Latest news with #charterflight
Daily Mail
a day ago
- Daily Mail
I flew to Paris on a private jet for just £550 - here's the simple travel hack I used
A British holidaymaker has revealed how she surprised her husband with a flight on a private jet for his birthday for just £550 per seat. Ore, 36, from London, took to Instagram in April to showcase their once-in-a-lifetime experience, which saw them hop on a seven-seater charter plane from Bristol to Paris. In one clip, shared to her page @oreathome, the interior designer explains that after almost two decades together, she was forced to think outside of the box for a unique idea to celebrate her partner's special day. Her husband had always expressed the desire to fly private at least once in their lives, and so Ore looked into booking a charter flight at a discounted rate, as recommended by a work colleague. The mother of two explains she was able to travel via jet by booking an empty leg flight, which is a one-way journey on a charter plane without any other passengers. These flights are often offered at a discounted price when the plane is returning to its base or flying to its next destination without any passengers, and the operator needs to reposition the aircraft anyway. In a follow-up clip, Ore reveals she paid £550 per seat on the seven-seater jet, meaning the entire flight set her back a total of £3,850 to 'fill' the remaining five seats. However, she went on to describe their experience as 'seamless, stress-free and luxurious' and went into detail about the perks of private air travel. She explains the pair were only required to arrive at the airport lounge 30 minutes before their scheduled departure, where they were personally greeted by their pilot and escorted to the aircraft. To her surprise, Ore reveals, there were no passport or baggage checks before settling in on the plane - a procedure she describes as 'wild.' They were also free to use their phones at full capacity during the flight, and they were not required to strap into their seatbelts for take off and landing. There were also no flight attendants present during the two-hour flight, so the pair had to 'serve' themselves drinks from the selection of beverages available on board. Once they had arrived in Paris, they had their passports checked by officials and were soon on their way to enjoy sights, snails and the Seine. She concludes: 'It actually made flying enjoyable, but then again you get what you pay for.' Over 300 viewers were left impressed by the price in the comments, as one person wrote: 'Wow I've never seen an empty leg that cheap! Usually they're still thousands. Good find.' A second said, 'It's cheaper than what I thought. I'll definitely consider for a future occasion,' while a third wrote, 'I'd so do it! It's less than what I thought! Especially if it's a big group flying as you said!' To her surprise, Ore reveals, there were no passport or baggage checks before settling in on the plane - a procedure she describes as 'wild' Over 300 viewers were left impressed by the price in the comments Finally, another added: 'Right another thing to add to the group chat *sigh.' It comes as a major travel company has launched a holiday that's designed to give holidaymakers the chance to 'live like a Kardashian'. Luxury Escapes' new European charter tour lasts for 25 days and will take holidaymakers to some of 'Europe's most sought after destinations'. But it's pretty exclusive as the 'Ultimate Europe' adventure will only be running once. The tour will take place on a Luxury Escapes chartered A320-200 aircraft stopping at private airport terminals at Prague, Bergen, San Sebastian, Porto, Marrakesh, Champagne, Sicily, Dubrovnik and Istanbul.
