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[Roude Leiw]

I've never had a problem with them, just as long as you know they are flying in its most basic form.

yep, flying with ryanair is like taking a bus.

 

[Danneee]

Haha, insane. Not a chance in hell that I'm flying with a company that is run by a raving madman. It's not that cheap anyhow.

 

[Korey]

That's perfectly fine.

If having one pilot is deemed safe enough under law (which is what would have to happen for this to happen right?) and has a positive track record then I will be perfectly fine paying $100 less than you.

If they're cutting corners on the personnel, bathrooms, luggage, seating, you have to wonder where else they might be cutting corners.

 

[Cerebral Assassin]

So what exactly is the problem with RyanAir, intercom ads aside? I'm flying with them next month for the first time, from Trieste (Italy) to London and back. I don't expect top class service, but then again, the flight from Germany to the USA with Lufthansa was the worst travelling experience I had in my life so far, so how much worse can it be? I only paid 50$.

They don't really fly to the city they say they will, for example you are likely flying into London Luton or Stansted which will take you 30mins or so to get into "actual" London.

 

[DrForester]

If they're cutting corners on the personnel, bathrooms, luggage, seating, you have to wonder where else they might be cutting corners.

And once again. There's only 3 passenger jets currently flying that are rated for 1 crew member. And of those 3 the largest has 8 seats.

 

[Munin]

If they're cutting corners on the personnel, bathrooms, luggage, seating, you have to wonder where else they might be cutting corners.

They are cutting corners on these things so they don't have to where it matters.

 

[koam]

PAYIUNG FOR TOILETS?

What the fuck? That's total bullshit.

I don't mind the one pilot idea though.

 

[Danielsan]

I've flown with Ryan Air on multiple occasions and as long as you don't expect high comfort they are great. For €50 I flew from The Netherlands to Ireland and back. Their planes are pretty much brand new and in great condition and they often land ahead of schedule.

 

[avaya]

What Ryanair have done is run so many airlines out of business that they are now the only regular flyer to quite a few places.

 

[Burai]

Ryanair :lol
Only way that airline could get worse is if they started flying Tupolevs

Seriously. I wish Wizzair flew more places. They are cheaper and the planes are nicer.

 

[Gallbaro]

What Ryanair have done is run so many airlines out of business that they are now the only regular flyer to quite a few places.

The market has spoken!


Anyway, since flying is a science not an art, why not just automate the second pilot?

 

[Veritas_]

Why bother with flight crews? Just more meatbags that could've fit more customers. Just throw a brief tutorial on the airplane control and let the customers take over if the pilot dies. Pretty sure they'll do just fine since they want to live.

I flew out of Detroit to Orlando via Spirit airlines once. The Spirit employee who checked in my luggage also managed passenger boarding at the gate then ran outside to guide the plane with the traffic lights. I'm pretty sure he flew the plane too.

Point being, I'm not flying on Spirit again.

 

[Burai]

They don't really fly to the city they say they will, for example you are likely flying into London Luton or Stansted which will take you 30mins or so to get into "actual" London.

That has nothing to do with Ryanair though. They don't choose where the airports go or how they name themselves.

 

[Count Dookkake]

Depends.

:lol

 

[avaya]

If I have to pay for the flight I don't mind paying for Ryanair or Easyjet. They are both as pikey as each other. Thankfully the company uses BA.

 

[Cerebral Assassin]

That has nothing to do with Ryanair though. They don't choose where the airports go or how they name themselves.

If Ryanair don't pick the airports they fly to, who does?

 

[ClosingADoor]

That has nothing to do with Ryanair though. They don't choose where the airports go or how they name themselves.

Sure it does. Ryanair picks the airports they land on. And those airports and hour away from your actual destination ar cheaper for them to use.

 

[Zenith]

That has nothing to do with Ryanair though. They don't choose where the airports go or how they name themselves.

Slots at airports in the middle of nowhere are cheaper than slots at busy airports.

 

[SmokeMaxX]

Sure it does. Ryanair picks the airports they land on. And those airports and hour away from your actual destination ar cheaper for them to use.

And so...? How is this Ryanair's fault? They clearly state they are going to Airport X. They're not naming the airport. It's not their fault that Airport X has a misleading name.

