That’s not a mock-up of just any airplane there in Terminal 4 at JFK International Airport.
It’s an “experience” Jose Cuervo had Air Hollywood put together to commemorate the legendary 1972 Rolling Stones tour (dubbed the Tequila Sunrise Tour) and give travelers a mild version of the tour’s party plane experience.
The pop-up plane is in the retail lounge of Concourse A at JFK Terminal 4 through December 30 and Jose Cuervo will be offering tequila sampling Monday through Saturday, 2:30 – 8:00pm.
Germs on a plane.
They’re far likelier to get under your skin than snakes, screaming babies or smelly seatmates. And they’re most common on tray tables – a surface that is touched frequently during a typical flight, a new study found.
Travelmath.com recently sent swab-carrying microbiologists to five airports and onto four airplanes and then asked them to determine which surfaces were the dirtiest.
The results will make you reach for the hand sanitizer and rethink what you touch when you travel.
Tray tables, which travelers have been known to use as a platform for everything from eating a meal to changing their baby’s diapers, are the germiest surfaces on airplanes, the experiment found. Next on the list: the overhead air vent, the lavatory flush button and the seat belt buckle.
In airports, the microbiologists identified drinking fountain buttons and bathroom stall locks as the dirtiest places.
Hard to believe?
Charles Gerba, a microbiology and environmental sciences professor at the University of Arizona known as “Dr. Germ,” agrees.
He said his research team did similar studies and found much the same thing. “We also found infleunza virus, norovirus and MRSA on the airplane trays,” said Gerba.
Should you worry? Not if you take the right precautions.
John Zautcke, medical director at the Chicago O’Hare medical clinic, which is opening its first seasonal, in-airport flu shot clinic this weekend, said airports and airplanes are not dirtier than homes or other public places.
“Airports and airplanes get cleaned, but there are hundreds of thousands of people moving through those spaces every day,” he said.
And while it is impossible to avoid coming in contact with the germy places on airplanes and in airports, Zautcke says that’s no reason to stop traveling.
To avoid catching a cold or the flu from germs left behind by other travelers, “use common sense,” says Zautcke, “Try not to touch your mouth after touching any of the germy places on planes and in airports. Wash your hands a lot. Bring along hand sanitizer. Use a towel to open the lavatory door and carry a small package of towelettes.”
Zautcke suggests using a hand sanitizer after buckling or unbuckling your seatbelt on the plane and wiping down the tray table before using it.
And what about the strange looks you may get from a seatmate?
“There is no reason to be ashamed or embarrassed,” said Zautcke, “The important thing is to try to avoid germs and stay healthy. In fact, it would be polite to offer your seatmate some sanitizer as well.”
(My story about germs on a plane first appeared on NBC Travel).
Eva Air’s Hello Kitty Hand-in-Hand jet is on the move again.
This time, with a beret and a baguette.
Part of a fleet of Hello Kitty-themed jets, this Boeing 777-300ER is the airline’s first long-range Hello Kitty-themed aircraft and has a collage of 19 Sanrio characters joining hands the entire length of the aircraft.
On board, it’s all about Hello Kitty, starting with the boarding passes and baggage stickers. Inside the plane, the cabin crew wears pink aprons with Hello Kitty designs and there are more than 100 in-flight service items with Hello Kitty themes – including the headrest covers, pillows, napkins, paper cups, utensils, snacks and meals.
Want to ride on this plane? EVA operates the Hello Kitty Hand-in-Hand Jet on three of its four weekly Paris flights as BR88 from Paris’ Charles de Gaulle (CDG) to Taiwan’s Taoyuan International Airport (TPE) on Monday, Thursday and Saturday. Return flight BR87 flies TPE – CDG on Sunday, Wednesday and Friday.
Can you vape on vacation? Maybe. Maybe not.
Sales of e-cigarettes and their cousins, re-fillable “vaporizers,” are currently a $2.2 billion market in the United States, according to tobacco analysts at Wells Fargo Securities, up from an estimated $1.7 billion in 2013. And e-cig consumption could surpass that of combustible cigarettes in 10 years, according to the same forecast.
Yet, while the popular, smoke-free, nicotine delivery tools are marketed as being less toxic than traditional cigarettes, the options for where travelers may use the devices can be hazy.
In the air
Although its rules don’t explicitly spell it out, the Department of Transportation believes the existing ban on smoking on domestic and international flights of U.S. and foreign air carriers is sufficiently broad to include a ban on the use of electronic cigarettes.
