Passenger Avoids Delay By Fixing Plane Himself

It would be a shame if an engineer on a recent Thomas Cook Airlines flight doesn't get a complimentary first class upgrade every time he flies. The engineer was on flight TCX9641 when it was announced that the trip would be delayed eight hours, while a mechanic was flown in to fix a problem. Luckily for the other passengers, the engineer happened to work for Thomsonfly Airlines, which has a reciprocal maintenance agreement with Thomas Cook. After about 35 minutes the man fixed the problem and the flight was on its way. A spokeswoman for Thomas Cook said, "When they announced there was a technical problem he came forward and said who he was. We checked his licence and verified he was who he said he was, and he was able to fix the problem to avoid the delay. We are very grateful that he was on the flight that day."

Charity is Unpatriotic

[ObsessiveMathsFreak]

I imagine if he had tried to pull that in the US he'd be colling his heels naked in a TSA holding cell by now.

Bad summary!

[dzfoo]

Keith Lomax was not the engineer who fixed the plane. From the article:

Holidaymaker Keith Lomax, from Stirling, was travelling home from a week's break with his wife when the plane's captain announced the expected delay.

"We were in the plane, ready for take-off, when he announced there was a technical problem and that an engineer might have to be flown out from Manchester to fix it," he said.

"Then a stewardess told us there was an engineer on board and they were checking out to see if he could work on it. He was obviously successful. When he came back onto the plane there was a round of applause from the back of the aircraft.

Keith Lomax is just a passenger, on vacation with his wife, who witnessed the event and talked about it to the reporter.

Jeez! now not even the submitters are R'ingTFA!

        -dZ.

Re:I tried this once...

[PalmKiller]

Maybe it was your attitude. Your language probably pissed them off, so they decided to screw with you.

Re:Charity is Unpatriotic

[jav1231]

Actually, union rules would have forbidden him from touching the plane in the U.S. even if were an American in that union.

Re:This is too much.

[Anonymous Coward]

I think it is fair to mod a redundant post as redundant, so that those browsing comments at a certain threshold don't need to be bothered with extra posts. If only it were karma neutral.

Re:Hrm

[SheeEttin]

You say that in jest, but you pretty accurately summarized most unions' stance on labor.

Re:Charity is Unpatriotic

[Anonymous Coward]

Doesn't matter if he _could_ work on the plane. Many union rules forbid unscheduled activity. In effect, this guy took away 8 hours of pay from his union brother.

What if he got hurt while working on the plane? Would the airline claim responsibility? His employer, even though the were not paying him for the labour?

I'm not saying what he did wasn't sensible, but when you're dealing with unions and bureaucracy you must discard all common sense and reasonableness first.

Re:BREAKING NEWS: Plane engineer fixes plane

[clone53421]

Plane engineer fixes plane, and what's news about that, you ask?

How often does the engineer just happen to be there already, as opposed to needing to be flown in from eight hours away...

How often does an engineer do the job for free...

And how often does one ride in the plane after he successfully repairs it? Personally, if my flight is delayed because the plane is broken down, I'd be very reassured to have the guy who fixes it riding in the same flying tin can as myself...

Re:This is too much.

[dkleinsc]

What, you didn't think to bring your own parachute either?

Re:Charity is Unpatriotic

[darthwader]

First of all, many small airlines are not unionized. And even if they are, emergency maintenance is unscheduled by definition, so any union agreement would allow the company to send in the first qualified mechanic they could find. Secondly, what makes you assume the work was unpaid? I think it is reasonable to assume his company, Thompsonfly, approved the work under the existing cross-maintenance agreement, and that the AME was paid for the work just as if he was the on-call mechanic and got the phone call from his company dispatcher. He was probably paid the standard "callout" rate for his 1/2 hour work. They had to verify his identity and his credentials, which means that Thomas Cook Airlines needed to phone Thompsonfly for that information. Since they had them on the phone anyway, it's reasonable to assume they also got his company to authorize the work and assign him to the job.

Re:Charity is Unpatriotic

[badasscat]

Doesn't matter if he _could_ work on the plane. Many union rules forbid unscheduled activity. In effect, this guy took away 8 hours of pay from his union brother.

His "union brother" works a standard work week regardless. He'll just be working on a different plane. There is no shortage of work for airline engineers.

And the repair took 35 minutes, not 8 hours. The 8 hours was presumably to fly an engineer in. He likely would not have been paid for all that time (he would have been paid for "flight time" but not his full transit time, which is what the 8 hours refers to).

What if he got hurt while working on the plane?

Covered in the maintenance agreement.

I would like to point out that various airlines have maintenance sharing agreements in the United States as well. The industry wouldn't work otherwise. Imagine an airline that flies just one or two flights into an airport per day - as many do to many airports - but having to have a full maintenance contingent at every one of those airports. Talk about inefficiency...

Re:Charity is Unpatriotic

[KillerBob]

the reason unions have so much power in the US is because the labour laws are so lax. in countries with strong labour protection laws, like most of Europe, Canada, Australia, etc., the government has been set up to protect the workers. Unions aren't needed as much, and so they do not exert their power... truth be told, I have never worked at a company that was unionized, because unions are dying a slow death in this country (Canada). Outside of the federal government and manufacturing sectors, most people are not unionized any more. who needs collective bargaining when we have public health care benefits, labour laws that say you can't be fired without cause and that you're entitled to severance if you've worked there more than 90 days, and a wealth of other fundamental rights that have traditionally been fought for by unions?

In the US, though, things are different. Employers have much more power that they can exert, and as a result, the employees need to exert more collective power. It's protectionism. For starters, look up what it means to live in an "at will" state: you can be fired at any time, with no notice, no severance, and without cause. they need unions in the US, and so the unions exist, and they exert power.