Delta flight returns to Barcelona after sustaining damage from hail
Delta flight 169 to New York's John F. Kennedy International Airport returned to Barcelona shortly after takeoff on July 12.
'The flight landed safely in Barcelona and customers were reaccommodated on alternate flights to their final destinations,' the airline told USA TODAY in an emailed statement. 'Delta apologizes to our customers for the delay in their travels.'
Bird strikes, turbulence and weather: Despite hazards, flying is extremely safe
The company did not respond to questions regarding the extent of the damage. The plane returned less than an hour after takeoff, circling twice before landing back at Josep Tarradellas Barcelona–El Prat Airport, according to flight-tracking website Flightradar24.
The Spanish Aviation Safety and Security Agency did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The incident is not the only one of its kind in recent years. Another Delta flight from Milan to New York made an emergency landing in Rome in 2023 after the plane was pummeled by hail not long after departure.
This story was updated to add new information.
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Skift
6 hours ago
- Skift
AI & Airfares, Loyalty Program Trends, Travel Demand Outlook: Ask Skift's Top Questions
Delta says it's not using AI to set fares for individual travelers, but the criticism hasn't gone away. Here are three of the most popular questions our answer engine Ask Skift 2.0 fielded recently. Why Is Using AI for Airfares Controversial? Delta Air Lines said during its most recent earnings call that it plans to use AI to price up to 20% of domestic fares by the end of the year. The backlash was swift. The concern is that Delta could leverage personal information — everything from browsing history and income to a personal crisis — to charge one passenger more than another. Senator Ruben Gallego, a Democrat from Arizona, called Delta's use of AI for airfares "predatory pricing." Former Federal Trade Commissioner Lina Khan said on a podcast that using AI to set airfares could lead airlines to exploit personal circumstances to maximize revenue. One hypot
CNN
9 hours ago
- CNN
Delta Platinum vs Delta Reserve: My recommendation as a top Delta frequent flyer
CNN Underscored reviews financial products based on their overall value. We may receive a commission through our affiliate partners if you apply and are approved for a product, but our reporting is always independent and objective. This may impact how links appear on this site. This site does not include all financial companies or all available financial offers. Terms apply to American Express benefits and offers. Enrollment may be required for select American Express benefits and offers. Visit to learn more. I'm a frequent Delta flyer holding Diamond Medallion status with the airline, its top published elite level. Delta's co-branded credit cards are an essential tool in my wallet, and I recommend that people who fly Delta regularly consider applying for one of them. For people who fly Delta more than a few times a year, it's worth looking at the airline's mid-level credit card, the Delta SkyMiles® Platinum American Express Card. And really frequent Delta flyers should take a good look at the Delta SkyMiles® Reserve American Express Card, the airline's top co-branded card. Neither of these cards is cheap, though, with annual fees in the hundreds. The good news is that if you are in the Delta ecosystem, and can use enough of the cards' credits and perks to help offset the annual fee, they can make financial sense for you. Either will help you get to Delta elite status faster too. But which one should you get? Can you make do with the Platinum, or do you need the high-end benefits of the pricey Reserve, with an annual fee that's almost double? Let's look at the two cards together, and at my experience using them, to help you decide. (And before we start, let's clear up one potential source of confusion: The Delta Platinum American Express is not The Platinum Card® from American Express. They are similarly named, but very different, cards.) Both the Delta Platinum and Delta Reserve earn Delta SkyMiles and can earn a sizable welcome bonus in miles. Note that American Express allows earning a welcome offer only once per lifetime on each of its cards. That means that if you've had either one of these Delta cards before and earned a welcome offer, you won't be eligible to earn another. Earn 60,000 bonus miles after spending $3,000 in eligible purchases in the first six months of card membership Earn 70,000 bonus miles after spending $5,000 in eligible purchases in your first six months of card membership $350 (see rates and fees) $650 (see rates and fees) - 3 miles per dollar on eligible Delta purchases- 3 miles per dollar on purchases made directly with hotels worldwide- 2 miles per dollar at restaurants worldwide (including takeout and delivery in the U.S.)