Re: The BAA and new BCS membership requirements

On Apr 8, 9:21=A0pm, phil chastney
<phil.hates.s...@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:

> it is by no means clear to me which one is responsible for the shambles
> at Heathrow's T5, but that "blame it on the computer" sounds like a lame
> excuse, and about 40 years out-of-date

This analysis doesn't seem to say much about the computer systems:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/7322453.stm

I don't know how you do a full scale test of the opening of a new
terminal - any ideas?

I was there on the day (picked BA like the people who sit on the
outside of curves on at auto rally trials, hoping to see a spectacular
crash - to see if I could land another 50,000 compensation miles like
I did after a catering strike a while ago :-). I was carrying hand
luggage only and had my laptop in case the wait got too long, but got
through relatively unscathed: Had to keep looking straight ahead to
ignore the queues of snarling people (lots of calm places to hide
where NOTHING was happening :-), my plane was half an hour late and
left T5 with no catering. So far no air miles in my in tray, lots of e-
mails from BA reassuring me that if I had any luggage it has now been
sent to Milan for sorting. Very reassuring, I seem to remember they
fired 90% of the baggage handlers at Malpensa a few years ago after it
was discovered that the reason bags took so long to be delivered was
that they were being searched for valuables - maybe these guys have
now set up the "specialist baggage sorting plant" that BA refers to -
perhaps they sort the bags for free?

Highlight of the day was the touching speech from a BA captain who
came out into the cabin to welcome us onto his plane; he had been
there since 10am without seeing any passengers until we showed up at
7pm - all his earlier flights had been cancelled.

> indeed there was (APL at BA), but I'm not sure if that is still the case

I believe some of it is still there, but do not know the exact
details.

Morten