Coronavirus will change airlines and the way we fly
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Coronavirus will change airlines and the way we fly
1–10 of 72 posts
Re: Coronavirus will change airlines and the way we fly
#2I think about the depression era behaviors that stuck around in my grandparents as a good example of what to expect coming out of this pandemic. They learned certain things out of necessity and it changed their worldview on everything from darning their own socks to what ingredients they'd use in their cooking.
I expect that many of us will carry similar behavioral scars for years or decades later - ensuring we have masks on hand, unconsciously observing social distancing, being wary around crowded spaces like airplanes and airports. I don't know what all those behaviors will be, but there's no way we avoid carrying at least a few with us.
Re: Coronavirus will change airlines and the way we fly
#3> Configurations are likely to change as carriers try to squeeze more money from customers.
If that’s not what they were already doing, I wonder what that will look like.
Anyway, it’s not necessarily bad. Air travel was way too cheap considering its externalities.
I know someone who _commutes_ by plane because their office is two countries over (in Europe), they don’t want to move to the much higher COL country where the job is, and the office won’t let them be remote with the same salary. So every week twice a week, they fly. And it’s still cheaper than living next to the office. This insanity and many like it must stop, it’s so much pollution for completely stupid reasons.
Re: Coronavirus will change airlines and the way we fly
#4I think about the depression era behaviors that stuck around in my grandparents as a good example of what to expect coming out of this pandemic. They learned certain things out of necessity and it changed their worldview on everything from darning their own socks to what ingredients they'd use in their cooking. I expect that many of us will carry similar behavioral scars for years or decades later - ensuring we have…
I think it is totally futile to try to predict these things. Of course, making pronouncements as in the original post is insane, but enough people delight in this misery to put it on the front page of HN.
Re: Coronavirus will change airlines and the way we fly
#5I have a hunch that once the severity of the pandemic eases, we may see an increase in car journeys for holidays, particularly for continental Europe. Why? Many people will remain cautious about travelling with strangers in closely packed airplane cabins or even train carriages. The alternative is to travel by car. But people can only tolerate a certain amount of time in the car and so this may affect where people travel. Will densely packed cities lose out as holiday destinations?
Governments want people to travel because tourism and hospitality employs thousands of people and brings substantial money into the economy for almost every country in the world.
I'm sceptical the airline industry, which has thrived with low fares, particularly in Europe, will raise prices. I expect they will do everything to tempt passengers to return to the air with low fares. Will that be enough to tempt us back on board?
Re: Coronavirus will change airlines and the way we fly
#6I think about the depression era behaviors that stuck around in my grandparents as a good example of what to expect coming out of this pandemic. They learned certain things out of necessity and it changed their worldview on everything from darning their own socks to what ingredients they'd use in their cooking. I expect that many of us will carry similar behavioral scars for years or decades later - ensuring we have…
I’ve been thinking along these lines, but with a twist. I’m half British and half Italian, raised and resided in the latter most of my life. As I’m sure you know, both of these countries have been hit very severely by the pandemic, and Italy in particular is probably the epitome of the “hard lockdown” — or at least, it’s been one of the more prominent cases because it was the first Western country to make that move and the example everybody else seems to have drawn inspiration from. People are clearly very deeply affected on all levels by this. People have been locked indoors for, well, months now and society has become more regimented than it had ever been. Italians, a stereotypical gregarious population (though that of course varies from person to person and has some regional variation — I’m from the slightly less personally expansive North) have become accustomed to wearing masks in public and keeping strict distances from one another. ‘Touchy-feely’ has been revised to standoffish. There’s reports of people having panic attacks if they see somebody without a mask. Stuff like that (of course it’s hard to tell how prevalent that is, because broadcast & social media tend to blow such episodes out of all proportion).
