Fiji Horror on Pacific Blue

[Commuter]

Aspro,

Not connected to the Aspro brothers that were operating IEA in the UK, are you?

 

[markis10]

My two experiences last week on the same day with two different airlines:

Virgin (Inc VB and PB)
Dropped off the at the Kurb in Sydney, ran into a pensioner from NZ in a distressed state as it was 6.30 and she was on the 6.45 to Christchuch with PB, her VB flight was 4 hours late into Syd to connect and she could not find anyone to help her. I tried finding someone to see if the conenection flight was late as I figured there was no point rushing, told by CSA'a in checkin area they have no visibility on international ops or even departure times and pax should taxi across asap.

Qantas
Later that night took off at 11.15PM back to BNE, on arrival taxi in announcement made that connecting flights to Nandi/Noumea were holding and that a QF staffer would meet them at the gate to assist with transfer. Walking up the ramp a few minutes later, overhead crew talking to gate attendant asking where the person was to assist with the intl transfer, his reply, "there is no one here but me, tell them to take a cab". When I got outside the cab line had 200 people in it already - great suggestion!


So as you can see LCC or not, sometimes the service just does not stack up!

 

[Yada Yada]

this post describes a flight booked with australian airlines, which is also a discount air carrier.

in general you get what you pay for.

you can not expect to have the same level of service and the same amount of staff assisting when a problem arises with a budget airline compared with a non budget airline.

one9 - my experience is that it happens to all airlines whether LCC or "full service". As I mentioned in my post above, it has happened to me on AA and my boss had a particularly bad experience with SQ. No airline is immune from stuff ups when equipment or systems fail.

I do think that all airlines should have better contingency plans, e.g. staff at each location who can swing into action to look after stranded pax and co-ordinate alternate travel for them.

 

[blundeni]

In general I would say that this sort of cough up could (and does) happen on any airline. I think the measure of any airline is how well prepared they are for this sort of inevitable issue, and how they deal with the affected passengers.

In my mind, for this incident, PB were not ready.

I personally don't think that there is any excuse for that - LCC or not.

Also I really dont think that Virgin or PB really fit the LCC model - our tickets were only about $200 cheaper that the equivalent QF flight - the reason we took PB was the better flight times allowing us more time in Fiji.

 

[Yada Yada]

Also I really dont think that Virgin or PB really fit the LCC model - our tickets were only about $200 cheaper that the equivalent QF flight - the reason we took PB was the better flight times allowing us more time in Fiji.

I agree. Even DJ now classify themselves as a "new world carrier".

 

[Alan in CBR]

this post describes a flight booked with australian airlines, which is also a discount air carrier.

in general you get what you pay for.

you can not expect to have the same level of service and the same amount of staff assisting when a problem arises with a budget airline compared with a non budget airline.

Australian Airlines were adamant that they were not a discount carrier. They claim they were an all-economy full service airline.

Not having flown them, I can't comment on the veracity of their claim.

 

[jad01]

Virgin and Pacific Blue were seperate companies

That has to be the biggest cop out......Pacific Blue is 100% owned by Virgin Blue, furthermore.....online reservations and information for Pacific Blue is on Virgin Blue's website.

If they want to use the term 'guest'....then they should treat them accordingly.

I dont agree on the LCC argument.
If you pay for a service and they then fail to provide that for whatever reason then they should exercise good customer relations and repair that.
It pays to rectify these problems because after hearing of similar Pacific Blue problems, I wont be flying with them as I was considering to do.

Their customer service is disgraceful.
I think their recruitment is way too focused on pretty looks and the song and dance carrying on like a ****head elements.
Everytime I have experienced a problem with Virgin Blue it's met by what sounds like a scripted response repeated over and over that doesnt actually answer the dilemma at the time.
I would rather a 48 year old woman who knows how to assess and deal with problems than some 22 year old blonde who fixes her hair about 30 times while she rattles of "I dont understand".

It really makes me worry that despite their training in a controlled environment, how they would actually deal with a real emergency if they cant even deal with stuff ups they they created.

In regard to the initial thread, if the initial flight was cancelled the flight passengers were put on was late departing.....staff should have foreseen possible congestion and problems at the other end.......and with around 4hrs in the air, they would have had plenty of time to organise a contingency plan.

