The price of a barrel of crude oil hit a new record high today at the close of trading in the commodities markets.
And that price was? $78.23.
To put this number in perspective — this new high comes without a major hurricane having come close to the Gulf this year, and after OPEC said today it would boost oil production.
Okay, I just had a little email conversation with Brett Snyder, aka Cranky Flier. He told me that because he had admired the fact that I honor the airline employees who perished on 9/11 every year in PlaneBusiness Banter, he had done the same today in his blog. As he said, it should be a tradition.
Which got me to thinking. Yes — it should be. And it should be one that is expanded upon. It’s one thing for me to honor these people in a subscriber publication. But I think we need to make sure that as many people as possible remember. Every year.
Here are the names of the airline employees who lost their lives as a result of the events of September 11. They all deserve to be remembered and honored this day by all of us who love this industry.
American 11 (Boston to Los Angeles)
Crashed into World Trade Center
John Ogonowski, Dracut, Mass., Captain; Thomas McGuinness, Portsmouth, N.H., First Officer; Barbara Arestegui, flight attendant; Jeffrey Collman, flight attendant; Sara Low, flight attendant; Karen Martin, flight attendant; Kathleen Nicosia, flight attendant; Betty Ong, flight attendant; Jean Roger, flight attendant; Dianne Snyder, flight attendant; Madeline Sweeney, flight attendant
United 175 (Boston to Los Angeles)
Crashed into World Trade Center
Victor J. Saracini, Lower Makefield Township, Pa., Captain; Michael Horrocks, First Officer; Amy Jarret, flight attendant; Al Marchand, flight attendant; Amy King, flight attendant; Kathryn Laborie, flight attendant; Michael Tarrou, flight attendant; Alicia Titus, flight attendant
American 77 (Washington/Dulles to Los Angeles)
Crashed into the Pentagon
Charles Burlingame, Captain; David Charlebois, First Officer; Michele Heidenberger, flight attendant; Jennifer Lewis, flight attendant; Kenneth Lewis, flight attendant; and Renee May, flight attendant
United 93 (Newark to San Francisco)
Crashed in Shanksville, Pennsylvania
Jason Dahl, Colorado, Captain; Leroy Homer, Marlton, N.J., First Officer; Sandy Bradshaw, flight attendant; CeeCee Lyles, flight attendant; Lorraine Bay, flight attendant; Wanda Green, flight attendant; Deborah Welsh, flight attendant
This year was the first year I had the courage to watch MSNBC’s replay of the live NBC coverage from the morning of September 11, 2001.
I had thought about doing it last year, but nah, I just wasn’t ready.
This year, for some reason, I was.
This morning MSNBC replayed the first two hours plus of the “Today Show” that aired that day.
I couldn’t help but feel the irony when thinking about Matt Lauer and his coverage — juxtaposed against that totally inane interview I saw him do Friday with the Hooters waitress.
But trust, me, that was a very small fleeting thought in the big scheme of things. Actually in listening to the coverage this morning again — it seemed Matt was the one most concerned with the welfare of those in the buildings and the most affected when they went down. Katie Couric was trying her best to be the “stoic anchor.” Then Tom Brokaw, then- Nightly News anchor arrived — and clearly he felt it necessary to began pontificating on the “big picture” impact of the events.
But I digress.
Watching the footage this morning I kept thinking for some reason of American Airline’s flight attendant Betty Ong. Ong was working American’s flight 11, scheduled to fly Boston-LAX.
It was Ong’s voice, recorded on AMR’s SOC tapes, and played for the 9/11 Commission, that resonated in my mind this morning. It was Ong who identified the hijackers on that flight to operations by seat. It was Ong who stayed as long as she could on the line.
Then I thought of a former cohort and columnist at TheStreet.com, Bill Mehan. One of the nicest people you’d want to work with — and always happy to answer a question when I had one. (As opposed to some diva columnists who would not have done the same). Bill worked for Cantor Fitzgerald — located on the top floors of One World Trade Center.
And, hand in hand with Bill, I thought of my former editor at TSC at the time, Charlotte-Anne Lucas. CA is a great journalist –and was always a wonderful mentor to me. Even though Charlotte-Anne worked for TSC, she worked from her home office in San Antonio.