 

[Jex]

And so...? How is this Ryanair's fault? They clearly state they are going to Airport X. They're not naming the airport. It's not their fault that Airport X has a misleading name.

Won't someone think of poor RyanAir, they're clearly the victim in all this!

 

[Yen]

Fun fact: Michael O'Leary drives a taxi cab so he can use the bus lane and miss all the traffic.

 

[Bananakin]

"If the pilot has an emergency, he rings the bell, he calls her in," O'Leary says. "She could take over."

Did anyone else notice this? I thought it sounded a bit sexist. What is this, the 70s? There's tons of male flight attendants (although admittedly far too few female pilots).

 

[SatelliteOfLove]

Yeah, I don't see how this is a money saving idea. You're going to get rid of people already qualified to fly planes, so you can pay to train other people, who will most likely now demand a raise due to their increased responsibilities, or quit.

"Hey look, pal. I'm a CEO. I'm paid to come up with ideas; it's your job to make sure it happens!"

 

[Zozz]

Why we still got pilots?

 

[LiveFromKyoto]

This article highlights the problem with the current hyper-rationalized corporate mindset. Doesn't matter what they do to their employees or how they treat people or how they lower the bar, if it makes money it's great and at the end they'l dodge the blame by putting it on the customers because hey, they let us get away with it.

In the end everything and everyone is reduced to an integer to be exploited all in the name of getting a bigger house. Great, but what are we alive for? To feel crappy all the time and then anesthetize it with material consumption?

 

[SmokeMaxX]

Won't someone think of poor RyanAir, they're clearly the victim in all this!

Sucks to not be able to come up with an answer doesn't it?

If people want to waste money, that's their own problem. I've already stated that I'm fine with better quality airliners still serving people who don't want to take a budget airline. I'd rather save a hundred bucks each time I want to travel somewhere by plane. It's not like Ryanair has a track record of being obscenely dangerous or anything.

Some people want to pay for comfort. That's cool with me. Don't bitch because others would rather save money than be comfortable for a 1 hour plane ride. And yeah if it saves another $100, I'd stand up for the entire hour.

I don't even see why so many people on Neogaf are against this. This guy's trying to cut the overall costs of plane trips and people are making a big deal because they can't pay for conveniences and they THINK it MIGHT make the plane trip more dangerous? Well first off, if you save $50, then surely you can spend $20 of that on conveniences like refreshments, using the restroom, etc. Second, obviously this will never happen if it makes the plane trip more dangerous. The guy's a genius, he's not an idiot. He'll end up losing a ton of money if the planes end up crashing.

 

[werewolf2000ad]

Shanna! They bought their tickets, they knew what they were getting into! I say, let 'em crash!

EDIT: Okay, seriously?

obviously this will never happen if it makes the plane trip more dangerous. The guy's a genius, he's not an idiot. He'll end up losing a ton of money if the planes end up crashing.

"Of course BP won't start cheaping out on safety just because they neutered the regulations! Think how much it would cost them if there was an accident!"

Look, if you and everyone else in the If-I-suck-up-to-the-richest-1%-of-the-population-maybe-they'll-let-me-in-their-clubhouse society want to try and claim that businesses don't chase the most immediate profit at the expense of everything else unless forced to do otherwise by properly enforced laws, regulations and unions, that's your lookout. You should just be aware that THE ENTIRE FUCKING HISTORY OF CAPITALISM DISAGREES WITH YOU, is all.

 

[n0n44m]

Did anyone else notice this? I thought it sounded a bit sexist. What is this, the 70s? There's tons of male flight attendants (although admittedly far too few female pilots).

you haven't flown with Ryanair yet I guess? :lol

ok I'll have to admit they had a female copilot on my last flight

 

[SovietStriker]

As a college student I love the idea of Ryan air and Easy Jet. I just wish there was a similar discount airline in the USA

 

[SmokeMaxX]

EDIT: Okay, seriously?

"Of course BP won't start cheaping out on safety just because they neutered the regulations! Think how much it would cost them if there was an accident!"