JASON

 

[bravoecho1]

I know of a lot of cases where due to the VB hiring policy of "Virgin Flair", brains and experience were overlooked every single time.

And before anyone jumps on my back, I know people in both camps and are not being biased.

 

[crazydave98]

This from today's paper...



Airport hell inspires a righteous crusade
Kathy McCabe

29 June 2006

ANYONE who uses air transport regularly for business or pleasure has a yarn about their day of airport hell. My day of reckoning with airlines and airports -- along with thousands of other commuters -- was last Friday.
While many were impressed by the natural beauty of a city cloaked in fog, those scheduled to fly into or from Sydney experienced the entirely opposite reactions of anger, frustration, despair and helplessness.
I was blissfully unaware my home town was shrouded in soup when I went to check-in for my 10am Qantas flight.

So when the little kiosk machine that spits out your boarding pass these days asked me if I wanted to check the availability of an earlier flight, I did a mental Homer and went "Woo-hoo". It was only 9.15am and the departure screens said my flight was running 20 minutes late, so I went for the earlier option.

That put me on some flight number that started with a five instead of a four and, being a semi-regular commuter between Sydney and Melbourne, alarm bells sounded, but I headed for the gate and waited. And waited.
The lounges started to fill and people started complaining about fog in Sydney, so I put two and two together and realised I might be delayed a while.

It wasn't until the pilots sitting next to me pointed out that the flight we were supposed to be on was leaving without us that I had any clue it was going to be one of those days. A computer stuff-up had put us on a non-existent flight on an actual plane which was meant to go to Canberra originally but was now going to Sydney and the pilots and I were now non-passengers who didn't exist as far as Qantas was concerned.
I was then transferred to the midday flight that was leaving at 1.30pm and finally left after 6.30pm. I got home at 9pm.

During my nine hours in Melbourne airport, not one person could tell the other thousands of tired and cranky airline hostages anything. There were no announcements beyond "Don't yell at us -- we don't do the weather and we have no idea what is going on so we can't help you. Apologies for the inconvenience." We couldn't go anywhere just in case our flight did actually arrive from wherever it had been diverted to.
Mothers with babies ran out of milk and nappies. Businessmen ran out of phone and computer batteries. Staff ran out of "Can I help you?" smiles. Everyone ran out of patience.

So what did Qantas management do besides shrug their shoulders and say "Hey, we don't do weather"? They told stranded passengers who missed international connections or just couldn't get on a flight to go ahead and make their own arrangements. It gave no information to their own staff to assuage people's anxiety. They did not replace cancelled flights. They saved some money.

Weather happens and surely in 2006 there are contingency plans for airlines and airports to deal with a few hours of fog. I could feel my arteries hardening as my backside moulded into the uncomfortable seat in the lounge and I plotted my revenge. I had nothing else to do. I was going to send them an invoice charging them an hourly rate of $50 for stealing my time. The thought some Qantas accountant would show it to all their mates and laugh at me made me shelve that idea.

And then I saw the photos of the tens of thousands of people who protested yesterday against the new industrial relations laws and bingo, it came to me. Let's have a No-Fly Day. If airport and airlines want to treat their customers like sheep, let's act like it.

I nominate my birthday, August 28, as No-Fly Day, when thousands of airline passengers cancel their flight 30 minutes before its scheduled departure. Make sure you have a fare that can be changed, of course.
Can you imagine it? Empty planes sitting on tarmacs waiting for passengers while Qantas management count the cost of this silent protest. And while we're at it, let's have No Mobile Phone Day to teach the telcos who's boss. And No Banking Day to teach the banks that those fees we pay should get us something for our money. And No Tradesmen Between 8am and Midday Day to teach them that our time is precious too and it would be convenient if they turned up at an allotted time for a change.