- 2 miles per dollar at U.S. supermarkets- 1 mile per dollar on all other purchases - 3 miles per dollar on eligible Delta purchases- 1 mile per dollar on all other purchases First checked bag free on Delta flights (including up to eight companions) First checked bag free on Delta flights (including up to eight companions) - 15% off award redemptions for Delta flights (when paying taxes and fees with this card)- 20% off in-flight purchases (in the form of statement credits)- Up to $120 annual Resy credit each calendar year (up to $10 monthly) at U.S. Resy restaurants- Up to $120 annual ride-hailing credit every calendar year (up to $10 monthly) with select U.S. providers- Up to $150 Delta Stays statement credit per calendar year- Up to $120 statement credit for Global Entry every 4 years or up to $85 for TSA PreCheck every 4.5 years- Complimentary Hertz Five Star status- Trip delay insurance- Baggage insurance- Car rental loss and damage insurance- No foreign transaction fees (see rates and fees) - 15% off award redemptions for Delta flights (when paying taxes and fees with this card)- 20% off in-flight purchases (in the form of statement credits)- Up to $240 annual Resy credit each calendar year (up to $20 monthly) at U.S. Resy restaurants- Up to $120 annual ride-hailing credit every calendar year (up to $10 monthly) with select U.S. providers- Up to $200 Delta Stays statement credit per calendar year- Up to $120 statement credit for Global Entry every 4 years or up to $85 for TSA PreCheck every 4.5 years- Complimentary Hertz President's Circle status- Trip delay insurance- Trip cancellation/interruption insurance- Baggage insurance- Car rental loss and damage insurance- No foreign transaction fees (see rates and fees) No - Access to Delta Sky Club lounges (15 visits per year when flying Delta with a same-day boarding pass; unlimited visits after spending $75,000 in a calendar year)- Four one-time guest passes for the Delta Sky Club (when flying Delta with a same-day boarding pass), then $50 per person per visit- Access to Amex Centurion Lounges when flying Delta and booking your flight with the Delta Reserve One round-trip companion certificate each year upon renewal of your card (valid in Main Cabin on domestic, Caribbean or Central America flights; taxes and fees of between $22 and $250, for itineraries with up to four flight segments) One round-trip companion certificate each year upon renewal of your card (valid in Main Cabin, Delta Comfort+ or first class on domestic, Caribbean or Central America flights; taxes and fees of between $22 and $250, for itineraries with up to four flight segments) Earn 1 Medallion Qualification Dollar (MQD) for every $20 spent, plus 2,500 MQDs toward status qualification at the start of the Medallion Qualification year Earn 1 Medallion Qualification Dollar (MQD) for every $10 spent, plus 2,500 MQDs toward status qualification at the start of the Medallion Qualification yearEnrollment is required for select card benefits; terms apply. The main difference in perks between the two is that the Reserve allows access to Delta's Sky Club lounges, as well as American Express Centurion lounges, when flying Delta (or its partners, if the flight was bought through Delta). The Reserve also acts as a fourth tiebreaker for complimentary upgrades between passengers after elite status, cabin purchased and Million Miler status. That said, both cards feature rich lists of benefits, including the below. Companion Certificate: Using the certificate, you can buy one round-trip ticket on Delta to all 50 states, Mexico, Central America and the Caribbean and get another one for just the cost of taxes and fees. The certificate that comes with the Platinum every year is valid for economy class, while the one with the Reserve is valid for extra-legroom Comfort+ and first class as well. The Companion Certificate alone could offset the annual fee on either card. TakeOff 15: Both cards provide the TakeOff 15 benefit, a 15% discount on the SkyMiles required for award flights operated by Delta. For example, if you want to book a flight that requires 20,000 SkyMiles, it will only cost 17,000 SkyMiles with the discount. The lower cost in miles will be reflected in your flight search results in the Delta app or on the site. Delta Stays statement credit: Every calendar year, holders of either card receive a credit for a prepaid hotel or vacation rental booked on the Delta Stays platform. It's a third-party platform, so you may not get the hotel points or any loyalty perks you might get when booking directly, but the savings are huge. The Delta Platinum card gives you