Eastern Airlines to return?

[reednavy]

A group of former employees and an investor group are exploring the posibility.

http://blogs.wsj.com/middleseat/2009/03/04/the-return-of-eastern-airlines-color-us-skeptical/

[Ocklawaha]

I doubt this is a very good time to launch, but hey, if they can pull it off, go for it. JIA? ANYBODY WATCHING? Go after this with a vengeance and bring them home to hub.

OCKLAWAHA

[CS Foltz]

Nice idea but viable in today's climate...........somehow I don't think so.....at least now quite yet!

[JaxBorn1962]

A group of former employees and an investor group are exploring the posibility.

http://blogs.wsj.com/middleseat/2009/03/04/the-return-of-eastern-airlines-color-us-skeptical/

Bad Idea as Jet Fuel costs go up up and up. Bringing back an old great Airline that Eastern once was is not such a good plan.

[buckethead]

I doubt this is a very good time to launch, but hey, if they can pull it off, go for it. JIA? ANYBODY WATCHING? Go after this with a vengeance and bring them home to hub.

OCKLAWAHA

My first though after reading the headline. Jax as a Hub and home base for even a mid sized carrier is perhaps the single fastest way to get more people into Jacksonville. Business people. Corporations being exposed to the wonderful potential of our city. Direct flights are a huge plus when courting corporations in todays work from home corporate environment.

I do love our uncrowded airport, which is small and user friendly. When returning from a trip, it feels like my own personal airport; clean and walkable. I could give that up for a better corporate presence in DT Jax.

[Dog Walker]

There was an interesting study done some years back about the airline industry as a whole.  It concluded that since 1937 until the time of the study that airlines had gone through billions and billions of dollars of investors money and have NEVER made the investors any return on their investment....that they have burned through way more money than they have ever made.  This seemed to be true both before and after deregulation.

[Ocklawaha]

Good information Dog Walker, I too have seen MANY studies of this same phenomenon. Airlines as a whole don't make money without huge government support. The single exception of the Zeppelin Airship Lines, the twin ships Graf, Los Angeles, and the monster huge Hindenberg, did turn a profit. Fyi, They also performed the first trans Atlantic East to West flights, over the North Pole from EU to AK, EU to SA (Recife, Rio), India, China, over Siberia to Japan, round the world flights etc... The Graf, which was smaller then the Hindenberg, could lift 58 TONS.

...and for the guy who can't wait to post the infamous photo of the crashing Hindenberg. Did you know that out of 97 persons on board, only 35 died, plus one ground crew member? Try that with a Jumbo Jet under the same conditions. Not a single Zeppelin ever crashed that didn't have to do with:

 1. Experimental flying, such as a midwest tornado front. ZR1 Shenandoah. Broke in two, and came down softly in two states, with few casualty's.

2. Flying in spite of maintenance requests, thus faulty instruments, rudders etc... ZRS 5 Macon

3. Flying into the sea, no kidding! ZRS 4 Akron

4. Graf Zeppelin and Los Angeles, were dismantled after perfect safety records

5. Hindenberg, landing in the aftermath of an electrical storm against the will of the crew on board.

Okay, off my soapbox, the airline seats in this country have always been as much as $500 tax payer dollars per passenger! when Ronald Reagan wanted to scrap Amtrak because of it's $35 dollar per passenger cost to the government, Amtrak shot back with the REAL airline figures. OUCH! They even prepaired an advertisement showing the difference, as well as the fuel economics over the other modes, and were sent a (still standing?) Executive Order to Stand Down!!

So lets give Eastern the keys to the city, and meanwhile start some serious talk about the new Zeppelins, flying out of Germany, with state of the art avionics and weather instruments, and no explosive gas. "Think Ship and Ship Zeppelin!" I bet S. Teeagle enjoys that remark! 

[CS Foltz]

Zeppelin Graf Ocklawaha? Geez Ock.....I'm game.........all I have to say is "Lets go for it"! Of course, that would involve City participation and not too sure anyone one at that end can even  spell Zeppelin!

[Ocklawaha]

"UP SHIP!"

Circumnavigation of the globe took the Graf Zeppelin 21 days, 7 hours, and 34 minutes, with stops at Friedrichshafen and Tokyo before returning to Lakehurst. Total elapsed flying time was 14 days, one hour. The scheme to publicize dirigibles worked. By 1930 regular passenger service between Germany, Brazil, and the United States had begun, with each year proving more profitable than the previous one. Success permitted the laying of the keel of a new and better airship, the Graf Ocklawaha... Hee, Hee !

Hey! At least it's 99% true!

OCKLAWAHA

[CS Foltz]

Actually Ock.........Airships make perfect sense from an effiency point of view and the next generation ones most likely would have electric power rather than fossil fuel.......but for now I would take fossil fuel powered ones anyday!........only down side - NO TRACKS! he he he!

[Overstreet]

Not a chance Eastern will come back. Too many old employees trying to relive the old days.  They've been talking about this for a long time.   I deleted all the wife's old Eastern chat sites. Too much beating a dead horse.  I think most of them though would like to beat a dead Lorenzo.

 

[danno]

I work with a few former Eastern employees.  If I had a nickel for every time I have heard "Well at Eastern we did blah blah blah......"  I always reply with... well maybe thats why they aren't in business any more.