Pretty soon, we were unstoppable.. Brenneman attributes Continentals turnaround to five operating principles, which incorporate the key components of any successful strategymarkets, products, finances, and people. If Continental Airlines flies to your chosen destination, you'll be able to filter your results to just those operated by them. In October 1994, Continentals CEO resigned. Of the 115 people on board, 38 sustained injuries, with 2 seriously injured, including the pilot. I never denied that Continental had been a terrible airline. So advertising lesslying lesswas another way of saying we were sorry. My goal that day was to sell Bains consulting services to Continentals CEO and new owner, a leveraged buyout firm that had just rescued the airline from its second bankruptcy in nine years. Based in: Ghana. If it's cheaper to travel to/from a nearby airport, we'll alert you. November 1985: Tyre burst on a BA plane leaving Heathrow, causing damage to the landing gear door and fuel tank. They explained that the process was easy: as you pull the bags off the airplane, the ones marked priority go in the first baggage cart, which is the first to be unloaded. Choose travel cost protection and take your trip with confidence. The economy could have been in a downswing. In fact, I usually agreed with everything they said. For more than 20 years Fly.com has been the leader in cheap airfare and discount ticket booking. We couldnt afford to have people hoarding ideas or sapping enthusiasm as we built our new organization. 2. At 16:38 CEST (14:38 UTC), five minutes before the Concorde departed, Continental Airlines Flight 55, a McDonnell Douglas DC-10-30, took off from the same runway for Newark International Airport and lost a titanium alloy strip that was part of the engine cowl, identified as a wear strip about 435 millimetres (17.1 in) long, 29 to 34 millimetres . He moved into the CEOs office, and I moved into his old office. The same team that leads a company into a crisis is rarely able to get it back on track. We lit a fire of urgency. After that second incident the "French director general of civil aviation issued an. Factors contributing to the accident were the insufficient training provided to the contract mechanics by the airline, and the failure of the airport to disseminate a policy prohibiting ground engine runs above idle power in the terminal area. The cause of the incident is unknown, however the right side of aircraft caught fire once coming to a stop. The piece could reach this speed by combination of rotation of the tyre on takeoff and the tyre burst. The hard part is figuring out how to improve the customers experience so that revenues increase faster than costs. Looking for a cheap last-minute deal or the best return flight? And then fun happens pretty naturally. It remains the backbone of the companys strategy today. [3]:115 It did not directly puncture any of the fuel tanks, but it sent out a pressure shockwave that ruptured the number 5 fuel tank at its weakest point, just ahead of the left landing gear well. We saved Continental because we acted and we never looked back. If you ask customers what they really want, they will write you an epistle a foot thick. First, they had to pass what we called the raw IQ testthere is no substitute for smarts. [3]:159[28][29] Fuel transfer during taxiing left the number 5 wing tank 94 percent full. Get started today and Give your life Wings! They began ranting and raving. We have big plans for Continental and mustnt lose our momentum. In-Service Fleets carrying 89 aircraft, including 71 Passenger Jets/ 18 Freighters. You may feel as if youve lost a bit of your authority and control over every last detailbecause you havebut thats okay. Language links are at the top of the page across from the title. Taylor was given a 15-month suspended sentence, while Ford, Perrier, Hrubel, and Frantzen were cleared of all charges. They surrounded the room and refused to sit down. Lufthansa flights to Jacksonville International, Brussels Airlines flights to Luqa Malta International, Singapore Airlines flights to Athens International. We also immediately started fixing our idiotic food policy. Sure, you can skip this step, but youll miss out on the goodwill it fosters and the relationships it spawns. January 1988: BA plane leaving Heathrow lost 10 bolts from its landing gear wheel. By focusing only on costs, the airline had created a product no one wanted to buy. You bet. In our case, that meant listening to the customers in seat 9C, the business travelers who book the aisle seats near the front of the plane. In our business, revenue comes from credit card receipts. About Press Copyright Contact us Creators Advertise Developers Terms Privacy Policy & Safety How YouTube works Test new features NFL Sunday Ticket Press Copyright . Only after that has begun can you move on to making moneythe subject of the next principle. Home. In addition to changing when we served food, we also changed the food itself. I know most of them thought