Look, if you and everyone else in the If-I-suck-up-to-the-richest-1%-of-the-population-maybe-they'll-let-me-in-their-clubhouse society want to try and claim that businesses don't chase the most immediate profit at the expense of everything else unless forced to do otherwise by properly enforced laws, regulations and unions, that's your lookout. You should just be aware that THE ENTIRE FUCKING HISTORY OF CAPITALISM DISAGREES WITH YOU, is all.

Way to blow things out of proportion. Would you like for me to list accidents that happen to companies that DON'T cheap out? How about all the companies that go about things cheaply and NOTHING bad happens? But sure, your one anecdote surely counts so much more than anybody else's!

You're really not being smart here. The guy wants to MAKE MONEY right? I assume we both agree with that. Please tell me how crashing planes will make him more money. Please tell me how LOWERING PRICES on airfare will make more money than nickel and diming customers on every stupid thing they can? You blow one small part of the article out of proportion "oh we might fly with one pilot if we can, but we'll have someone else qualified to fly the plane there too..." and don't address the fact that 1) it obviously won't be legal if it's not safe and 2) they already addressed the one pilot problem.

And fuck you for assuming you know anything about me. I don't give a fuck about the richest X% of the population. I'm a hardcore liberal democrat who is all about universal healthcare, welfare, and all that jazz. This is despite the fact that my father is a physician and I'm currently in med school. I think anybody who's making over 200k a year can seriously spare 10k a year, but that's a different topic. The topic is about Ryanair being cheap. Yeah, so what? If they make money offering me a good product, then who are you to judge? I don't care if the guy becomes a trillionaire if it allows for me and everybody who's budget conscious to fly cheaply and safely with no problems.

You're seriously ragging on this guy because he is going to make money in a legit way that you're scared "might be dangerous." Think about that. You have no proof that it's dangerous.

 

[perryfarrell]

Agree with quote in OP.

A bus with 50 passengers hurtling down the interstate at 90 MPH with an unattentive driver is not any safer than a plane with 1 pilot.

 

[evil solrac v3.0]

Way to blow things out of proportion. Would you like for me to list accidents that happen to companies that DON'T cheap out? How about all the companies that go about things cheaply and NOTHING bad happens? But sure, your one anecdote surely counts so much more than anybody else's!

You're really not being smart here. The guy wants to MAKE MONEY right? I assume we both agree with that. Please tell me how crashing planes will make him more money. Please tell me how LOWERING PRICES on airfare will make more money than nickel and diming customers on every stupid thing they can? You blow one small part of the article out of proportion "oh we might fly with one pilot if we can, but we'll have someone else qualified to fly the plane there too..." and don't address the fact that 1) it obviously won't be legal if it's not safe and 2) they already addressed the one pilot problem.

And fuck you for assuming you know anything about me. I don't give a fuck about the richest X% of the population. I'm a hardcore liberal democrat who is all about universal healthcare, welfare, and all that jazz. This is despite the fact that my father is a physician and I'm currently in med school. I think anybody who's making over 200k a year can seriously spare 10k a year, but that's a different topic. The topic is about Ryanair being cheap. Yeah, so what? If they make money offering me a good product, then who are you to judge? I don't care if the guy becomes a trillionaire if it allows for me and everybody who's budget conscious to fly cheaply and safely with no problems.

You're seriously ragging on this guy because he is going to make money in a legit way that you're scared "might be dangerous." Think about that. You have no proof that it's dangerous.

can you name any company that has proposed cutting the co-pilot to save money?

 

[LM4sure]

Isn't flying on Ryanair now scary enough? Now they want to take out the co-pilot?! Way to go!

 

[Incognito]

my only experience with ryanair was disastrous, although it wasn't their fault. was in marsaille, france, along with a few buddies of mine. had our tickets to madrid and barcelona printed and ready to go, sitting in the terminal, when over the intercom system it is announced that the ATC working at the aiport had decided to go on strike. after 2 hours of waiting in a 500+ person long line, finally talked to a ryanair representative who said flights wouldn't be available until 4 days out. :lol not being savvy as our local counterparts, we were slow to book train tickets and ended up on a 10 hour bus ride to barcelona.

you can't beat their damn prices, though.

 

[SmokeMaxX]

can you name any company that has proposed cutting the co-pilot to save money?

Can you please tell me the relevance of your question? Or are you just fear-mongering?

