GUWonder

GUWonder

entropy

If you can ride a "shabbos" elevator, you can probably remain on a plane that's already in the air.


Now, once you get to TLV, you might have to walk to a hotel., or home... or whatever...

craz

A number of years ago youd be correct. But the situation has changed completely and LY has ample competition to almost every where it flys, and probably less expensive to boot All too often LYs flights arriving on Fri afternoon wont leave a person even living in Tel Aviv enough time to get home in time before Shabbos starts. Which to me is a main farce of the so called LY being Shomer Shabbos. It might not fly on Shabbos but thats about it. Arriving anything less then 2 hours before Shabbos starts is a no go and why the Rabbis decided that thats OK is beyond me

I think LY has to decide whom they wish to be and to whom. They cant be everything to everybody, which they have been trying to do. That said the Charedi have to do something they hate to, Educate their flocks, to what is and what isnt permissible according to Halacha (Jewish Law). Ive seen it where a person is demanding they be allowed to stand and pray since they Must according to Jewish Law when the fact is they can do so sitting in their seat, I prefer to stand myself but dont demand something and say something which isnt true.

In this case of LY 002 once again LY messed it up badly, they should have gone back to the gate let off whom ever wanted to get off with telling them their tkts will be good only on LY when there is room, unless they have a fully refundable tkt, that the flight will be landing in Europe place to be decided with enough time to get to a hotel before Shabbos and food will be provided. To those not Shomer Shabbos they too will have to get off and another plane will be coming to fly them onto TLV. Case closed. While inflight keep everyone posted where you plan to land and that arrangements have been made treat your passengers exactly how youd want to be treated

mikebg

I don't think anyone on board was asking for anything more than that. In fact, one of the passengers interviewed said that the crew told them that if they got off the flight they would lose their ticket completely and they replied that they were happy to go along with that.

The real problem here is not Shabbos observance or not, but EL AL's terrible attitude to their paying customers.

awayIgo

Going back to crew using public transportation to get to the airport. My local ( when in US) train station is a few away from JFK air train. We always have loads of individuals going to and from the airport on the train. ( you can tell by the luggage) In ALL the years I've been riding this train--(23) I have NEVER seen flight crew on it. Now, it could be a coincidence--or it could be that flight crew generally use private shuttles or cabs.

Thursday was a freak occurrence. My neighbor said on an express bus for 5.5 hours--to get from Manhattan to Queens. I do not, as posted earlier get crew being late--since it happens when there is no snow too. But, sometimes you need to cut some slack.

craz

the flight crews Ive seen on the AirTrain @ JFK were JetBlue crew, rare occasion DL

ELAL

A couple of years ago my brother was on a LH flight from FRA-JFK on a Friday with a similar story of being delayed a few hours away from the gate.
He eventually requested to be off-loaded due to Shabbat, the crew where not too happy as they were finally being allowed to take-off. The captain came out to ask him why he so badly want to be off-loaded, he explained to him about shabbat, the pilot fully understood and turned back to the gate and got him off-loaded, while showing full understanding. Of course LH re-booked him free of charge on a Sunday flight.

If LH could do this for 1 single passenger, why couldn't ELAL do this for 180 passengers?
Never mind the lies by the captain and untrue blaming by ELAL

Alpha Golf

I think the issue is that that captain inconvenienced all of his other pax. Happened to me on LX once -- delayed due to a blizzard, we finally are ready to go and a group of folks insisted on returning to gate and getting off, delaying the rest of us a couple more hours.

ELAL

You can't force a person to stay on a flight which is delayed by hours.

entropy

of course you can. Delaying 400 passengers for one is ridiculous. Its one thing if its a medical emergency, quite another if it isn't.

craz

+1, also what if I will now misconnect and have to overnight at my own expense since the delay was weather, or my trip now became a trip in vain since by the time I get to my destination it will too late for what I was going there for

I wouldnt want to inconvince anyone least a full plane of passengers but yet Im not an idiot that I will still fly when there is no longer a reason for me to or by doing so incur an addtional expense.

GUWonder

Alpha Golf

... but are willing to do so. I think this is the crux of the tradeoff.

craz

You betya Im not about to fly somewhere simply so as not to delay a plane of people. However thats say I boarded on time with the expectation that we will be leaving on time. If we boarded late and the flight was delayed then its upon me to make sure before boarding that I still want to fly and that everything will be in order by doing so and that I wont change my mind once Im on board. Of cause with an Intl flight if the delay gets too extended and its no longer viable for whatever reason to still take that flight I should inform the agent ASAP so that my bags can be off loaded causing as little additional delay as possible

But no way will I fly just so as not to delay everyone else, sorry that goes with flying everyone knows stuff always hits the fan and if its no longer viable for even 1 passenger to fly then if you have been sitting in the penalty box or on a taxiway etc its back to the gate, if its an Intl flight they must off load the bags. The main thing is to constantly reassess the situation and to bail out ASAP in order to cause as little further delay as possible.

But only a nut will continue to fly just to avoid delaying everyone else, Id never expect someone who has just crossed into a trip in vain to continue with the flight and simply fly back upon landing or pay $$$ out of pocket for a not needed hotel room @ XYZ.

the problem with LY is they decided to make the final decision w/o regard for what the passengers wanted to do. So if a person was flying to be a simcha over Shabbos in Israel and were flying back on Sun why should that person now have to be in ATH and waste their time. Dont decide what is best for me , let me decide that, just give me your best info so that I can decide what cause of action if any I which to do. that is the main problem, not the snow or traffic but that LY (along with probably most carriers) are only interested in what is best for the carrier and really dont care how it affects the passengers