we were on drugs. I dont know about you, but to me, a two-hour flight that leaves at 7:00 a.m. (after I have gotten up at 5:00 a.m. to get to the airport and havent eaten breakfast) is a lot different from a two-hour flight at 2:00 p.m., which falls after lunch but before dinner. Sure, we were able to fix some problems, such as an incredibly slow reservations system and a substandard customer-response policy. Gordon and I werent totally convinced that Continental could be saved, even with our plan. In my six-odd years of working on turnarounds at Bain, I had never seen a company as dysfunctional as Continental. Time is tight; money is tighter. In order to make up for these increased expenses, management cut costs further. From. Let the inmates run the asylum. Earn badges to share on LinkedIn and your resume. In fact, for 15 years, the way to get ahead at Continental was to torpedo someone and then take his or her job. We had a week to put together a turnaround plan for Continental and develop a pitch to the board to name Gordon the CEO. By LISA STARK and HUMA KHAN February 2, 2010, 4:55 AM Feb. 2, 2010 -- Pilot error was one of the chief causes that led to the deadly crash of Colgan Air flight, operating as Continental Connection Flight 3407, last February, federal investigators said today. Continental is a fun place to work today. If not, we'll show you the next-best options, by price or journey length. To offer you a more personalised experience, we (and the third parties we work with) collect info on how and when you use Skyscanner. Both the Delta (London-Cincinnati) and Continental (London-Newark) were heading to the U.S. with nearly 600 people total on both aircraft. CONTINENTAL AIRLINES FLIGHT 1943 DOUGLAS DC-9-32, N10556 HOUSTON, TEXAS FEBRUARY 19, 1996 1. Here are the lowest-priced Continental Airlines flight tickets from hundreds of providers. To put an end to Continentals strategic wandering, Gordon and I introduced the Go Forward Plan to our coworkers. It sounded like a great idea, but I was worried we would raise expectations and then not be able to deliver. Every month, Gordon and I hold an open house where employees can ask us questions, and we publish a newspaper describing whats happening in the company. When AF4590 subsequently departed, Concorde's left main landing gear tires struck the strip of metal and were punctured. The airline is operating the Hong Kong route since 1967, and operates in 161 destinations in 29 countries/districts, as of 31 DEC, 2018. Keep an eye on your favorite fare and book when it's cheapest. When they are constants in a business, people become engaged in their work. Because I was not a frequent flier on Continental, I was seated in the last row of an unattractive and dirty DC-9. Strong leadership, firm parameters, and clear direction are necessary in a turnaround situation, but the workplace neednt be repressive. As a result, most employees learned of the companys activities, plans, and performance through the press. Fly to Win was the market plan: we were going to build up our Houston, Newark, and Cleveland hubs, for instance, and expand our customer mix from backpacks and flip-flops to suits and briefcases. It may even be their most important job; Gordon and I certainly considered it our top priority. Not mollified, the union president asked me to come to a meeting the pilots were having before my meeting with the entire airport staff. [18][19], A few days after the crash, all Air France Concordes were grounded, pending an investigation into the cause of the crash and possible remedies. The program did decrease fuel costs, but it motivated many pilots to skimp on air-conditioning. [14], The crew was trying to divert to nearby ParisLe Bourget Airport, but accident investigators stated that a safe landing would have been highly unlikely, given the aircraft's flightpath. The same employees who used to tear the patches from their shirts so no one would know they worked at Continental have increased their purchases of hats, caps, T-shirts, and the like for themselves and their friends by more than 400%. You may check the current baggage fees at both the Continental Airlines official website, or by. (two gongs and sound of switch, followed by another switch and sounds likened to objects being moved)Pilot: (unclear, sounds like exertion)Pilot: (unclear, sounds like exertion)Pilot: (unclear, sounds like exertion)End of recording, The flight was chartered by German company Peter Deilmann Cruises. The program didnt cost anything, but it added value to the customer. Finally, each corporate officer is assigned a city on the system. Very quickly, we required the scheduling and operating departments to review and sign off on the flight schedules before they were loaded to be flown. I want you to listen to what he has to say, and when he tells you to do something, you assume it is coming from me, and do it.. As you all know, cash is the lifeblood of any business. List of Continental Airlines destinations, Philip S. W. Goldson International