 

[j_k_redtail]

Did anyone else notice this? I thought it sounded a bit sexist. What is this, the 70s? There's tons of male flight attendants (although admittedly far too few female pilots).

I saw it :lol But I got distracted by the post about "standing" in flight. I don't think I could fly with these guys. The Frontline Ep ("Flying Cheap") startled me enough.

 

[Risible]

Fucking co-pilots, how do they work?

Edit: Holy crap, beat by a country mile.

 

[seanoff]

PAYIUNG FOR TOILETS?

What the fuck? That's total bullshit.

I don't mind the one pilot idea though.

you need to get to the pointy end of an aircraft during descent and see if that changes your mind, esp in marginal conditions or if there is a problem. those guys are more than busy enough, with 2 people.

not every runway has advanced ILS etc to allow the computers to do it.

for the foreseeable future, if there was only one pilot i'd not fly.

 

[Evlar]

Apparently they'll still have a co-pilot, they're just not going to call it that, they'll give the co-pilots extra duties (flight staff) and they'll undoubtedly train and pay them less.

 

[jorma]

Can you please tell me the relevance of your question? Or are you just fear-mongering?

wat? It's right there in the OP.

"Really, you only need one pilot," he continues. "Let's take out the second pilot. Let the bloody computer fly it." What happens if the pilot has a heart attack? One member of the cabin crew on all Ryanair flights would be trained to land a plane. "If the pilot has an emergency, he rings the bell, he calls her in," O'Leary says. "She could take over."

 

[Shanadeus]

Ryanair is good for short flights where all you're bringing is your carry-on luggage. Anything else, and to places that they've stupidly stopped flying to, I just go with a regular company and enjoy my expensive peanuts on board.

 

[Jex]

Way to blow things out of proportion. Would you like for me to list accidents that happen to companies that DON'T cheap out? How about all the companies that go about things cheaply and NOTHING bad happens? But sure, your one anecdote surely counts so much more than anybody else's!.

You know, not preparing for unlikely 'black swan' events that probably won't happen because they're unlikely is exactly how the markets got into a state where they all collapsed, how BP ended up in a terrible state and so forth.

His line of thinking on comfort is reasonable, on safety, it's absurd and dangerous.

You're seriously ragging on this guy because he is going to make money in a legit way that you're scared "might be dangerous." Think about that. You have no proof that it's dangerous.

Holy shit, you're just as bad.

I'm pretty sure the whole "one pilot" plan is inherently dangerous.

He'll end up losing a ton of money if the planes end up crashing.

Try looking at the history of deaths caused by corporations that cut a few too many corners. You'd be surprised how often they didn't go out of business, or even admit that they were ever wrong.

 

[Supervlieg]

The guy is nuts, I like him!

 

[LM4sure]

Did anyone else notice this? I thought it sounded a bit sexist. What is this, the 70s? There's tons of male flight attendants (although admittedly far too few female pilots).

c'mon, really? who fuckin cares

 

[megateto]

Ryanair do cut costs with things like not overloading fuel. Most airlines load way more fuel than they need for their planned flights, so if things go wrong they can change airport mid journey. Ryanair do overload, but not as much as others. Things have gone pretty well for them, but the minute they have one accident, shit will hit the fan in a major way.

The thing with airtravel is that maybe we currently have to many security measures. But yes, who dares to ease the hand on that regard?

 

[AstroLad]

Post from the always-interesting Ask the Pilot blog about this:

When Michael O'Leary talks, people listen. O'Leary, if you're unfamiliar, is the head honcho of Ryanair, Europe's wildly successful, low-cost version of Southwest. People listen because what he's got to say is liable to be some eyebrow-raising combo of controversial, insulting and nonsensical. It can be difficult to determine when he's being serious, which is likely part of his shtick, but he's nothing if not provocative.

O'Leary is a sort of anti-Richard Branson. Where Sir Richard uses his flamboyance to elevate and even re-romanticize the idea of flying, O'Leary strives to grind away every last vestige of its dignity. His gimmicky proposals have included on-board pay toilets and stand-up cabins. He strives to make Ryanair so low cost as to do away with airfares entirely, he has said, relying only on ancillary revenue from things like luggage fees and, well, pay toilets.

