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1. Airline cultivates glory days of flying

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — Judging from the popularity of the Broadway show, "Boeing Boeing," and plans for a television series based on the world of Pan Am stewardesses, the public seems to long for the days when airlines prided themselves on their flight attendants and the pampering they provided.

Those days are long gone for most carriers. But some long-haul airlines are betting that service that harks back to the glory days of flying will give them an edge.

Emirates Airline is one of them. The airline, one of the fastest growing carriers in the world, plays a crucial role in making Dubai the center of a network that links the West and the East. It is using the image of an Emirates flight attendant — her smiling face beneath the signature red hat — on its website, on advertisements and even on duty-free shopping bags to make the point, as one airline executive put it, that the service provided by Emirates is of "the utmost significance."

"It is what we are judged on more than anything else," said the executive, Terry Daly, a senior vice president at the airline.

Shashank Nigam, chief executive of SimpliFlying, which provides branding advice to airlines and airports, said in an email that delivering a level of cabin service and high product quality "gives Emirates a sustainable competitive advantage." He added, "For an airline providing mainly long-haul flights, the in-flight experience becomes supremely important."

Emirates is one of a half dozen airlines, including Virgin Atlantic and Singapore, that cultivate an elegant image for their cabin crew. Because Emirates is growing so quickly, it is in constant need of more flight attendants.

So far, it has had little trouble recruiting them from around the world. "It's a fun, glamorous job," said Nicole Domett, chief executive of Travel Careers and Training in Auckland, New Zealand, who has sent a few students to Emirates. "For those who have that confidence and thrill of adventure, I mean, wow, it's really exciting."

Mona Issa, for instance, was a doctor in Egypt before joining Emirates. "The way people look at you when you say, 'I work for Emirates,' " she said, "It's magic. Everyone will treat you with respect."

Blake Celestino just joined the airline from Australia, while Maurine Moraa, of Kenya, decided to quit her job working for a nongovernmental organization to fly for Emirates. The job has also been a safety net for people like Mohamed Jaber, a 31-year-old American who was laid off from JPMorgan Chase in the economic downturn.

Newly hired cabin attendants have just over a month to earn an international safety certificate while learning how to apply makeup flawlessly and turn an airplane trolley into an attractive display of duty-free products.

To accommodate the 60 to 120 recruits who arrive each week, the training center runs 16 hours a day. For the first few days, students just get acclimated to the blazing heat and ubiquitous sand. They live in an apartment complex in an area of Dubai where camels graze near the parking lots. Catherine Baird, the senior vice president for cabin-crew training, said that when the trainees see the camels, it sinks in that they are a long way from home.

Baird is equal parts cheerleader and mother superior. "We know you can do this job," she tells them at a morning assembly shortly after they arrive, "because you are brilliant." But she is also tough, if, for instance, she sees a student in uniform with her long hair loose.

"We don't want anything to be too distracting from the hat, from the logo," said Helen Roxburgh, a training manager of the signature hat with the silky cream-colored scarf that is evocative of the Arabic veil.

Roxburgh must teach students the rules regarding the most minute dressing and grooming details. Acceptable shades of hair dye? No more than two shades from one's natural hair color. Tattoos? None that can show while wearing the uniform. When to button the suit jacket? All the time.

The trainees also get a primer on the travel industry, learning about everything from loyalty programs to duty-free merchandise. "Many people think that to become an Emirates flight attendant is about pushing a trolley up and down the aisle and pouring tea and coffee," Daly said. "It's way more complex than what people think."

Emergency procedures are taught in a full-motion cabin simulator that is more expensive than the static training cabins used by most airlines. Kellie White, the safety-training manager, said students need to know what an emergency looks, sounds and feels like.

"They've had an experience that mimics the real thing," White said of the cabin that rocks, pows, bangs and mists.

This year, Emirates plans to add 2,500 flight attendants to its roster of 13,000 to work on the new Airbus A380 jumbo jets and Boeing 777s that will soon be delivered (Emirates is Boeing's biggest 777 customer, operating 88 of the widebody aircraft with 45 on order).