Airport, Rio de Janeiro/Galeo International Airport, So Paulo/Guarulhos International Airport, Arturo Merino Bentez International Airport, Alfonso Bonilla Aragn International Airport, Jos Joaqun de Olmedo International Airport, Toussaint Louverture International Airport, Ramn Villeda Morales International Airport, Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj International Airport, Licenciado Gustavo Daz Ordaz International Airport, Josep Tarradellas BarcelonaEl Prat Airport, BirminghamShuttlesworth International Airport, Ted Stevens Anchorage International Airport, Norman Y. Mineta San Jose International Airport, Fort LauderdaleHollywood International Airport, HartsfieldJackson Atlanta International Airport, Louis Armstrong New Orleans International Airport, BaltimoreWashington International Thurgood Marshall Airport, Detroit Metropolitan Wayne County Airport, MinneapolisSaint Paul International Airport, Rick Husband Amarillo International Airport, Lubbock Preston Smith International Airport, Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport, CasperNatrona County International Airport, 1955 MacArthur Airport United Airlines crash, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=List_of_Continental_Airlines_destinations&oldid=1133996164, Short description is different from Wikidata, Articles with failed verification from February 2018, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License 3.0, This page was last edited on 16 January 2023, at 14:02. It also forced the airline to pay more to accommodate customers who had to take other airlines because of missed connections. They are required to research each suggestion and get back to the employee within 48 hours with one of three responses: we fixed it; we are not going to fix it, and here is why; or, we need to study it a little more, and we will get back to you by such and such date. EVA Air is the airline's main competitor. Neither qualified what was meant by "major U.S. airline.". That lowered the cost per seat mile by adding more seats, but it alienated Continentals best business customers and often resulted in an all-coach airplane on long flights when airplanes were swapped during adverse weather conditions. Deciding to focus more on customers desires rather than on cutting costs is actually the easy part. They told the pilots that they should feel lucky that Continental finally had a senior management team that treated them with enough respect to deliver the bad newsas well as a good relocation packagein person. Speaking of dignity and respect, cleaning house neednt be a brutal or humiliating experience. In a turnaround situation, people are tense and suspicious for good reason. Gordon and I each took our share of the letters. Do you know what the first step in problem solving is? I asked. They cant see any way out either. When I discovered Continentals real cash situation, I called Gordon. [3]:17,107[7] At 16:42, the Concorde ran over this piece of debris during its take-off run while the aircraft was doing 185 mph (300 km/h), cutting the right-front tyre (tyre No 2) of its left main wheel bogie and sending a large chunk of tyre debris (4.5 kilograms or 9.9 pounds) into the underside of the left wing at an estimated speed of 140 metres per second (270kn; 500km/h; 310mph). In fact, if employees arent having fun at workthat is, if they arent engaged in the process and treated with respectyour turnaround will not succeed. The following were major incidents and accidents that have occurred on Continental Airlines mainline aircraft. 26 May 1937. . This was immediately confirmed by the Captain's calling for the engine fire procedure". The flight engineer shut down engine number two at only 25 feet altitude. For instance, in the early 1990s, pilots earned bonuses if the fuel burn rate on their airplanes fell below a specified amount. There was next to no strategy in place. As for improving reliability, we had to get two sets of folks talking to each other: those that wrote the flight schedules and those that ran the flight and airport operations. Page 32: "The maximum structural weight on takeoff being 185,070kg, it appears that the aircraft was slightly overloaded on takeoff". (For more on Continentals performance, see the exhibit Climbing Again.) How did the reversal of fortunes happen? It was our story and we were sticking to it (to borrow a line from a country-and-western song). Begging for forgiveness can be unpleasant, thats for sure. Continental Airlines Flight 1515 was preparing to take off for Bush Intercontinental Airport in Houston when "a maintenance-related engine run-up of the right-hand engine" was carried out,. The aircraft's last scheduled repair had taken place on 21 July 2000, four days before the accident; no problems were reported during the repair. "Pilot: "No time, no (unclear). A group of baggage handlers came to me a little more than a year ago and asked if we could tag the bags of our best customers priority and deliver them first off the baggage belt. We