Instead of whingeing and turning blue in the face from frustration, it is time for consumers to act. The might of collective consumer power should send the message that customer service should actually mean serving the customer.
[email protected]

 

[Commuter]

About the fog delays - isn't it about time we had decent equipment at airports? I'm sick of below-third-world-country standards of instrument approaches in Australia

 

[blundeni]

[FONT=&quot]Heres the actual content of my letter of complaint - it's basically a rehash of the above, extraneous detail removed, and with a little more feeling.....
[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]
[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]To Whom It May Concern:[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] [/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]My family and I booked and flew Pacific Blue from BNE to NAN on DJ177 on the 18th of June, and were booked to return NAN to BNE on the 25th June. My booking reference was XMJ6BB[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] [/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]We arrived at Nadi airport on the 25th June am 1pm to discover that our flight - DJ176 to BNE – had been cancelled.[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] [/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]There was no announcement of this at the airport at any stage, we merely saw one of the TV’s overhead of the check-in staff displaying the message that DJ176 had been cancelled.

The official excuse from people who had been informed of the cancellation (some the previous day) seemed to be 'bad weather' in BNE, although many people who rang home to check discovered that this simply was not the case.

The line to check-in refused to move for nearly 90 minutes before ground staff started to check the flight in – once again there was no announcement explaining either the delay in checking in, or to explain the cancellation.[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] [/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]After nearly 2½ hours in the queue, we finally made it to check-in and were given 2 sets of boarding passes - one for DJ154 to SYD, the other for SYD to BNE on DJ277 at 9:00pm. Despite this obvious opportunity to explain what was happening, we were told nothing.[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] [/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]The most disappointing part of this whole process was that at no stage was there any announcement to let people know what was going on either in the terminal or on board the plane (other than a few 'thank you for your patience' calls on board), and no one was forthcoming regarding the reason for the BNE flight cancellation - when asked directly the FA's trotted out the 'they don't tell us anything' line.

[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]DJ154 was supposed to depart at 2:55pm, but with all the BNE passengers trying to make the flight, it finally left at closer to 4:30pm. Toward the end of our wait on board, we were told that Nadi check in staff had issues with their computers which meant that they were unable to check passengers in.

We touched down in Sydney at around 7:40pm to be told by a local Virgin representative (over the PA) that all passengers with connecting flights were going to be put up in hotels for the night as we had no chance of making our flights. No other info - just that!

We disembarked, went through immigration, collected our luggage and then went through customs reaching the Arrivals hall at 8:40pm so it would have been tight to make the flight - although had Virgin really wanted us to I suspect that they could have made it happen.

Once we went out into the arrivals halls we expected to be shown where to go, told about hotels and future flights etc, but there was no one from Virgin / Pacific Blue anywhere in the terminal that we could find. [/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] [/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]We wandered around until we stumbled across the information counter who told us to go to Bus terminal 6. I asked where they had got this info from and they said that they had been told nothing by Pacific Blue, and that they had heard it from other passengers. I asked if they had tried to contact either Virgin or Pacific Blue, they replied that yes they had but were not able to contact anyone.

With no other info to work on, we made out way down to Bus terminal 6 to find a number of other passengers looking pretty confused, some said we were going to the Mercure, others said it was the Ibis. When the buses for those hotels turned up, we queried the drivers - none of whom knew anything about anything - so not being sure no one got on the buses. [/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] [/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]By the time everyone turned up there were at least 60 - 80 people there - none of whom knew anything definitively. [/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] [/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]A lot of passengers (including myself) had very small children, all of whom were freezing, most of whom were starving, and at least half were in tears![/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]
After standing around for nearly 45 minutes in the freezing cold, Virgin staff finally turned up - 2 young ladies (Natasha and Kate I think) and some guy (Tom?). I say Virgin staff as they were not Pacific Blue - when I asked who they worked for I was told Virgin Blue. [/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] [/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]They seemed as confused as us, and when set upon by what was now a pretty unhappy group of people actually got pretty pissy in return.[/FONT]

[FONT=&quot][/FONT]

[FONT=&quot]The Virgin staff clearly did not know much and certainly did not have the power to make any decisions - any request from the passengers was relayed to someone in a nice cosy office. One of the Virgin staff remarked how cold she was getting - well you can imagine how that went down, and then commented on the fact that her shift had already finished and she wanted to go home…so did we!!