Yahoo
7 days ago
- Yahoo
'Unbelievable': 'Emergency landing' briefly closes Tallahassee airport, flight diverted
An "emergency landing" of a charter flight of armed services members Monday evening at Tallahassee International Airport briefly closed the airport's runway and led to the diversion of one flight back to a Texas airport. Passengers on a flight headed to Florida's capital were stuck scrambling for a hotel or spending the night on the floor or in stiff chairs at the Dallas Forth Worth International Airport after being unable to land in Tallahassee. Just minutes before landing, which was supposed to be around 10 p.m. on Aug. 11, the Tallahassee-bound plane was informed both runways were closed for landing and it had to turn around, said John Matthews, a passenger. The pilot came on over the intercom and said, "Ladies and gentlemen, the Tallahassee airport is closed." The plane was forced to make the three-and-a-half hour trip back to the Texas airport, getting in around midnight, Matthews said: "It's been unbelievable." With no official notice from airport officials on social media or otherwise, reports of fire trucks and paramedics on the runways were bouncing around social media. One person posted that the incident was because a chartered flight full of military personnel returning from a month-long stint in California had a mishap during landing. Tallahassee's Deputy Director of Aviation Vanessa Spaulding confirmed that account in an interview with the Tallahassee Democrat. Spaulding said the charter flight's final destination was intended to be Tallahassee, but around 9 p.m., the pilots – who were transporting National Guard members – called in requesting "an emergency landing" due to the plane experiencing hydraulic issues. She said the airport immediately coordinated and communicated very closely with its airline partners. From there the airline is supposed to communicate with its passengers. "This is what we do, we handle things like this and diversions on the daily," she said. "We're trained for this; our team executed the training exceptionally ... I think our team did an exceptional job. It was an overwhelmingly positive response from our team." Passengers, however, said they were in the dark. When they landed in Texas, Matthews said that the airline blamed the Tallahassee International Airport for the mix-up and wouldn't provide them with vouchers for food or lodging, so they had to pay out of pocket. "The hotel here in the airport is $400 a night, so I said to heck with that and took an Uber to a Motel 6," Matthews said. Matthews said he thinks the Tallahassee International Airport has "some explaining to do" because "nobody seemed to know what was going on." Passengers later learned that one runway was shut down due to construction and the second was closed because the disabled plane was stuck on the tarmac. As of 10:40 a.m. Tuesday, nearly 80 people were still waiting in Texas to return to Tallahassee after a long sleepless night. Matthews said they were given little information about what happened and after they landed the pilots and flight attendants walked off without a word. The runway was cleared in roughly an hour and a half, Spalding said, and no one was injured. "While it was unfortunate and inconvenient for the passengers, the good news is that the plane landed 181 passengers and crew safely, and we're very, very proud of our team's response." The passenger on social media wrote that the charter plane made a "harder-than-usual landing" and that they "almost ran out of runway and ran into the perpendicular runway for other planes." He said the plane sat on the runway for over two hours and no explanation was given until an hour in when the pilots informed them that the tires were to hot to move and had to cool down. "Long night, but everyone is OK," he wrote. Before details of the "emergency landing" became clear, the lack of notice drew fire from Red Tape Florida, a website run by former Tallahassee Democrat publisher Skip Foster, who now heads Hammerhead Communications, a public relations firm. The blog site, which does not reveal its clients, has been a consistent critic of the airport in its mission of "shining a light on the good, bad and ugly" of bureaucracy in Florida. "You might think an airport with 58 full-time employees and a $19 million budget would be able to tell the public what was going on," the Red Tape Florida article says. "You would be wrong." Local government watchdog reporter Elena Barrera can be reached at ebarrera@ Follow her on X: @elenabarreraaa. This article originally appeared on Tallahassee Democrat: Tallahassee airport: 'Emergency landing' closes runway, diverts flight Solve the daily Crossword
National Post
24-06-2025
- Business
- National Post
Pan Am nostalgia takes flight under new ownership
A small gaggle of former Pan American World Airways flight attendants stood by a window in Terminal 7 at John F. Kennedy International Airport, craning their necks and holding up phones. There were a few audible gasps and a soft cry of 'Oh gosh, there it is' as the plane came into view. Several of the women teared up as the jet finally slid past the window, its fin bearing the unmistakable cobalt-blue meatball of the Pan Am logo. Article content Article content The former flight attendants — and several dozen fellow passengers — were at JFK to board the plane, a chartered Boeing 757 that's being billed as a 'Pan Am journey by private air.' Over 12 days the plane will travel from New York to Bermuda and then on to Lisbon, Marseille, London, and Shannon, Ireland, before returning to New York City. The plane itself, which has capacity for 50 passengers, features fully reclinable lie-back seats, personal devices from which to stream entertainment options, as well as an open bar and chef-prepared meals served by attendants dressed in full Pan Am regalia. The trip cost US$59,950 per person for double occupancy, $5,600 more for single occupancy. Article content Article content Article content The flight to Bermuda isn't quite the first to wear the iconic Pan Am badge since the pioneering airline folded in 1991; a previous owner dabbled in launching a few routes in 2006. But it's the maiden voyage under Pan Am's new owners: Chief Executive Officer Craig Carter, who's led luxury travel-planning companies, and four other investors with backgrounds in hospitality and event marketing. They bought the Pan American World Airways trademark last year with the intention of reviving one of the most storied brands in airline history. Article content What Carter and his fellow investors had purchased in February 2024 was essentially a licensing operation. There are Pan Am watches by Breitling and Timex; you can buy branded T-shirts and sweatshirts; and the name had been on a gin and vodka distillery, among other things. Most of those efforts are very much ongoing, but almost immediately the new ownership began planning a high-end luxury tour. 'We knew this would be a good way to get a plane back in the air,' Carter says. 'That was one of our main objectives.' Article content The trip itself was put together by Bartelings, a company that specializes in tours by private aircraft, and Criterion Travel, a tour operator that plans high-end trips for alumni organizations, museums and similar groups. Its six stops were part of Pan Am's first two trans-Atlantic routes, which the airline began flying commercially in 1939. The group is set to stay at hotels including the Fairmont Hamilton Princess & Beach Club in Bermuda, the Four Seasons in Lisbon and the Savoy Hotel in London. The last stop, in Shannon, is built around a visit to the Foynes Flying Boat & Maritime Museum, which features a full-size replica of a Boeing 314 'flying boat,' the famous Pan Am Yankee Clipper.