dont implement all of the suggestionsId say about one in ten is implementedbut we take each one seriously. Continental Airlines, also known as CAL was formed in 1959 by some retired Chinese Air Force officers in Taiwan. A couple of days later, I found myself in a room with our largest creditors. It was a very long list. Once youve rebuilt strong customer relationships, you can proceed to the next step: making better products theyll pay for. Believe it or not, at this point I still wasnt on Continentals payroll. Needless to say, morale was terrible. Theyve seen their friends get fired. We loaded bags; we stood alongside the agents at ticket counters. It was the only fatal Concorde accident during its 27-year operational history. Do it now! We lit a fire of urgency beneath Continental; we rotated quickly and picked up speed as we climbed to 41,000 feet. We named it that because we knew our history was not going to help us. Along with explaining the details of the closing and relocation plans, I also shared with them my vision for Continental and how far we had come. [3]:17,170, At 16:38 CEST (14:38 UTC), five minutes before the Concorde departed, Continental Airlines Flight 55, a McDonnell Douglas DC-10-30, took off from the same runway for Newark International Airport and lost a titanium alloy strip that was part of the engine cowl, identified as a wear strip about 435 millimetres (17.1in) long, 29 to 34 millimetres (1.1 to 1.3in) wide, and 1.4 millimetres (0.055in) thick. Continentals was pure common sense. A passenger intent on claiming money from life insurance planted a bomb on the aircraft which departed Chicago-OHare, destined for Kansas City Municipal Airport. The Delta flight strayed 60 miles (97 km) off course during its flight and came within 30 feet (9.1 m) of colliding with the 747 as the L-1011 flew under it in Canadian airspace. File your flight plan and track your progress. On 25 July 2000, Air France Flight 4590, a Concorde passenger jet on an international charter flight from Paris to New York, crashed shortly after takeoff, killing all 109 people on board and four on the ground. If you bag one of these tickets, you wont lose out if your flight has to be changed or cancelled. Filter your search by airline. The offer sounds pretty bold for a company almost in bankruptcy, doesnt it? They could see senior management finally taking the actions they knew had been needed for years. Most important, even with all the work ahead, turning Continental around seemed like it was going to be fun. Thats the kind of thing that happens when you let the inmates run the asylum. The airline was part of Skyteam and Star Alliance with frequent flyer program name Onepass. Probably none of them will knock your socks off. Since the costs of the aircraft and fuel were fixed, and costs such as food had already been cut, the only way to reduce costs was to take back wages from employees. We have taken more than 200 calls per week in the three years the hotline has been open. My best suit and I were soaked. [3]:134135 The aircraft was unable to climb or accelerate, and its speed decayed during the course of its brief flight. [6], At the start of the takeoff, the aircraft had 1.2 tonnes of extra fuel which should have been burnt during the aircraft's taxi. Moreover, pressure and fear often make managers do erratic, inconsistent, even irrational things. They felt pressured to do so, they said. "Co-pilot: "Negative, we're trying Le Bourget" (four switching sounds).Co-pilot: "No (unclear). . But we had to try40,000 jobs were at stake. October 1993: Tyre burst on a BA plane during taxi at Heathrow, puncturing wing, damaging fuel tanks, and causing a major fuel leak. Think money in, not money out. As Brenneman wryly states, I knew the fastest way to make money was to stop doing things that lost it, such as flying empty planes. A fuel tank was punctured. And the companys results showed it. All passengers and crew were safely evacuated. )[33] This skewed the alignment of the landing gear because a strut was able to wobble in any direction with 3 of movement. In fact, they have many ways of saying, If the solution were simple, we would have already thought of it. On top of that, they usually have trouble accepting responsibility for and reversing the poor decisions they made in the past. You know this this plane was the same plane that caused the Concorde Thats why when we took over, we started talking with employees at every opportunity. Many customers, particularly business customers with a choice, selected other airlines, reducing revenues enough to create huge losses. My first assignment was to help Continental lower its maintenance costs and improve its dispatch reliabilityin other words, figure out a way to fix planes that were breaking down when they needed to be flying. [18][19][20], All the passengers and crew, and four employees of the Hotelissimo hotel were killed in the crash. None will knock your socks off, he acknowledges, but all are well worth considering for any company. I