The Virgin staff finally made an announcement after being there for nearly 10 minutes, and announced that some flights (they used the connecting flight numbers) were going to the Ibis and others to the Mercure. They then rattled off flight numbers, DJ271 and DJ888 were off the Mercure - another Perth flight number was off to the Ibis - they said DJ277 passengers needed to stick around as they had not yet decided what to do with that flight - yup I was booked on DJ277.

Apparently passengers had not been abused sufficiently yet, as they were made to wait for the hotel shuttles - which had to make several trips to get all the flights away. When some passengers complained and said what about taxis or another bus service, they were told that Virgin would not pay for the transfer - although we were generously told that Virgin would pick up our return costs – but that we had to arrange the return trip ourselves. [/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]
Flight DJ277 finally got the news that we were to be put up at the Ibis (10:05 pm), and that we were expected back at the airport at 6:15 – We were not told anything about which flights we would be on other than it would be either the 7:00am, 7:30am or 8:00am flight depending on how full the flights were - we were told that it was a first come first served basis.
[/FONT]

Continued in the next post....
[FONT=&quot] [/FONT]

 

[blundeni]

[FONT=&quot]The last message we received from the Virgin staff was that the hotels had been informed that we were allowed $20 per passenger for food and beverage - I'm not sure when anyone from Virgin last visited a hotel in SYD, but I can tell you that $20 pp does not go very far.....

My wife, myself and my 2 kids finally got to the hotel at 10:30pm. We checked into the hotel and were given 2 pokey little rooms - we enquired about return transfers to the airport and were told that there was a shuttle at 5:40am, which we duly booked.

It already being late, with all of us freezing, pissed off and exceptionally tired, my wife and kids decided to forgo Virgin's generous offer food and drink and retired for the night. I slipped down after I got the kids to bed and grabbed a coke and water.

Our wake-up call came at 5:00am, and we made it to reception just ahead of the crowd. One lady made it before us, and had obviously made one of the earlier shuttles last night as she had managed something to eat before retiring. I know this because she was charged for the food - this despite her telling the receptionist that Pacific Blue had told everyone that they had $20pp to spend. The Hotel knew nothing about that apparently and proceeded to ask for payment. [/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] [/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]When my turn came to check out I said to the receptionist that there was no way I was paying for anything - he checked with his Manager and they obviously decided that the $5 I owed was not worth the fight - the people behind me were equally vocal and also got off the bill.....

We arrived at the domestic terminal at 5:50am and went straight to guest services - neither of the two ladies on the counter knew anything about us or our predicament - so we and the other people beside me had to explain the debacle to them.

As we were the second to arrive we expected reasonably confidently to make the 7:00am flight. No such luck, we were booked on the 8:00am flight. I asked first about the chances on getting on the 7:00am flight and then asked for 'The Lounge' passes for my family if we had to be on the 8:00am flight. I was told by the Virgin staff member that as I was a passenger with Pacific Blue (which was a separate company) that there was no chance of either. [/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] [/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]I explained again to the lady about the issues of the previous day, and asked her to reconsider - she told me pretty clearly that she could not help. At this point I insisted on speaking to someone who had the ability to make the decision. The lady behind the counter disappeared off to talk to her supervisor.

The other counter freed up at that point and the next family came and went - happy with their 7:00am flights. We were told pretty clearly that it was first come first served so I was not too happy at hearing this....

After about a 10 minute wait the counter lady returned saying that she had got us on the 7:00am flight, but that I was really lucky as Virgin and Pacific Blue were separate companies and I shouldn't expect this sort of thing again. Honestly it was all I could do not to start screaming at that point....

The flight to BNE went pretty smoothly - the expected 7:00am departure turned into 7:10am but that was insignificant compared to the rest of the experience.

On arrival in BNE I asked both the flight crew and ground crew how I was expected to get from the Domestic terminal to the International terminal which is where I had parked the car. As you can imagine at this point I was not surprised by Virgins complete lack of response to my suggestion that they should foot the bill for the taxi to the International airport.