RNZ News
20-06-2025
- RNZ News
Prisoners misbehaving before flight forced to turn around
Photo: Five of the eight women on a special charter flight for prisoners that was forced to turn around after an interior window was damaged were misbehaving before leaving prison grounds. The eight women were flying from Auckland to Wellington on 12 February when one of them damaged the window. RNZ has obtained a heavily redacted Department of Corrections report into the day, which reveals bad behaviour from some of the women began at the Auckland Region Women's Corrections Facility. It said five of the women turned up at the meeting point together, displaying "resistance and pushback regarding hand cuffing and property". "Active resistance continued while transporting the wahine into the vehicles to go to the airport - nothing major." Some prisoners kept resisting even when being walked on to the flight. On the flight, one prisoner broke the window at 10.15am, when the plane was about 5000 feet in the air. After the crew was told, the pilot decided to turn around and land at Auckland Airport. "The broken inner windowpane did not let air into the plane itself. The charter flight had about eight prisoners and [redacted] onboard," the report said. Another prisoner kicked and damaged a chair armrest onboard. No staff were injured in the mid-flight melee. The prisoner who broke the window suffered a cut finger. The prison sent extra staff to the airport to help with the plane's landing, where there was more trouble. In a heavily redacted section the report said one prisoner verbally abused a prison officer, while one person's hair was pulled, but it wasn't clear who the victim was. The report said internal prison misconduct charges would be laid. Among the "learnings and considerations" identified from a debrief was that prison staff did an excellent job at calming the prisoners. Corrections commissioner for custodial services Leigh Marsh said there had been no further such incidents since February. "Safety is our number one priority and we have a robust system in place to ensure prisoners can be safely transported between prisons, courts, specialist medical facilities and rehabilitation providers. "We carry out tens of thousands of these prisoner escorts each year without incident. Staff conduct a thorough risk assessment for all prisoner escorts and security measures are put in place to mitigate any safety risks." Prisoner behaviour on the charter flight was unacceptable and staff acted appropriately to de-escalate the situation, Marsh said. "A full review into the incident is currently under way and this will inform whether any of our processes can be further strengthened." Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero , a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.
Bloomberg
19-06-2025
- Bloomberg
Pan American Airways Is Back, But It's Not What It Seems
A small gaggle of former Pan American World Airways flight attendants stood by a window in Terminal 7 at John F. Kennedy International Airport, craning their necks and holding up phones. There were a few audible gasps and a soft cry of 'Oh gosh, there it is' as the plane came into view. Several of the women teared up as the jet finally slid past the window, its fin bearing the unmistakable cobalt-blue meatball of the Pan Am logo. The former flight attendants—and several dozen fellow passengers—were at JFK on Tuesday to board the plane, a chartered Boeing 757 that's being billed as a 'Pan Am journey by private air.' Over 12 days the plane will travel from New York to Bermuda and then on to Lisbon, Marseille, London, and Shannon, Ireland, before returning to New York City. The plane itself, which has capacity for 50 passengers, features fully reclinable lie-back seats, personal devices from which to stream entertainment options, as well as an open bar and chef-prepared meals served by attendants dressed in full Pan Am regalia. The trip cost $59,950 per person for double occupancy, $5,600 more for single occupancy.