kept telling them it was the worlds worst $6 billion company. [They] needed to stop flying 120-seat planes with 30 passengers . A change in wind conditions created an 8 knot tailwind, which would have reduced the regulated takeoff weight to 180 tonnes, six tonnes below the actual aircraft weight. But he also knew that when you focus only on cost reductions, you risk sabotaging the very products youre trying to sell. Two engines were damaged as a result of the accident. We search Expedia, Orbitz and others for packages that can save you even more. We provide accurate real time flight status like arrivals, departures as well as delay time of all Continental Airlines flights. Continental Airlines, simply known as Continental, was a major United States airline founded in 1934 and eventually headquartered in Houston, Texas.It had ownership interests and brand partnerships with several carriers. New York $ 415. The historical norm for delivering bad news at Continental was for a senior manager to dump the news in the local airport managers lap and then hide in our corporate office building. There was silence. ", "How the Crash of Flight 4590 Destroyed Concorde's Mystique", "Why the Concorde crashed and what happened next", Accident on 25 July 2000 at "La Patte d'oie" at Gonesse, Accident survenu le 25 juillet 2000 au lieu-dit "La Patte d'oie" Gonesse, PlaneCrashInfo.Com Data Entry on Flight 4590, Doomed The Real Story of Flight 4590: Special Investigation, All 109 Aboard Dead in Concorde Crash into Hotel Near Paris; 4 On Ground Dead, "Air France Flight 4590 at Paris, France", https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Air_France_Flight_4590&oldid=1151182575. 3. Ill never know what possessed me to say that. Strategic clarity is particularly important when time and financial resources are limited. The aircraft was a total loss. A single creditor could have blocked our restructuring. And theres one more problem with existing management teams sticking around for a turnaround. [58] Another monument, a 6,000-square-metre (65,000sqft) memorial surrounded with topiary planted in the shape of a Concorde, was established in 2006 at Mitry-Mory, just south of Charles de Gaulle Airport. Any first-year marketing student can tell you that to make more money, you have to listen to your best, most lucrative customers. 55 a.m. None: CO378: Larnaca (LCA) Frankfurt (FRA) 10:05 a.m. 1:15 p.m. None: CO1804: Frankfurt (FRA) Cagliari (CAG) 5:45 a.m. 7:50 a.m . The jet crashed into a hotel in nearby Gonesse two minutes after takeoff. Rather than to take off from the other end of the runway to take off into the wind, no change in takeoff direction occurred. [1] We set up a toll-free hotline that operates around the clock to handle employees suggestions. In fact, when we went before the board, we told them Continental could earn about $40 million in 1995. They forget to ask simple questions like, Do we have a product people want to buy? Maybe it was the fact that I had seen a client of mine do largely the same thing during a real estate restructuring, to great effect. We knew a major ending was on the horizoneither the old Continental was going to be entirely reinvented or it was going to go bankrupt for an unprecedented third time and would probably be liquidated. All told, after 15 years of a low-cost approach, Continental had created what I call a doom loop. The on-time bonus I mentioned earlier made it clear that our employees would win when our customers did. Some of these managers had spent their careers in the airline business and some hadnt worked a day at an airline. Go do itnow. [3]:17 A large plume of flame developed, and the flight engineer shut down engine 2 in response to a fire warning and the captain's command. But it was a tough and emotional time for everyone. They got us into this hole, the thinking goes, how are they going to have the sense to get us out of it? En route stops were planned at Phoenix, Arizona and El Paso, Texas. And we wanted it all done in six months. But we knew we couldnt listen to everything the customers in seat 9C had to say. But it would have been dishonest to back down or to fudge a reaction of sympathy I did not feel. Of all the contributors to Continentals success, Brenneman says, the biggest factor in our favor was momentum. Join the millions of customers that have used Fly.com to compare prices between hundreds of airfare providers. We were taking in approximately $750,000 per month. The accident investigation revealed that Air France 4590's right front tire on the left main landing gear was destroyed after having run over a strip of metal debris shed by a Continental Airlines DC-10-30, which departed on the runway just five minutes prior. Fare Calendars show the best prices over the next 180 days on 2000+ routes. Damaged beyond economic repair when the propellers struck the runway shortly after take-off. About an hour later, I met with the rest of the employees and their familiesabout 600 people in all. Of course, wed be fools if all