In the latest issue, for example, we learned that 28 firearms were found at airport checkpoints nationwide this week – a tally that is not that unusual.
Of those 28 firearms, 25 were loaded and eight had rounds chambered. And among the loaded firearms was one discovered strapped to the ankle of a passenger at Pittsburgh International Airport (PIT).
I wonder if that passenger gave the excuse most people do when found with firearms at airports: “Oops, I forgot that was there.”
British Airways billboards: how do they do that?
British Airways is rolling out video billboards that show children pointing to the sky whenever a British Airlines plane flies by. The airline says there’s some sort of “digital “wizardry” involved that allows the billboards to “know” the flight number and city a plane is arriving from and display it on the screen.
The first billboard was installed in Chiswick, a suburb west of London. Bustling Picadilly Circus gets one as well.
More than a dozen statues are scheduled to get yarn bombed this season as the city goes a little knit-crazy with sweater -themed events and ugly sweater promotions at several hotels.
At the Mark Spencer, for example, any guest wearing an ugly sweater at check-in will automatically receive a free room upgrade. And at the Heathman Hotel, ugly sweaters will be issued to all dogs checking in with their people.
A permanent digital luggage tag being tested by British Airways could help make temporary tags obsolete and speed up the check-in process.
The 2.95 billion adhesive luggage tags that airlines now print each year are enough to circle the Earth 39 times, according to the International Air Transport Association. “And they’re not just made of paper, but a silicon derivative that’s very hard to recycle,” said Andrew Price, IATA’s head of baggage services.
British Airway’s digital tag would allow travelers to use the same ID tag on each journey.
Here’s how it works: Using the airline’s mobile app, travelers can check in for a flight and hold their smartphones over a personalized digital tag to program it with flight details and baggage destination information. The tag uses Near Field Communication (NFC,) a short-range low-power wireless technology to transfer the information and long-lasting Kindle-like electronic ink to keep the unique barcode displayed and readable by baggage handlers and machine readers.
At the airport, the traveler can bypass the kiosk that prints tags and leave the electronically tagged luggage at a luggage drop or with a service rep at a counter. When it’s time for a new trip, the information on the tag is reprogrammed.
During the recent month-long test of the digital tags on British Airways flights between Seattle and London, “all bags went where they needed to go,” said Glenn Morgan, the airline’s head of service transformation. He declared that digital tag a success, but said the next step is expanding the type of smartphones that can program them. “Right now only Android and Windows phones support NFC,” said Morgan, and the airline wants to make sure the tags work fully with Apple phones as well.
British Airways may roll out a more sophisticated version of the digital tag for use by passengers in early 2014, but Morgan said the airline hasn’t decided whether it will give the tag to its frequent fliers and/or offer it for sale at a price yet to be determined.
British Airways isn’t the only company working on a digital bag tag.
In 2011, Australian airline Qantas Airways introduced its QBag Tag.The permanent electronic tag can currently be used only on the airline’s domestic routes (with some exceptions) and relies on radio-frequency identification (RFID) rather than near-field communication to encode flight details onto the tag. Frequent fliers get a Q Bag Tag for free; others can purchase a tag for cash (about US $28) or for 6,500 Qantas points.
In April, IATA put together an industry working group to create standards for a permanent bag tag “that can be used in an interline environment and on any airline, regardless of the issuer of the tag.”
Airbus Bag2Go
And at the Paris Air Show in June, aircraft manufacturing company Airbus showed off a prototype of Bag2Go, a digitally enabled suitcase developed with the IT services and consulting company T-Systems and luggage manufacturer Rimowa. The bag not only incorporates electronic tagging but also a scale to weigh its contents and GPS for real-time tracking.
“Convenience and speed is the key for frequent travelers,” said Richard Warther, president and CEO of Vanguard ID Systems, a Pennsylvania-based company that makes digital luggage tags. Security is built into the design so “electronic bag tags are now as good as the digital passports that are scanned when you get to customs,” said Warther.
Morgan agreed on the safety. “The digital bag tag contains the same information as a paper tag so there are no security risks,” he said.
And while the home-printed bag tag is becoming more popular, IATA’s Price doesn’t think anything will totally replace the thermal adhesive-paper tags travelers have become so familiar with.
“But,” he said, “I expect you may begin to see airlines using the digital tags within a year.”
Air New Zealand, which brought us highly entertaining in-flight safety videos featuring flight attendants dressed in nothing but cleverly applied paint and that pixie-ish, always-exercising Richard Simmons (both videos below), now brings us another version of this in-flight necessity.
It’s definitely not as titillating at the “Bare Essentials” video (below), but it is sort of cute and has ‘guest appearances’ by Snoop Dogg, President Obama and others.
And, here’s a fun video made by British Airways (set to “London Calling,” by the Clash) urging locals NOT to travel during the London summer Olympics.
And, as promised, here are those earlier Air New Zealand videos.
And, because we don’t have Rico around any more (Air New Zealand killed off this cute, but somewhat creepy puppet) here’s the safety video Rico helped out with.
The London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games are just a year away and, just to make sure you don’t forget, British Airways has painted the underbelly of an Airbus A318 with that message.
The plane begins flying on July 27th on Flight ‘BA001’ from London City Airport to New York.
Olympic Gold medalist Denise Lewis at the London City airport with British Airways’ One Year To Go until the London 2012 Games plane. (Photo by Nick Morrish/British Airways)
