Contests

You can’t win if you don’t play: July edition

Contests, , , ,

Here are few travel-related contests to consider entering. Because you can’t win if you don’t play.

ANA (All Nippon Airways) and XPRIZE  joined forces for the Seat 14C  project, which is a mix of a science fiction anthology and a writing competition set 20 years in the future.

Storytellers are invited to submit stories imagining the year 2037 when an ANA flight from Tokyo to San Francisco mysteriously lands in the future.

Stories must be 2000 to 4000 words and sent in by 11:59 Pacific Time on August 25, 2017.  More story requirements and tips for the contest are here. The $10,000 prize package includes round trip airfare to Tokyo for two, four nights in a four-star hotel, $1,500 in spending money and more.

Win a million Star Alliance points

To celebrate 20 years of “Connecting People and Cultures” Star Alliance and its 28 member carriers are inviting customers to enter a contest to win one million frequent flyer miles.

The deadline to enter is July 31, 2017 and 21 winners – one for each participating frequent flyer program – will be announced on September 28, 2017.

20 out of the 21 participating frequent flyer programs are offering miles (or mile equivalents) . SAS’s EuroBonus Programme is offering flight tickets instead of miles.

To enter you’ll need to be a member of one of the member carrier’s frequent flyer programs. Then, upload a profile picture and an image of a favorite cultural experience and describe where it was and what made it so special. More details here.

SkyTeam contest for a round-the-world trip

SkyTeam is celebrating 17 years as an airline alliance with a contest offering two round-the-world tickets as a prizes.

To enter, take a short quiz about your travel style and watch a short video from a web series of ten short films following ‘celebrity’ frequent flyers.  Contest ends July 13, 2017. More info here.

Good luck!

 

 

 

 

 

Southwest Airlines celebrates Shark Week

Contests, liveries,

Shark Week is coming to the Discovery Channel July 23 – July 30 and, once again, Southwest Airlines is jumping in with a shark-themed 737-700 featuring five shark species on the fuselage.

 

The shark plane will fly through Aug. 31, 2017, but on all WiFi-equipped Southwest planes passengers will be able to watch a pre-premiere episode of African Shark Safari on the on demand Shark Week channel.

During Shark Week, passengers can watch the programming live on the Discovery Channel.

And to kick off Shark Week, Southwest and Discovery are planning to do a surprise takeover of a special flight.

Shark fan or not, you might want to enter the Dare to Dive sweepstakes to  Grand Cayman.
The prize includes round trip travel for the winner and three guests,  a $2,000 Ritz Carlton gift card, and a $1,000 Visa gift card for an aquatic adventure. Enter by July 31, 2017. Good luck!

 

Hate extra airport pat-downs? TSA offering 1.5 million to fix the system

Contests, Security,

The extra pat-downs passengers often have to undergo at airport security checkpoints are not only irritating to those of us not interested in having our body parts touched by strangers in public, they make the lines go slower for everyone.

What triggers those secondary pat-downs? False alarms.

A high rate of those false alarms are triggered by expensive and, evidently, not too reliable, potential-threat algorithms the Transportation Security Administration purchases from the manufacturers of airport scanners.

In an effort to fix the problem TSA has put up $1.5 in prize money to see if someone else – maybe you? – can improve the accuracy of the threat prediction algorithms.

The contest, being run in partnership with Kaggle  will award eight prizes (1st prize: $500,000; 4th to 8th prize: $100,000) and to enter you’ll need to evaluate a set of body scans.

These are real body scans, from TSA volunteers, and the “images may contain sensitive content,” the rules explain. So contest participants are asked to “conduct yourself with professionalism, respect, and maturity when working with this data.”

Here are links to deadlines and more information. Good luck!

 

Icelandair’s new Stopover Pass promotion

Contests

 

Icelandair is celebrating its 80th birthday with a fun promotion.

The airline already allows a free stopover in Iceland, but a new Icelandair Stopover Pass offers some fun extra perks.

From now until March 2018 passengers can apply to their have their standard boarding pass into a Stopover Pass, which offers exclusive access to a series of entertaining performances on land and in the sky.

The performances range from a three-act play on board a flight from London to New York via Iceland (starring Icelandair crew members), tickets to a private concert, trips to Icelandic football matches, backstage passes to a music festival and more.

Go here to enter a contest to be on a flight September 8 from London to New York (via Iceland), during which that three-act play will be performed and to enter your name to snag a ticket to one of the special events taking place during the next year.

 

 

 

Delta joins Seattle Sounders FC for cool contest

Contests, Sports,

 

In and around Seattle, soccer fans are super passionate about the Seattle Sounders FC, who just happen to be the defending MLS Cup Champion team.

Delta Air Lines is the team’s official airline and they’ve kicked off a cool fan ‘engagement’ campaign called the “Join the XI” program, that will give 11 fans some super-special perks.

Fans selected to join the “Starting XI” team will “get to live the life of an MLS player, sign a one-day contract with the Sounders FC and fly with the team to the July 29th match against Los Angeles,” promises Delta.