And now for the twist: as chance would have it, I am working in Malta (a small independent island off the bottom of Sicily, the EU’s smallest member state), so I’m actually abroad in this crucial time and experiencing a very ‘light’ experience: 440 or so cases on a population of half a million, three or four confirmed deaths. We’ve been in a “light lockdown” since sometime in late march. People basically started working from home of their own initiative and/or businesses decided to implement this ahead of governmental recommendations to that effect; bars, restaurants, and non-essential shops are shut and those that are considered essential admit only a few people at the time. People largely give each other a wider berth and aren’t seen congregating in more than the governmentally mandated three people per cluster, but it’s all rather lax, and seems to have worked (fortunately).
So I can’t help but speculate about how odd everything will seem when I will finally go back to visit Milan: everybody back there has gone through a perspective-altering collective trauma that I haven’t experienced. I can imagine myself ending up doing something that has suddenly become a faux pas (or at the very least outmoded) such as putting forward my hand to give a shake, or something gauche such as (comparatively) ‘looming’ over somebody in a queue. I’m quite disturbed by this prospect, to be very honest. There might also be a bit of “survivor guilt” rolled in too (by a quirk of chance, I avoided the ordeal everybody else had to go through).
We’re not five months into the Twenties yet and things are definitely very different from what I had anticipated.
Re: Coronavirus will change airlines and the way we fly
#7I have a hunch that once the severity of the pandemic eases, we may see an increase in car journeys for holidays, particularly for continental Europe. Why? Many people will remain cautious about travelling with strangers in closely packed airplane cabins or even train carriages. The alternative is to travel by car. But people can only tolerate a certain amount of time in the car and so this may affect where people tr…
That’s a good point, but I’m also starting to speculate whether, when the infection rates and (crucially) hospital occupation rates diminish, we will see some people deliberately seeking to get infected so as to gain immunity whilst the risks are low, specifically, when they can be reasonably certain that if they experience severe symptoms they’ll have a place in an ICU to receive intensive care. This might sound unsound (pardon the awkward phrasing) but it’s not necessarily irrational given the perceived advantages of immunity and the diminished perceived risks. It might not even be socially undesirable either, as a kind of “low burn” through the population, or at least it’s sturdier members, might be seen as building up that “herd immunity” which makes it difficult for the virus to reach the higher-risk individuals.
Re: Coronavirus will change airlines and the way we fly
#8I think about the depression era behaviors that stuck around in my grandparents as a good example of what to expect coming out of this pandemic. They learned certain things out of necessity and it changed their worldview on everything from darning their own socks to what ingredients they'd use in their cooking. I expect that many of us will carry similar behavioral scars for years or decades later - ensuring we have…
I’ve been thinking along these lines, but with a twist. I’m half British and half Italian, raised and resided in the latter most of my life. As I’m sure you know, both of these countries have been hit very severely by the pandemic, and Italy in particular is probably the epitome of the “hard lockdown” — or at least, it’s been one of the more prominent cases because it was the first Western country to make that move a…
Islands and countries such as Australia are having a completely different experience, as they can track incoming cases and with good quarantine practices genuinely create a safe bubble for all residents. Watch what happens with New Zealand, Iceland and other small islands like yours and the Canaries etc - you'll be out of lockdown while everyone agrees to be very strict on what enters the country, something continental countries can't do.
Re: Coronavirus will change airlines and the way we fly
#9> Configurations are likely to change as carriers try to squeeze more money from customers. If that’s not what they were already doing, I wonder what that will look like. Anyway, it’s not necessarily bad. Air travel was way too cheap considering its externalities. I know someone who _commutes_ by plane because their office is two countries over (in Europe), they don’t want to move to the much higher COL country where…
Do they go in to the office twice a week or do they fly on Monday and leave on Friday? The part about not letting them be remote is confusing me.
Where do they stay when they go in to the office?
Re: Coronavirus will change airlines and the way we fly
#10I think about the depression era behaviors that stuck around in my grandparents as a good example of what to expect coming out of this pandemic. They learned certain things out of necessity and it changed their worldview on everything from darning their own socks to what ingredients they'd use in their cooking. I expect that many of us will carry similar behavioral scars for years or decades later - ensuring we have…
Personally, I expect to walk straight to the sink and wash my hands, as soon as I get indoors, for the rest of my life.