I understand that there are operational issues that mean that for whatever reason that flights will have to be cancelled, and the passengers moved around to other flights. Fair enough – it happens. [/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] [/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]What is important to me, and where I feel that Pacific Blue / Virgin have let us down badly is how the situation was organised and handled by SYD ground staff.[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] [/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]Considering some people were told that the flight had been cancelled the day before, Pacific Blue / Virgin had around 24 hours to ensure that there were no further issues for affected passengers. That the run-around my family suffered through occurred after the advance warning that Sydney ground staff had is I think the worst aspect of this debacle[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] [/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]The impact on my family of the cancellation of the flight from Nadi was extreme.[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] [/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]From the moment we left the plane in Sydney we were treated as if we did not exist, in several instances we were made to feel that we were a major pain and that we should be grateful that anyone was assisting us at all.[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] [/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]The complete lack of information from any Pacific Blue or Virgin staff member is disgraceful, and the control of passengers from the point that we disembarked the plane was woeful. At one point one of the Virgin ground staff admitted that we should have been met off the plane, but that something had been ‘coughed up’[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] [/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]Being forced to wait around in the freezing cold for someone from Virgin to contact us, and then having to wait until hotel shuttles made many round trips to take us to the hotel is simply unacceptable. The whole outdoor process took nearly 2 hours to complete, and although I dispatched my wife and children inside to the relative warmth of the terminal, both children and myself have come down with pretty bad colds.[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] [/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]Information that we were given by Virgin staff such as the $20pp at the hotel, and the first come first served issue at guest services were clearly not communicated at all, or to the correct person at either the hotels or guest services.[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] [/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]When arriving the following morning as instructed – under our own steam I might add - to discover that no one at guest services had any clue to what was going on showed to me very firmly that Virgin simply did not care about me or my family.[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] [/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]When I asked for assistance from guest services I was made to feel that the staff member was doing me a favour – and one that was unlikely to either be repeated, or to have happened in the first place had I not stood firm in my request.[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] [/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]Finally, upon arriving in BNE no assistance was offered to me or my family to get us back to where we should have been in the first place – BNE international airport.[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] [/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]Frankly the whole incident has left a very bitter taste in my mouth. [/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] [/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]You cannot imagine the feeling of frustration and impotence when you are left stranded in effectively what is a foreign city with no assistance from the very people who stranded you there in the first place.[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] [/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]I have posted my distasteful experiences on www.frequentflyer.com.au under the heading “Fiji Hell with Pacific Blue”[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] [/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]I would ask that this complaint is responded to, by an appropriate member of Virgin staff, with a formal letter of apology.[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] [/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]I also ask for compensation for the nightmare that Pacific Blue / Virgin forced me and my family to suffer through.[/FONT]

 

[mileagemax]

Feel for you, but here is my 2 cents anyway:

1. Short complaint letters work alot better... most employees won't read it all and just skim over it.

2. I think living overseas can give one more perspective. Generally things work according to plan in Australia, and therefore Australians seem to have very high expectations and are quick to complain. Experiences like yours are common place overseas even with full service airlines, let alone low cost airlines.

Good luck in getting a response and compensation, but I think the best plan of action is to just avoid that airline in the future

 

[JohnK]

This from today's paper...

Dave, one QF story does not make Virgin Blue/Pacific Blue look better. Your response on this thread should have been to explain why the OP had these problems and what Virgin Blue/Pacific Blue would do in future to rectify their very poor customer care.

I have never flown Virgin Blue and to be honest with you as long as I hear stories like this one I never will fly with them. And I will also do everything in my power to relate these sort of experiences to everyone I know.

The comparison between DJ and QF is not even close. On the 10th June I turn up to Sydney T3 at 6:35am with my golf bag and luggage for a 6:50am SYD-ADL-DRW flight. Say a very big thank you to the taxi company for delaying a pre-booked taxi by 30 minutes. I see the QF customer service desk as soon as I walk in to T3 and there are 2 ladies and a man having a conversation. I interrupted them and mention I am supposed to be on the SYD-ADL flight that is about to leave. One of the ladies seeing the look on my face and after asking for my name started pushing buttons on the keyboard. About 2 minutes later she printed 2 boarding passes and told me to go to check in desk 16 quickly to drop off bags. She managed to get me on a SYD-BNE-DRW flight that was departing in 30 minutes and would arrive in DRW about 2 hours earlier.

This is what I call customer care and it happens to me with QF all the time. There was no need for them to do this as I was booked on a non-refundable red e-deal.

