Why am I not surprised that Oz airline Qantas screwed up yet again?
Fed-up Qantas passengers who were forced to sit on the tarmac for six hours before their flight was eventually cancelled have unleashed on the airline.
Flight QF93 from Melbourne to Los Angeles was cancelled at 3 am on Tuesday after it was decided the plane was too heavy to take off due to strong winds. The doomed flight had already been delayed before customers boarded.
‘We just wanted to get off. We were tired, there was no water, we weren’t even offered any food, we weren’t allowed to get out of our seats.’
‘This isn’t their first rodeo, they didn’t have any contingency plan and they’re never on the front foot. You’ve got to get on the phone to them, you’ve got to chase them up, you’ve got to be the one that tries to get your compensation or get your complaint in.’
And:
A Qantas spokesperson has since apologized for the inconvenience to customers.
Frankly, I’m amazed — at the apology, not at their behavior.
Qantas is one of the several reasons why I’ll never visit Australia. They have a near-monopoly on flights to that foul country, and their arrogance has become legend among frequent travelers. After our first flight to Sydney was canceled because of the WuFlu, Qantas refused to give me a refund because they’d put a two-year restriction on refunds — and as the OzGov only opened the gates after three years, Qantas told me, in almost these terms, to go and piss up a rope.
Of course, I’m also still furious at the bastard OzGov for their inefficiency and intransigence when they cocked up my trip to visit my family in Sydney a while ago — a cock-up which cost me nearly $4,000, by the way, and which made me swear never to go Down Under, ever.
(Apologies to Readers Biwoz and Bluey, amongst others — it’s not your fault, of course.)
As for Qantas, my advice is that if you have to fly to Oz for whatever reason, fly any other airline — Qantas’s prices are always high anyway — because you’re less likely to be treated like shit. It’s worth taking, say, Cathay Pacific or Emirates even if you have to connect (and wait some time) in another airport, because that hassle is likely to be more pleasant than dealing with Qantas. If Qantas is “the spirit of Australia” as they claim, Oz is pretty much fucked.
Caveat viatorem.
It’s big news in the papers here, how bad they’ve gotten, and abusive of their monopoly. PMs son got given membership of their Captain’s club, so the story won’t continue. I’m intrigued as to how much more wobbling the wheels of the country will take. It’s a bizarre place to live
For many years Qantas has been horribly mismanaged by a short Irish cocksucking homo named Alan Joyce. He’s a disgusting slimy piece of shit and has been one of the most hated and reviled men in the country for many years for good reason.
Qantas used to be a great company, and Joyce has single-handedly fucked it.
He retired recently, with a gazillion dollar payout after ruining the airline. I can only wish him a lifetime of prolapses, burning anal fissures, oozing monkey pox ulcers and AIDS.
Now THAT, children, is how one writes invective.
About 20 years ago I flew out to Brunei on Royal Brunei Airlines. It turned out that a major part of their thing was flying between the UK and Oz, with a stay in Brunei (the Empire Club has to be experienced). The other thing was that they fly the Gurkhas (and other British troops but on my flight it was the Gurkhas) between the UK and Brunei (for jungle training) and so the flight was very well behaved!
It’s important to keep in mind that, while many of Australia’s population are descended from convicted criminals, a significant portion derive from jailers.
Nice enough folk, all in all, but blood will tell.
.
Can’t trust ’em.
I was recently chatting with a friend in New South Shitsville, and he said that it’s a point of pride to “dob in” (snitch, in ‘murican parlance) those who flaunt relatively-minor rules like speeding or tyres too big, etc. They’re completely cowed by the cunts in Canberra. But that said, the friends I have down there are actually normal and think like most of us up here in the normal half of the planet.
Personally I’d love to visit and drive some of the best 4WD tracks on the planet. Also to visit the most southwesterly point in Western Australia for the specific reason of being as far away from the state of New Jersey as it’s possible to get on Planet Earth whilst still being on dry land. The actual antipode is about 1,200 miles southwest of that, in the Indian Ocean, but close enough for me.