I’ve saved Charlotte-Anne’s take from that morning, as was published in TSC:
At 8:26 a.m. I sent an Instant Message to our market columnist, Bill Meehan, asking if he’d be sending me his column at midday. His reply was a simple, “yup.” A few minutes later, television started carrying live images of the inferno coming out of the top of one of the World Trade Center towers. Then another columnist for the site pinged me with a frantic question: Isn’t that the building Meehan is in?”
I looked at the television again, then pulled up Meehan’s Instant Message window to ping him and see if he was OK. But I was too late. The IM window said it all: Wmeehan100 signed off at 8:49:35 AM.
There I was in my office in San Antonio, Texas, watching television images of a tower burning half a country away. And yet the message on my computer screen made it personal. Horrifying. And close enough to touch.”
As I have since those horrible events, I will pay tribute to the airline employees who lost their lives that day in this week’s PlaneBusiness Banter.
Lots more memories — but I’m sure you have them too. Frankly, unless something important occurs today, this is probably the only note I’ll post today.
Take care everyone.
Jamie Baker, analyst with JP Morgan issued a note this morning in which he talked about the effect of two fare increases last week (Southwest and Delta) and revenue trends.
While Delta’s $5 one-way domestic fare increase came late last week, Baker argues that the earlier increase in the week by Southwest was more meaningful in that there are higher traffic volumes associated with the lower end of the fare structure. (Where most of the Southwest fares are located.)
Jamie says we should count on “Southwest continuing to behave in a manner that helps, not hurts, industry pricing. With 60% of its fare increase occurring over holiday weekends, we’ll be watching for a sixth potential 2007 fare increase from Southwest this Thanksgiving.”
In addition, we are coming to the close of the third quarter. Jamie reminded investors today that Continental will issue updated cost and non-passenger revenue guidance this week, followed by AMR & US Airways guidance towards the end of the month.
As Jamie points, out, “given the strength in August data thus far (with particularly healthy revenue trends reported by CAL, JBLU & LCC), 3Q consensus is likely to begin rising concurrent with issuance of updated guidance. 4Q consensus may rise as well given the current downward sloping fuel curve, implying (at least for now) that industry fuel expense may be slightly lower in Q4 than Q3 (which was not what airlines guided to in July, particularly in United’s case).”
Tickers: (NYSE:LCC), (NYSE:AMR), (NYSE:CAL), (Nasdaq:JBLU); (NYSE:LUV)
Technorati Tags: airline earnings, airline stocks, airlines, AMR, crude oil, Delta Air Lines, jetBlue, Jamie Baker, Southwest Airlines, United Airlines, US Airways
What a week in the industry. First we hear that Nepal Airlines sacrificed goats to the Sky God in order to get their planes flying. Now today, the saga of the Southwest Airlines’ fashion police and the Hooters waitress, Kyla Ebbert is taking center stage.
Ya know, if this woman was so humiliated, then why did she wait two months to alert the press to her “pain and suffering?”
I mean, as her own mother told a columnist for the San Diego Union-Tribune, “My daughter is young, tall, blond and beautiful. She is both envied and complimented on her appearance. She dresses provocatively, as do 99 percent of 23-year-old girls who can. But they were out of line.”
So apparently a Southwest Airlines’ flight attendant asked her to “cover herself up a bit more” before letting her sit back down in her seat on a flight from San Diego to Tucson.
And for this, the woman is now on the “Today Show” and has hired an attorney?
Pahleez. And how long before we hear about the contract with Playboy? A week?
One of you wrote me a note this morning after watching Ms. Ebbert on the show and said, “Holly, you’ve got to see the video of this. The woman is sitting there in a skirt so short you can see right up her dress. And here she is, going on about how she was treated so badly?”
I haven’t seen the video yet — but am about to go find it.
I do know Media Bistro noted in its blog today, “At one point in the sit-down interview Matt asks Kyla to stand up to show what she is wearing. It’s the same outfit that nearly got her bumped from the flight. As she sat back down on the couch, her skirt rode up, revealing what was probably going to get her kicked off the flight in the first place. An astute TVNewser reader noticed when he watched the Today show in the central time zone, that editors had digitized Kyla’s privates (in all honestly, it was just a glimpse of her panties.) What’s more, the interview re-aired on the third hour of Today at 9:09ET. This time, the interview was fixed in editing, and her sit-down was covered completely with a cut-away shot of Matt.”