Here are some of the ‘positions’ they’re going to fill:

  • The Dynamic Duo – friends, family, a couple or coworkers united by their love of Sounders FC
  • The Stat Wiz – the one fan who knows the game and the team by the numbers
  • The Luckiest – the person who sticks to their superstitions to help the team win
  • The Lifetimer – someone who’s been a Sounders FC fan for what feels like forever
  • The Roadie – where Sounders FC goes, they follow – no matter the distance

There are some age and residency restrictions,  but if you’re a Sounders fan, here’s where to enter.

Good luck!

 

 

 

Satisfied customers at these winning airports

Airports, Contests,

DFW International Airport

Airports Council International (ACI) World just released its Airport Service Quality awards – which measure passenger satisfaction – and some of your favorite airports are likely on the list of 2016 winners.

In the Best Airport by Region (counting airports with over 2 million passengers a year), it was a three-way tie between Indianapolis International Airport (IND), Jacksonville International Airport (JAX) and Toronto Billy Bishop Airport (YTZ) for Best Airport in North America.

In the “Best Airport in North America,” – by size – category:

*Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport took top honors among airports serving over 40 million passengers a year;

*Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport got the 1st place nod for airports service 25 to 40 million passengers;

*Tampa International Airport won for airports service 15-25 million passengers a year,

*Indianapolis International Airport got the 1st place prize for airports serving 5 to 15 million passengers a year; and

*Toronto Billy’s Bishop Airport (YYZ) won Best Airport in North American in the 2-5 million passengers a year category.

One other award to take note of: “Best Improved Airport in North America,” which went to  John Glenn Columbus International Airport (CMH).

See the full list of winners from around the world here.

 

Delta wants New Yorkers to take Fridays off

Contests,

07_The check-in desk at the Delta ONE lounge is made from the tail of a DC9 (by MotoArt)

Even if your desk is made from recycled parts of a DC-9 (as is the reception desk at the Delta One check-in lounge LAX), it is a good to take a break from it.

And, if you live or work in New York City, Delta Air Lines is offering some sweet incentives this summer to get you to at least take Fridays off.

The carrier has kicked off a program it calls “Go Fridays” and each week throughout the summer, Delta plans to somehow find deserving overworked New Yorkers and give them plane tickets, tickets to ball games and other incentives to get them out of the office.

Here’s the short promo kicking off the program.

Giveaway Tuesday: Outer Space scene

Contests, ,

How about a trip to outer space?

You many not have enough money – or guts – to reserve a spot on one of the Virgin Galactic flights, but you can play around with the idea if you had this cute Outer Space travel kit that comes complete with aliens, rocket ships and 28 other cute, reusable vinyl stickers.

Outer space kit 1

outer space 2

Want it? Leave a note in the comment section about what city – or planet – you’re headed to next and we’ll pick a winner and send it along.

(Stuck at the Airport headquarters is moving – so stay tuned for more giveaway items.)

ANA’s BB-8 Star Wars plane #3 +contest

Contests, liveries, , ,

ANA STAR WARS BB-8

Japan’s All Nippon Airways – ANA – has been thrilling Star Wars fans with its series of Star War’s liveried planes and on March 27 the third and final aircraft in the specially-decorated series of planes will start flying international routes.

The aircraft will be unveiled in a ceremony on March 27 at Osaka’s Itami Airport, where the special livery was applied, and will then make a one-off domestic flight as ANA22 from Itami to Tokyo’s Haneda Airport.

At just past midnight on March 29, the plane will take off as ANA Flight 106 to Los Angeles and it will then fly various international routes between Tokyo’s Haneda and Narita and Los Angeles, New York, Chicago, Washington D.C. and Houston.

The Star Wars theme isn’t just on the outside of the BB-8 plane. Inside passengers will find special BB-8 paper cups and headrest covers and find cabin attendants wearing BB-8 aprons.

Want to get on board?

ANA is having a contest to give away a pair of round-trip economy class tickets from Los Angeles to Tokyo for the first outbound flight. If you don’t win the first prize, you may win one of the 50 second prizes: a special BB-8™ ANA JET model plane.

Enter the BB-8 ANA Jet Sweepstakes here.

Travel Tidbits: e-cigs, Cuba & mascots

Contests, liveries, routes, Smoking, , ,

Lucky Stirke smoking

The U.S. Department of Transportation has finalized a rule related to smoking on airplanes and now the use of electronic cigarettes on commercial flights is officially forbidden.

According to DOT: “The final rule applies to all scheduled flights of U.S. and foreign carriers involving transportation in, to, and from the U.S.”

havana

Many U.S. airlines – including Alaska, American, Delta, Frontier, JetBlue, Southwest and United – filed applications this week for regularly scheduled flights to Havana and other airports in Cuba. 110 daily flights will be approved, so stay tuned and start planning your trip now.

Frontier mascot

And, Frontier Airlines is running a contest to pick a school mascot to be featured on one of its new Airbus 320 airplanes.

The winning mascot’s organization will win 20 roundtrip tickets and every time you vote you get entered in a contest to win a free flight.