“We are finalizing a rule that will address whether we should amend the existing regulatory text to explicitly ban use of electronic cigarettes aboard commercial airline flights. DOT expects the final rule will be published in the Federal Register in early 2015,” an agency spokesperson said via email.
While e-cigs are sold at some airport newsstands, their use is determined by local regulations and ordinances.
A handful of airport shops operated by Paradies have been selling e-cigs since July at the request of the airports, according to Paradies Senior Marketing Manager Justin Marlett.
The Hudson Group also sells e-cigs in some airport newsstands. Cigarettes and other tobacco products, including e-cigs, now account for less than 1 percent of Hudson’s overall newsstand sales, “but while only 7 percent of that 1 percent is represented by e-cigs, e-cigarettes are the only tobacco products that are showing growth…albeit only incremental growth,” said Mike Maslen, Hudson’s vice president of sales.
Buying e-cigs at an airport is one thing, using them there is another.
Rules vary airport-to-airport, and sometimes within concession-to-concession. Until earlier this year, when Minnesota enacted legislation banning e-cigarettes from government buildings, e-cigs could be used in the terminals of Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport.
“We had no ordinance or policy banning them,” said Patrick Hogan, MSP’s director, public affairs & marketing, which mean e-cigs could be used in areas controlled by the Metropolitan Airports Commission. “However, concessionaires and airlines could prevent their use within their leased space. I don’t know how many did,” said Hogan.
Because the city of Los Angeles prohibits e-cigarettes inside public buildings, “the public is prohibited from using e-cigarettes within 20 feet of entrances to terminals, office buildings, and other on-airport properties,” said LAX spokesperson Nancy Castles.
But at Denver International Airport, where some retailers sell e-cigs, “this falls under the airport’s tobacco policy, so their use is only allowed in areas where smoking is allowed, such as the remaining smoking lounge on the C Concourse,” said airport spokesman Heath Montgomery.
At hotels
Hotels also vary widely in their e-cig policies.
While the cluster of hip Provenance Hotels in Oregon, Washington and Nashville, Tennessee, have no formal policies on e-cigs, The Warwick in San Francisco is clear that the hotel’s smoking ban includes e-cigs.
And while some hotels sell e-cigs in the in-room mini-bars, “most hotels use the same policy for e-cigs as they do for traditional smoking,” said Julie Faver-Dylla, executive director of the Hotel Association of Tarrant Country, Texas, which represents about 400 properties in and around Arlington and Forth Worth.
“Although we understand that oftentimes the vapor produced by e-cigs is less damaging to our properties and less offensive than traditional burned cigarettes, there many variants of those products in use, and it is not possible for hotel staff to determine which might be problematic,” she said.
At sea
There is no industry-level policy on e-cigarette use on cruise lines, but “it is something that individual cruise lines are looking at,” said Elinore Boeke, spokeswoman for Cruise Lines International Association, the industry’s trade association.
American Cruise Lines, for example, does not have a formal policy in place for e-cigarette use, but “for our smoking passengers there is a designated area on the top deck of each of our ships. In the event we have a passenger who does use e-cigs or vapes, we encourage them to go up to the top deck as well,” said company spokesman Britt Rabinovici.
On the Holland America Line, “electronic cigarettes are permitted in staterooms but not in other public areas of the ship other than on outside decks designated as smoking areas,” but on Royal Caribbean Cruises, e-cigarette users must join traditional cigarette, cigar and pipe smokers in designated outdoor areas of the starboard side of most ships.
(My story about e-cigarettes first appeared on CNBC Road Warrior).
Eva Air’s Hello Kitty “Hand-in-Hand” jet that has been flying between Taipei and Los Angeles since 2013 will change routes at the end of October and fly instead between Taipei and Paris.
Eva Airways said the charmingly liveried plane starts the new route October 29, 2014.
The airline operates a total of four weekly flights between Taipei and Paris and in late October will add the Hello Kitty Hand-in-Hand Jet to the regular schedule as BR87 from Taoyuan International Airport (TPE) to Paris’ Charles de Gaulle (CDG) on Sunday, Wednesday and Friday. On the return, it will fly as BR88, CDG-TPE on Monday, Thursday and Saturday.
The Hand-in-Hand Hello Kitty jet, which is painted in a livery that features Sanrio characters holding hands along the length of the airplane, and EVA Air’s five Airbus 330 Hello Kitty-themed jets. which fly within Asia, will also be getting some new themed service items , including new some new Hello Kitty-themed meals.