up to $150 back in statement credits on a Delta Stays booking, and the Reserve card up to $200. Resy restaurant credit: The Delta Platinum card gives you up to $120 in statement credits of $10 monthly at restaurants available through Resy, the reservation platform owned by American Express. With the Reserve card, those credits are up to $240, divided into $20 monthly. (Enrollment required. After that, find a restaurant on Resy and use your enrolled card to pay your bill.) Ride-hailing credit: Both the Platinum and the Reserve offer $10 in statement credits per month, for a total of up to $120 per calendar year, for purchases on Uber, Lyft, Curb, Revel and Alto. The credits will not be applied for purchases outside the U.S. (Enrollment required.) Global Entry or TSA PreCheck credit: Both cards offer a statement credit of up to $120 every four years to cover the application fee for Global Entry, which allows expedited clearance for preapproved, low-risk travelers when reentering the U.S. Alternatively, both cards offer a credit up to $85 covering the application fee for TSA PreCheck every four and a half years. Since Global Entry includes PreCheck, we recommend applying for the former if you travel outside the country or plan to. Travel and car rental insurance: Both cards come with travel protections when you use the card to buy a ticket, including paying the taxes and fees on award tickets. This includes trip delay insurance; insurance for lost, stolen or damaged luggage; car rental loss and damage insurance; and trip cancellation and interruption insurance, which only the Delta Reserve provides. (Conditions and limits apply.) Complimentary Hertz status: The Platinum comes with Five Star status and the Reserve with President's Circle status in the Hertz Gold Plus Rewards program. Those are the second-highest and highest status tiers in the car rental agency's loyalty program. (Enrollment required.) Lounge access is an exclusive benefit of the Delta Reserve, and the main reason the card is likely to stay in my wallet until that changes. With the Reserve, you get 15 day passes to Sky Clubs per year when flying Delta with a same-day boarding pass. (The year in this case isn't a calendar year but the Medallion year, which goes from Feb. 1 to Jan. 31.) Once you enter a Sky Club with a pass from the Reserve, you have unlimited access to all of them for 24 hours. This is good for people with connecting flights, since they won't burn a visit for each airport. If you spend more than $75,000 on the card in a calendar year, you'll have unlimited Sky Club access. Reserve card holders also get four one-time guest passes, provided guests are also flying Delta with a same-day boarding pass. After that, the cost is $50 per person per visit. But Sky Clubs aren't the only airport lounges you can get into. When flying Delta and booking your flight with the Delta Reserve, you also get access to the excellent Amex Centurion Lounges (do note that bringing guests, up to two of them per visit, will cost $50 per person, or $30 if they're age 2 through 17). Between the 15 yearly passes to Sky Clubs and the unlimited access to Centurion lounges, I have all the lounge time I want. Thanks to Centurion lounges, which can be found at 15 U.S. airports and 11 abroad, I typically don't even exhaust my yearly allotment of Sky Club visits. A nifty feature of the Platinum is that authorized users of the card get their own batch of 15 Sky Club passes per year. The fee to add an authorized user is $175, though, so make sure they will use the lounge access perk if that is your main motivation for adding them. Medallion Qualification Dollars, or MQDs, are the only metric that matters to earn the various levels of Delta Medallion status. Silver Medallion requires 5,000 MQDs, Gold requires 10,000, Platinum requires 15,000 and the top Diamond Medallion level is attained at 28,000 MQDs. You can earn MQDs by flying Delta or its partners, or by spending on the Delta Platinum or Reserve cards. The Reserve earns 1 MQD for every $10 spent, and the Platinum earns half that, or 1 MQD for every $20. The cards' real heft in that regard comes from their MQD Headstart feature, which gives you 2,500 MQDs at the start of the Medallion Qualification year, every February. That's halfway to Silver level just for holding the card. When it comes to earning miles, the Platinum card has a vast advantage. The Reserve is, in fact, a bad card for earning miles on anything other than Delta flights. You'll get 3x miles per dollar on those but a measly 1x on all other expenses. There are no-fee, cash-back cards that earn at much higher rates. The Platinum does a lot better. It earns the same 3x on Delta purchases but also on purchases made directly with hotels worldwide. At U.S. supermarkets and at