Defending JetBlue

I have an enormous amount of respect for JetBlue. To borrow from their boilerplate, I think they’re an innovator in bringing back humanity to air travel. So, I was a bit annoyed when I read She’s seething on a JetBlue plane: Oh baby, she’ll hate to go again. so I wrote the Columnist an email:

Hello,
I’m not a regular reader of your column, but instead I got to your JetBlue article because of my interest in airlines.

I’m a bit disturbed that your article seems like a unfair pot shot against JetBlue.

I noted a couple of factual inaccuracies:

1. The flight you were on was originally planned to be flown by a JetBlue E190, a 100-seat semi-express jet, not an A320 jet as you state. (The E190 falls in between mainline and express jets, and at the moment there isn’t quite consensus in the airline community which category it best fits into.)
2. Its an unsupported conjecture that the E145 that you were flying on had any less capability to circle than the E190 that the flight plan was created for.

I find it a bit disturbing as well that you cast a negative light on decisions that were made specifically to ensure safety. Including:

1. The decision to divert to Warwick, RI. Planes are fueled with enough fuel to get to their destination, circle for a specific period of time, then fly to their alternate destination. Any more fuel would raise costs for the flying public, and at times it may be impossible to load additional fuel onto a jet. Would you have liked the story to have read that a crashed because it ran out of fuel while circling Logan?
2. The decision not to fuel the plane while there were lightning strikes at the airport. As I understand it this is to prevent the plane from acting as a lightening rod while its hooked up to the fueling truck and igniting both the plane and the truck into a fireball. Again, would you have liked the story to have read that while diverted at Warwick, RI a Jetblue Flight operated by ExpressJet was struck by lightening and everyone on board burned to death in a fireball?
3. The decision not to disembark passengers in Warwick, RI. Given that JetBlue didn’t have facilities in Warwick it would have taken a reasonable amount of time to come to an agreement to use another airline’s facilities. This is time spent that must be traded off against efforts to get the flight to the intended destination.
4. The pilots decision to follow the FAA’s instructions. This is really a matter of safety, to the point that the FAA will revoke a pilot’s licence for violating a flight controller’s instructions. The pilot is at the mercy of the FAA controller, a controller who is again making decisions about the routing of many flights to ensure safe travel.

You were delayed around three hours and forty-five minutes beyond the planned arrival time at Logan. That isn’t great, but given the trade offs that must be made its pretty good.

You’re also probably wondering by this point why I care so much? No, I don’t work for JetBlue. I’ve never even worked for an airline. I have done some of my Pilot’s licence training.

The real reason I’m writing is that I’ve worked in logistics and I understand that its really easy to say “just do this” but its a whole lot harder to make it happen. Its unreasonable for anyone to expect everything to happen as planned 100% of the time. Problems do happen, but denigrating an airline in your column disrespects the efforts of those who ensure both your safety, and your travel needs.

Respectfully,
Cliff Barnard