The airline must also replace flight attendants who leave. The average time on the job is just 4.3 years, a result of the rule requiring them to live in Dubai, Baird said. The high turnover is a challenge, but it also has its benefits, she said.

"We want to have a balance of both," she said. "We want to keep our experience and our maturity because you invest so much in it. But we want to have some movement because that's where you get the energy."

Domett, who runs the Auckland flight-crew school, said it was critical that flight attendants felt that their job was valued by the airline. "I don't think that the American flight attendants feel it's a really glamorous job," she said. "Americans are fantastic at service, but on an aircraft, it's not the same."

Knowing that every job eventually loses its luster, Emirates has one cost-free strategy for sustaining enthusiasm. The pilots and flight attendants are required to walk through the airport in one large attention-getting group, much as they do in a scene in the movie, "Catch Me if You Can."

It is a head-turning display of retro pizazz that promotes the flight attendants and reinforces to these employees that much of the airline's reputation is entrusted to their care.

2. Ansett employees rally 10 years on

Anne Lewis knew the Ansett Airlines collapse had faded from most minds when people stopped moaning to her about the frequent flyer points they'd lost.
But 10 years on from one of the most painful corporate failures in Australian history, the former flight attendant, and thousands of other Ansett employees, are still trying to comprehend the collapse of the company they loved.
At reunions around Australia over the past month, former Ansett employees have got together to remember - and to cheer each other up.

They will also spare a moment for the colleagues who didn't make it through the collapse of their company - at least 40 Ansett employees suicided following the airline's failure.
"Most of us have moved forward," Ms Lewis said.
"We've all suffered, but the way the administrators have handled things has given us the best outcome under the circumstances.
"And we can all be happy that we did our best, we loved our jobs, our company. It was the difference between us and Qantas.
"We loved the fact that we were trained to beyond the minimum standards of service."
Nostalgia pangs
Ms Lewis still works in the aviation industry, a choice that constantly brings on pangs of nostalgia.
"It was very difficult at first, and difficult to cope with other people's reactions," she said.
"But I started coming to terms with the situation when people finally stopped telling me about all the frequent flyer points they'd lost."
A reunion for Adelaide staff will no doubt rekindle memories for Ms Lewis of better days, and of worse.

"On the day that Ansett closed down I got a call to say not to bother coming in, the airline had folded.
"But I still got dressed in my uniform and went to work.
"The doors were closed and there was security people there to stop us going in, but it was the only thing I could think of to do."
By the time Australia's second-biggest airline went into administration Ms Lewis had moved up the management ladder - but until the day before the administrators took over she'd had barely an inkling of what was ahead.
Only a week earlier, the then CEO Gary Toomey had called senior staff together to tell them of a few problems, but insisted they would be overcome.
"A couple of days before the announcement I was on a flight and there was an issue because the refuellers were told not to refuel Ansett planes because the bill hadn't been paid."

For the 15,000 Ansett employees who lost their jobs and faced the possible loss of their entitlements, the 10th anniversary has arrived with some reasonable news.
Administrator KordaMentha last month finalised the sale of the last Ansett asset, its spare parts business, which realised $5.3 million.
The sale brought the returns achieved by the administrator to $727.5 million which amounts to 96 cents in the dollar.
"The Ansett collapse produced enormous pain and hardship to thousands of Australian families. This payment doesn't ease the pain but it can bring closure," said administrator Mark Korda.
Mr Korda said the Ansett Group administration was the largest ever undertaken in Australia.
Its comparative success rested on the decision to avoid a fire sale of assets at a time when the global aviation industry was at one of its lowest ebbs in the immediate aftermath of the September 11 terrorist attacks.
"The strategy for a more orderly approach gained important support from employees, the Federal Government, the ACTU and many other parties," Mr Korda said.
For the Ansett staff the money is obviously welcome.
But for those who were part of an airline that grew into a Australia's second-biggest carrying more than 14 million passengers a year, it is difficult to get past the fact that it ended up with a lot less than the one Fokker Universal aeroplane with which it began 66 years earlier.

Aviation NEWS By
Neha Jain
Aviation NEWS Reporter