restaurants worldwide, including takeout and delivery in the U.S., it earns 2x miles. For everyday spending, it's far and away the better card. First off, I have both cards. It works for me, as someone who takes 40 flights on Delta or its partners in an average year, but I would not recommend having more than one of any airline's co-branded cards to anybody but truly frequent flyers. Clearly, the Delta Reserve is aimed squarely at the airline's loyalists, who value lounge access and do not have a Sky Club membership, which starts at $695 per year. For less dedicated Delta flyers, the Platinum is plenty. And if I weren't a frequent Delta flyer, neither card would work for me. The Reserve is the only card I use for booking Delta flights, since it earns the same miles as the Platinum on those purchases but double the MQDs. The Platinum is one of my go-tos for grocery shopping, since it gets 2x at U.S. supermarkets. I use the Companion Certificates from both, and I dine at Resy restaurants often enough to use all of the Resy credits from both cards. Similarly, I use the Delta Stays credits in full. If I had to get rid of one, I would ditch the Platinum, though, and keep the Reserve. I have other cards that match or surpass the Platinum for earnings, such as the Citi Double Cash, which earns 2x on all purchases, and other cards that earn 3x on dining, such as the Chase Freedom Unlimited® or the Chase Sapphire Reserve®. But I couldn't get Sky Club and Centurion lounge access, which I value greatly, with any Delta co-branded card except the Amex Delta Reserve. Many frequent flyers, with Delta and other airlines, swear by the non-Delta American Express Platinum. For a steep annual fee of $695 (see rates and fees), it has Centurion lounge access and 10 Sky Club passes per year, and it doesn't earn Delta SkyMiles but rather American Express Membership Rewards points. Those can be transferred to many airline and hotel partners, including Delta, making them far more flexible than airline miles. Plus, the card earns 5x on airfare purchased directly from the airline, not 3x. But for most occasional Delta flyers, the Delta SkyMiles® Gold American Express Card, which we consider one of the best American Express cards, is a better bet. It has an annual fee of $150, waived the first year, and earns 2x miles on Delta purchases at U.S. supermarkets and at restaurants worldwide. If you fly Delta even three or four times a year, you can recoup its annual cost, and then some, just by avoiding the checked luggage fees. The following FAQs have been answered by CNN Underscored senior money editor and credit card expert Alberto Riva. Is it worth it to upgrade from Delta Platinum to Reserve? Is it worth it to upgrade from Delta Platinum to Reserve? The Amex Delta Reserve has a much higher annual fee ($650) than the Amex Delta Platinum ($350). Upgrading to it from the Delta Platinum makes sense only for frequent Delta flyers, and we mean very frequent, who would value the lounge access the Reserve gives. The Reserve also helps score cabin upgrades and earns more MQDs, which count for attaining elite status, than the Platinum. But its steep annual cost makes it worthwhile only for big Delta loyalists. Does the Delta Reserve get lounge access? Does the Delta Reserve get lounge access? Yes. The Reserve comes with 15 day passes to Delta Sky Clubs per year when flying Delta with a same-day boarding pass. A pass is valid for 24 hours after entering the first Sky Club. The card also provides four guest passes per year. Spending more than $75,000 on the card in a calendar year gives unlimited Sky Club access. On top of Delta lounges, card holders have unlimited access to American Express Centurion lounges when flying Delta with a same-day boarding pass. Do you get free flight upgrades with the Delta Reserve? Do you get free flight upgrades with the Delta Reserve? The Delta Reserve card does not guarantee upgrades to a higher cabin, but it does help. That's because it acts as a tiebreaker between two or more passengers after considering their elite status, fare paid and Million Miler status. Senior money editor and credit card expert Alberto Riva applied his years of experience using the Delta Amex Platinum (since 2014) and Delta Reserve (since 2017) to this article. He's had high-level status with Delta Air Lines for years, and in the past year, he got upgraded from economy to first class more than 60% of the time on Delta flights within North America. Our recommendations are grounded in real-world value and backed by thorough analysis, expert insight and a commitment to clarity and transparency. Click here for rates and fees of the Amex Platinum card. Click here for rates and fees of the Delta Platinum Amex. Click here for rates and fees of the Delta Reserve Amex.
