An incident aboard a recent U.S. Airways flight has led to the airline issuing a formal apology to a Marine veteran, who just trying to get to his family for the holidays with his service dog.
Anybody who’s ever boarded an airplane knows that there is something terribly inefficient about the slow, agonizing process. Astrophysicist Jason Steffen decided to do something about the messy procedure, using science to develop a plane boarding method that cuts seating times in half.
For about a decade, airlines and academics have tried to figure out the fastest way to load passengers onto a plane. The less time spent on boarding, the more revenue-generating flights airlines can squeeze into a day. In fact, according to a 2008 study in the Journal of Transport Management, every minute cut on boarding can save $30 per flight.
Now American Airlines is trying out a new boardi