (AUS-IAH).

A few years ago, CO flew a number of 757s between IAH and AUS, and it seemed as though the flight crew took pride in making sure that a beverage service was performed. No more. It is clear that the flight crew on these flights has decided that the IAH-AUS run is a good time to take a break.

FYI, I am referring to a beverage service in First so it isn't a large number of people.

The "most professional men and women in the industry" indeed...

sfogate

This information needs to be sent to the correct people to address. While I find it interesting to read, I don't have the power to fix it. Send an email to CO.

LukeSkywaiter

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Rah rah!

In all seriousness, the only time it's acceptable for this to happen would be when the captain tells the crew to stay seated. The crew should never decide independently to not do a service, unless there is actual, moderate turbulence.

paranoiatx

Interesting, I don't think I ever remember them skipping the drinks in F. Now back in Y is a different story where it varies from full service ("please have your orders ready"), to water service (most common) to nothing ("turbulence").

Maybe it varies by time of day? Or day of the week?

suzanneaustin

I hear this about once a month during my weeklies, and I'm usually in F. Days and times going home vary. After we land in AUS, I gotta wonder what happened to all of the expected turbulence. Maybe AustinWeatherGuy can enlighten us on this incredible yet recurrent phenomenon. tk?

The one that I've always loved is, "Due to the short duration of this flight, there will be no beverage service. HOWEVER, if there is anything else that we can do to make your flight more enjoyable, just let us know."

SAT Lawyer

This happens occasionally, but infrequently between SAT and IAH. Even less so on WN between SAT and HOU. About half the time "expected turbulence" has resulted in a preemptive shutdown of beverage service on a CO flight I have flown on in the aforementioned market, the flight attendants have nonetheless managed to serve beverages in the first class cabin.

"Expected turbulence" precipitating no beverage service which results in an actual ride that is smooth is, indeed, very disappointing.

pptp

Time to put this into perspective.

Worst case scenario: 757-300, 192 in Y, 3 FA's in back. That's 64 PAX per FA.

Flight time is 30 min's +/-. Take a minimum of 8 mins off for t/o and 5 mins off for landing.

That leaves 17 minutes to serve 64 PAX per FA.

That's about 16 seconds per PAX to serve one drink each (some don't want anything and some ask for two).

Keep in mind we still have to set up and break down the bar cart, pick up all trash, make sure all PAX are in compliance with the landing requirements, secure the galleys and strap ourselves in (all FAA requirements).

All of this being said, I still prefer to do full service, but at times it can be a challenge and it's possible that we don't finish, or at best, have to take your drink away a couple minutes after giving it to you.

pptp

Turbulence cannot be predicted (very accurately) only reported after the fact. If the last few flights reported turbulence, that's all we have to go by. It's entirely possible that the ride could clear up in the meantime but we have to err on the side of safety. Also an AUS flight is nothing but climb-out and descent which makes it even more of a challenge.

sidsub

I don't get it. It's about 25 minutes from wheels up to wheels down. I always thought it was rather silly that they even tried to do a drinks service on that flight. Let them take a break.

Xyzzy

I've been on flights of a similar length on carriers outside the US where they managed to do a meal service.

Catbert10

To pptp's comment, I was merely trying to point out that a few years ago, CO FAs literally ran through a large cabin making sure they did a drink service in Y, every flight, no matter what. To me, this demonstrated that there was a great deal of pride and dedication back then.

FYI, I'm talking about a beverage service in F, since that's where I usually sit on my IAH-AUS flights. The flights that I've seen this happen are the later flights in the evening, when it's the last flight of the night for the crews.

pptp

Non-US airlines often don't adhere to the same strict safety standards that we like to.

Xyzzy

True -- but I wouldn't put airlines like KLM and Lufthansa into that categry.

controller1

Maybe the crews are catching up on sleep.

channa

The behavior I've witnessed a handful of times is that the crew doesn't want to do it, so they ask the captain while on the ground to instruct them not to due to expected turbulence, which he or she usually does.

Just a bit of COllusion amongst two of most professional workgroups.