11 hours ago
How Delta is using AI for ticket pricing and what it means for air travel
Airfare prices are traditionally dynamic due to an array of variable external factors from seasonal demand and jet fuel prices to weather and competitor pricing. As companies like Delta Air Lines look to artificial intelligence to help with revenue management, consumers are wondering what this new factor could mean for the future of travel booking. What to know about AI technology used by Delta Air Lines On an earnings call last month, Delta President Glen Hauenstein told investors the Atlanta-based carrier currently uses generative AI technology to determine some prices of domestic flights with the goal to increase that usage from 3% of its network to "about 20% by the end of the year." The AI technology is still "in heavy testing phase," Hauenstein said, assuring investors that while they "like it a lot -- we're going to take our time and make sure that the rollout is successful, as opposed to trying to rush it and risk that there are unwanted answers in there." The model Delta is using from Fetcherr, an AI pricing company, and like most generative AI, it benefits from training, Hauenstein said. "The more data it has, and the more cases we give it, the more it learns, and we're really excited about it," he said. The Israel-based AI tech solutions company, founded in 2019, was named the Best Travel Tech Startup for the second consecutive time at the 2024 World Travel Tech Awards. The company states on its website that its technology "empowers airlines to adapt to dynamic market conditions, personalize offers, and maximize profitability while delivering a seamless and satisfying travel experience." Beyond its work with Delta, Fetcherr also lists other global airline clients on its website, including Virgin Atlantic, WestJet, Azul and Aerobus. Delta responds to critics of AI pricing technology Following Delta's investor call last month, Democratic Sens. Ruben Gallego, Mark Warner and Richard Blumenthal sent a letter to Delta CEO Ed Bastian on July 21, expressing concern about the use of AI and its potential impact on Delta customers. "Delta's current and planned individualized pricing practices not only present data privacy concerns, but will also likely mean fare price increases up to each individual consumer's personal 'pain point' at a time when American families are already struggling with rising costs," the lawmakers stated in their letter. The senators likened the AI technology implementation to that of surge pricing on ride sharing apps like Uber or Lyft. "Surveillance pricing has been shown to utilize extensive personal information obtained through a variety of third party channels, including data about a passenger's purchase history, web browsing behavior, geolocation, social media activity, biometric data, and financial status," they wrote. "Former FTC Chair Lina Khan has cautioned against a particularly egregious but conceivable example of an airline using AI to charge a higher fare to a passenger 'because the company knows that they just had a death in the family and need to fly across the country.' The opacity surrounding Delta's new customized pricing model could aggravate these concerns." A Delta representative told ABC News that Delta is in compliance "with regulations around pricing and disclosures" in its AI technology experimentation. "There is no fare product Delta is testing that is based on individual information," the representative said in an emailed statement. "Market forces drive the dynamic pricing model that's been used in the global industry for decades." Delta responded similarly in a letter to Gallego, Warner and Blumenthal on Friday, as first reported by Reuters, stating, "Our ticket pricing never takes into account personal data." Katy Nastro, travel expert and spokesperson for Going -- formerly Scott's Cheap Flights – told ABC News in a statement Monday, "With the shock and outrage of Delta proudly broadcasting their adoption of AI pricing, we tend to forget that if consumers decide to move en masse to another carrier, Delta's pricing strategy must adapt, which can ultimately mean discounts for certain fares." Quoting Going founder Scott Keyes, she explained that like fast food competition if one chain charges "$30 for a chicken sandwich when their competitors charge a fraction of the cost, hungry consumers will go elsewhere." "People may feel more bias against this type of pricing because the transparency is only based on what Delta is sharing, which can definitely raise some skepticism coming from the U.S.'s most 'premium airline,'" Nastro said.