The ability to charge 15 euros -- or no euros -- for a flight to Mallorca requires that expenses be held as low as possible. To this end, O'Leary views his employees as being about as important and expendable as a paper boarding pass. Indeed, O'Leary's latest publicity stunt is a call to remove first officers (copilots) from the cockpits of Ryanair's fleet of Boeing 737s. One pilot, rather than the required two, he says, is enough to get the job done safely, particularly on shorter flights.

"Really, you only need one pilot," O'Leary boasts. "Let's take out the second pilot. Let the bloody computer fly it."

The bloody computer. There are so many things wrong with this that I hardly know where to begin.

Regardless of whether or not his harebrained idea will ever fly (it won't), O'Leary is nevertheless perpetuating the irritating myth that jetliners are so automated that they essentially "fly themselves," with the crew on hand mainly as a backup. This ridiculous notion, forever repeated by the press, is something I've addressed many times in this column. It never goes away, and now O'Leary has given it yet another media run and another phony glimmer of plausibility.

I'll spare you another agonized dissertation, but here's a brief review:

The realities of cockpit automation are widely misunderstood and consistently exaggerated. This is in part thanks to the aerospace academics and researchers the media tends to call on. While their work might be useful and important, they often have limited knowledge of the operational aspects of commercial flying. Blame also falls on those airline pilots who, in their attempts to sound self-effacing or when trying to offer easy-to-understand explanations, come out with hokey summations like, "Aw, dang, this plane practically flies itself." They undermine their profession and give people the completely wrong idea.

Airplanes do not take off by themselves; they do not land by themselves; they do not fly by themselves. Yes, there is such a thing as an automatic landing -- an "autoland" in pilot parlance -- whereby the plane performs a hands-off touchdown. This capability is there if you need it, for those extreme low-visibility approaches, but in practice it is very rare, comprising well under 1 percent of all landings. Rare because an automatic landing is, in most aspects, more complicated and work-intensive than a manual one.

Meanwhile, the workload in even the most "automatic" cockpit can be surprisingly high. I fly mainly longer-haul international routes, and we carry along an auxiliary first officer. You'd be amazed how often all three of us are busy. As a rule, though, the busiest cockpits tend to be those on short flights. Ironically these are the very flights on which O'Leary seems to think pilots are most expendable. He's really showing his ignorance here -- if, in fact, he means what he's saying.

I'm trying to picture some poor lone pilot in a Ryanair 737 shooting an ILS approach to minimums, with a go-around and diversion to an alternate airport, having to deal with the weather, air traffic control and company communications, fuel planning, reprogramming the flying model simulator and setting up the next approach, and so on. Not to mention flying the damn plane. Sure, there's an autopilot, and it requires a steady stream of inputs in order to manage speed, altitude and course.

That's more or less routine. Now imagine something goes wrong. That's not a problem, though, in Michael O'Leary's view. And I quote:

"If the pilot has an emergency, he rings the bell, he calls her in."

By "her" he means a flight attendant. One extra employee on every Ryanair flight, you see, would be trained to land a plane.

I am not making this up.

To land a plane. As if "landing" is some insignificant, easily compartmentalized aspect of flying to be mastered over the course of a few hours of instruction. And with that I am forced to close my eyes, breathe easy and picture a "happy place" -- a place free of such abject idiocy and the ill-informed people who might actually pay attention to it.

I also picture a hapless flight attendant pressed into sudden duty, attempting to negotiate an instrument approach in a 737. Heck, for the touchdown, let's throw in a 20-knot crosswind just to make it interesting. This is so beyond the realm of possibility that it pains me even to address it, and I shudder to think that thousands, maybe even millions of people have read O'Leary's comments and granted them a shred of credibility.

Michael O'Leary has at last succeeded in presenting us with the most preposterous thing ever uttered by the head of an airline. Of course, no sane government body or aviation authority would consider his scheme for half a second, and I'd like to think that not even O'Leary could be brazen enough, or stupid enough, to take it seriously. But you never know. Certainly he sounds like he means it. Another provocative firecracker designed to cause a commotion and keep his company's name in the news? A cheap way of insulting his workers and reminding them who the boss is? Was he talking tongue-in-cheek?

Perhaps, though it'd be best if he simply kept his mouth shut.

http://www.salon.com/technology/ask_the_pilot/index.html