I would hate to think what would have happened to me had I been travelling on DJ that day.

 

[Mal]

Feel for you, but here is my 2 cents anyway:

1. Short complaint letters work alot better... most employees won't read it all and just skim over it.

Agree with this. Also, I think the OP needs to specify the remedy that they want from Virgin Blue/Pacific Blue - Reimbursement of X dollars for Y expense, Z expense and A expense etc. Just saying that you want compensation makes it hard for someone to quantify exactly what you want.

 

[Yada Yada]

Their customer service is disgraceful.
I think their recruitment is way too focused on pretty looks and the song and dance carrying on like a ****head elements.

Everytime I have experienced a problem with Virgin Blue it's met by what sounds like a scripted response repeated over and over that doesnt actually answer the dilemma at the time.

I would rather a 48 year old woman who knows how to assess and deal with problems than some 22 year old blonde who fixes her hair about 30 times while she rattles of "I dont understand".

It really makes me worry that despite their training in a controlled environment, how they would actually deal with a real emergency if they cant even deal with stuff ups they they created.

I have heard similar concerns expressed before and feel that your assessment is a little unfair. I have flown enough with Virgin Blue to observe that the crews are very well trained and exceed my expectations. I've seen them deal with difficult passengers as good an any other airline's crews.

I don't think that being young or having a cheery disposition means that they are not well trained or incapable of handling difficult situations. Conversely, neither should a surly attitude (e.g. QF crews) mean that they are well trained.

BTW, I have noticed on recent Virgin Blue flights that the jokes have been dropped and the on-board announcements now seem to be a little more business-like. I know some people didn't like the light-hearted approach so perhaps they are changing style. Nonetheless they are still very friendly and professional.

(And a side note - those wretched loud chimes that preceed announcements at SYD T2 have been replaced with quieter chimes that are a little less intense - yay!)

In regard to the initial thread, if the initial flight was cancelled the flight passengers were put on was late departing.....staff should have foreseen possible congestion and problems at the other end.......and with around 4hrs in the air, they would have had plenty of time to organise a contingency plan.

While I agree that it would have been better to inform passengers and be better prepared for such weather problems, as the post from crazydave98 shows this applies to every airline. With air travel, cough happens sometimes.

Having read the article from the Daily Terror, I must say that the writer is simply unreasonable to expect airlines to be able to cope with such an event. If a major airport is closed suddenly and indefinitely, it would require a massive effort to be able to divert so many flights and get people to where they need to go.

 

[bravoecho1]

About the fog delays - isn't it about time we had decent equipment at airports? I'm sick of below-third-world-country standards of instrument approaches in Australia

I know of a number of QF crew who are currently receiving endorsements on the 737's that are being updated with the new HUD software.

This will enable them to operate into airports like CBR, SYD, MEL and ZQN in these conditions.

 

[one9]

About the fog delays - isn't it about time we had decent equipment at airports? I'm sick of below-third-world-country standards of instrument approaches in Australia

I thought it was against the law for a commercial plane to land if there is less than X metres of visibility.

 

[Yada Yada]

I thought it was against the law for a commercial plane to land if there is less than X metres of visibility.

That might be the case in Australia, I don't know.

However it is different in the USA. I flew into and out of STL (connecting flights) in 2002 and the visibility was very poor. After arrival I was walking down the concourse to get to the gate for my next flight, and was amazed to watch the scene out the window. Through the snow and fog I could just see the runway, where planes would just suddenly appear from the clouds and touch down, after which a snow plow would pull out onto the runway for a few minutes and scrape off the snow and ice, pull over to the side and allow another plane to land. :shock:

 

[bravoecho1]

I thought it was against the law for a commercial plane to land if there is less than X metres of visibility.

It comes down to what the aircraft, airfield and aircrew are rated for.

As I said in a previous post, Qantas are making changes to their fleet of 737's whereby the aircrew can fly into these conditions using a Heads Up Display (like they have been using on military aircraft) and their limitations are less than aircraft/aircrew that don't have these endorsements.

Each airline, in accordance with the relevant regulatory bodies, determines what conditions their aircraft can fly in. Usually they are quite similar across the board however there are differences.