Oh, and apparently her MySpace site is full of Ms. Ebbert in revealing photos. An emailer to Media Bistro reported that after other morning shows did their homework on Ms. Ebbert’s background — they chose to pass.
One thing I do know. I think the whole story actually sheds more light on how inane and superficial the “Today Show” has become, more than anything else. I was stunned when a commercial appeared last night during the football game on NBC promoting her appearance on the show this morning.
Ticker: (NYSE:LUV)
Technorati Tags: airlines, kyla Ebbert, Southwest Airlines
Look at this Beast. Not to mention the lovely Texaco refueling truck.
Love those colors on the prop tips.
Just one example of plane porn I uncovered as I was searching through some of my parents’ slide carousels recently. Yes, remember them?
Granted, year-over-year the airlines did have easy revenue comps for August — considering the Heathrow terror incident ripples the industry experienced last year.
But even with that give-me, as more and more airlines report their August traffic numbers, the news looks even better than anticipated.
This week both Mike Linenberg, analyst with Merrill Lynch, and Jamie Baker with JP Morgan, upped their third quarter estimates on Continental Airlines — based on the airline’s August traffic and RASM numbers.
Today, Lehman Brothers’ Gary Chase said in a note:
“Traffic reports this week have pointed to August revenue performance that is better than expected. We believe the combination of slowed capacity growth, easier comparisons, as well as continued strength in underlying demand is driving the better than expected revenue results. CAL disclosed Tuesday that August consolidated RASM increased 6.5% to 7.5% while mainline RASM increased 8% to 9%, both well ahead of our expectations (5% to 5.5% consolidated, 6% to 6.5% mainline). LCC disclosed August RASM increased over 5%, in line with our expectations for the guidance (but hard to know just how strong given a wide range in how LCC discloses results, typically 5 percentage points on RASM). JBLU today disclosed August RASM increased 15%, also well above our expectations. DAL also added some color, commenting on strong August revenue performance. We expect that ATA RASM results, expected around September 20th, will also point to strong revenue performance in August.”
He concludes:
“We expect September RASM will remain strong, but likely be lower than August comparisons as we move into a seasonally weak month. We continue to model a slowing in underlying revenue trends in 4Q, but remain positive on the group
given significant cash generation, minimal capacity growth for the foreseeable future and little capital expenditure, particularly for legacy carriers.”
The most recent jobs numbers were issued today and the news was anything but good.
This turn of events apparently surprised a lot of people, but given the sharp increase in layoffs in both the housing and financial sectors, I’m scratching my head as to why anyone should have been surprised.
Short and sweet — the number of Americans with jobs fell in August for the first time in four years.
The Labor Department report showed was a net loss of 4,000 jobs in the month, down from the 68,000 increase in July, which was also revised lower. Economists surveyed by Briefing.com had forecast an increase of 110,000.
I really don’t know where those economists have been hiding out, but they certainly don’t seem to be talking to the same people I talk to.
So yes, this is why the markets took a steep downhill climb this morning.
Of course if you are a die-hard Wall Street type, you will sit back with this latest news, prop your feet up on the desk and let out a big sigh — as you assume that this news will probably force the Fed’s hand to lower interest rates the next time they meet.
Yes, Wall Street is a very weird place.
Of more direct interest to the airline sector, while it does look like the country is continuing to slide more and more into a recession, the price of oil refuses to do what it would normally do in such a situation. Instead of declining, the price this week has continued to increase. As well as the price of jet fuel.
As of this posting, the DJIA is down 165 points, but more importantly, crude is up to 76.50/barrel.
Okay, don’t gasp in shock and awe.
But I’ll have a nifty plane porn photo for you later today.
Hey, I said here that winning in the dome in Indy was difficult.
(Actually I think I said “the damn dome.”)
Anyway, yep, the only good thing about a game that is a lost cause is that it does offer one a chance to jump back online.
😉