we did was talk at our employees. The company had gone through ten presidents in ten years, so standard operating procedure was to do nothing while awaiting new management. It would be cheaper. That route, along with other cash-draining flights, was soon eliminated, and 7,000 employees were let go. Continental Airlines, also known as CAL was formed in 1959 by some retired Chinese Air Force officers in Taiwan. So when we let people go, we went out of our way to be fair by honoring their contracts and letting them resign with dignity. People want to be led, not managed, in a time of crisis. When I first arrived at Continental as a consultant, 18% of the flights were cash negative. To monitor our performance in the marketplace, we decided to track our monthly load factor, revenue per available seat mile, and quarterly cost and profit margins. By the end of the call, however, they were usually appreciative that an officer of the company had taken the time to seek them out. Its an ego thing. You cant run a company from the executive suite of an office building anyway. Sometimes people ask me, Did anything about the turnaround surprise you? My answer is, The fact that it didnt fail.. "Control tower: "Fire service leader, correction, the Concorde is returning to runway zero nine in the opposite direction. and subsequent crash. One of our MD-80 captains called me and said, Greg, I knew we would be a good airline again once our airplanes were the same color.. Now, how to create a new culture is the topic of hundreds, if not thousands, of books and articles. No one was going to come between us; if they tried, they were out. Flight 1943 landed wheels up on runway 27 at the Houston Intercontinental Airport, Houston, Texas. Continental Connection. When in doubt, everyone knew it was advised just to let the customers fend for themselves. In the broadest sense, we refers to my 40,000 coworkers at Continental. As a result, more customers left, revenues continued to drop, and costs had to be cut more and more. If you. [55][57], A monument in honour of the crash victims was established at Gonesse. Then again, the patient is cured now, right? The aircraft involved was a 25-year-old Arospatiale-BAC Concorde (registration F-BTSC, serial number 203) that had its maiden flight on 31 January 1975 (during testing, the aircraft's registration was F-WTSC). Its hub airports were in Cleveland Hopkins International . The scenes in this video are from Air Crash Investigation documentary.Music: I Am a Man Who Will Fight for Your HonorArtist: Chris ZabriskieNone Of Them Belo. Dynasty Flyer is the airline's frequent flyer program. Presto, now people were in control of their own destiny, and the finger-pointing stopped. We search 500+ sites to find you the cheapest flights. He wanted to meet for breakfast the next morning, and I quickly agreed. Cheap Roundtrip Fares to Amsterdam from: (per person, including taxes and fees). Its thrilling to lead people to do something no one thinks can be done. The new image had an even bigger impact on our employees. The thrust reverser of the aircraft was deployed in flight shortly after takeoff. Large amounts of fuel leaking from the rupture ignited, causing a loss of thrust in the left-hand-side engines 1 and 2. The type was finally retired in 2003: May at Air France; October at British Airways. Employees couldnt possibly know the entire contents of the book. For every month we finished in the top five out of ten airlines in on-time performance as measured by the DOT, we would give each employee $65. In spite of my reservations, I signed on. At the time, our stock was trading at about $7, but I told people we wanted to hire that we were going to drive it up to $80 or higher. Continental Airlines was an American airline headquartered in Houston, Texas. Little wonder it had churned through 10 presidents in as many years. Continental Aviation. [26] Commercial service was resumed on November 7, 2001, after a 17M (24M today) safety improvement programme, until the type was retired between May (Air France) and October (British Airways), 2003. CALite eliminated all food on its flights, and it also eliminated travel agent commissions and corporate discounts, which infuriated some very important customers. I will never forget my first flight from Dallas to Houston on Continental Airlines. Thats where our focus was, and its a good rule for any turnaround. Continental Airlines, also known as CAL was formed in 1959 by some retired Chinese Air Force officers in Taiwan. Nineteen items of luggage, weighing some 500kg (0.5 tonnes) were loaded onto the aircraft at the last minute without being included in the aircraft's manifest, giving the aircraft a weight of 186 tonnes, which exceeded the aircraft's certified maximum structural weight by one tonne. On the 1st of March 1978, a Continental Airlines DC-10 with 200 people on board blew a tire on takeoff from Los Angeles International Airport. They care; they talk; they laugh.
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