DontCallMeShirley

due to mx, inexperience pilots, old eqip, etc..atc..

I have never flown international. Since I am a stewardess domestically.

Does safety get compromised if there is bad atc and nothing is regulated? I have heard some talk of certain countries, but...


Have you ever felt that urge NOT board a plane because (insert reason)?

BearX220

Since when do flight attendants in this era refer to themselves as "stewardesses"?

Are you asking about airline safety, ATC safety in particular countries, or both?

The only airlines I would have been queasy about flying were Air Florida and a small supplemental carrier in the northeast US whose management I knew personally (and whose operating certificate was eventually lifted by the FAA). Both are long gone.

I might have thought twice about Korean Air some years ago, but not any longer.

florin

Nowadays the standards are high enough in most places so that safety is not really a concern. If anything, I avoid no-name charter airlines that fly very old planes.

szg

I avoid LCC.

voop

....United.

I guess that they'd be on the top of many lists

Penguinmoon

Living in Indonesia, the only two carriers I would fly within Indonesia, first choice Air Asia, second choice Garuda. I will NOT fly any other Indo carrier. (ex. Lion, Merpati, Adam(r they still even flying?)).

AusEuroFlyer

Yes, but not because of old equipment. Old equipment can be fine (safety-wise) if maintained well. I also do not necessarily see 'inexperienced' pilots as a big problem. It's 'poor standard' of pilots that I am concerned about. A good 500-hour pilot can be safer than a bad 5000-hour pilot.

ATC is not airline dependent but it's country dependent, so I wouldn't not fly on a particular airline because of the ATC. But I would rather avoid certain routes if I know the ATC to be very poor.

Error 601

Also United, my last three flights were all complete disasters for completely different an inexcusable reasons that all went back to inadequate staffing levels to maintain a minimum level of operations.

One plane got damaged by ground handlers, no mechanic was available to do the repair we were assured would take less than half an hour. Around the time the evening shift kicked in a guy showed up and did the deed. However by this time a significant number of people had simply left because they had already missed their connections.

On the next flight the wrong luggage was loaded on our plane and because the same three guys had to unload our plane, then unload the other plane and reload them with the correct luggage the delay was unbelievable. During this time one of the flight attendents saw fit to fold down the jump seat blocking the toilet.

And on the third strike we had a "weather delay" - actually we didn't, the flight attendents supposed to be on our flight were stuck in Chicago where there was a weather delay and it took United more than four hours to find another compliment of them at their Denver hub. After waiting more than an hour to talk to a CSA I nearly had my head ripped off when I very politely asked if I could get on a plane about to depart and connect from there.

On the same day their was nearly violence at another gate when the pilots boarded the plane and departed without passengers because there were no flight attendents for that flight either but the plane was needed elsewhere.

mecabq

I have vowed never to fly Air India, mainly because the probability seems to be high that one won't get to one's destination when one needs to, and they won't try very hard to accommodate one when things go wrong. Now that they are joining Star Alliance (), I am sure that I will fly them sooner or later.

(P.S. I have flown Indian Airlines a couple of times, and had fine experiences. They merged with -- or, rather, were subsumed by -- Air India, and most travelers with more knowledge of the scenario than I think that the merger will entail adopting AI's bad service as opposed to IC's not-quite-as-bad service.)

mee

Delta. After a series of problems in 2005, they gave me credit which I used for flights in 2006, which were if anything, worse. So never again
-- Mike

ANDREWCX

My personal no-fly list.

Anything from sub-sahara africa except Virgin Nigeria, Kenya Airways, or anything registered in South Africa - out of which to date I have only flown SAA and (now defunct) Nationwide. Simple reason, very poor oversight, very poor maintenance in general.

I would also agree with the previous poster who said they wouldn't fly most Indonesian airlines.

Air Koryo (do they count?) also wouldn't be one I would fly.

And I probably wouldn't fly MEA (no problem with the airline per se, just no desire to connect through Beirut given recent history).

And add any airline based in a failed or near failed state (ie Iraq, Afghanistan, Somalia, Burma, Zimbabwe).

I have also vowed to not fly UA (who I was PremEx with for 6 years) or US if I can help it due to some very bad experiences on my last few flights with them.

james318

Since oversees travel is extremely rare for me, I need to stick to the USA.

And that no fly list is:

Southwest - (I am a big fat guy... should explain it all.)
American - (Just a personal beef.)

BearX220

I think the OP was asking which airlines we might avoid because we think they're unsafe / mechanically unsound / etc., not because of bad service experiences.

United and US Airways are airlines of absolute last resort for me, but not because I think they're unsafe. I think they're awful, but not unsafe.

Kimberley

There are quite a few airlines that are not allowed to fly into Europe, so I'd start with saying I wouldn't fly any of them.

The list is published here, http://ec.europa.eu/transport/air-ban/pdf/list_en.pdf. There are many airlines form the Ukraine, Indonesia, Sierra Leone and the Congo

(Couldn't help hearing bongo, bongo, bongo I don't want to leave the congo Oh no no no no no when I read that... Bingle, bangle, bungle I'm so happy in the jungle I refuse to go...)

BearX220

Great list, thanks for posting. I did not realize Garuda was banned from Europe.