Princess affiliated air taxi or not?

On radio news here this morning they are saying these flightseeing passengers were part of a Princess Cruise. Does anyone know if this flight was part of a Princess shore excursion package or a Princess "Cruise Tour" or did they just book this air taxi as independent post cruise or pre cruise voyagers?

http://www.adn.com/article/20140825/atigun-pass-plane-crash-injured-4-occurred-during-sightseeing-tour

On radio news here this morning they are saying these flightseeing passengers were part of a Princess Cruise. Does anyone know if this flight was part of a Princess shore excursion package or a Princess "Cruise Tour" or did they just book this air taxi as independent post cruise or pre cruise voyagers?

 

http://www.adn.com/article/20140825/atigun-pass-plane-crash-injured-4-occurred-during-sightseeing-tour

All cruise ship excursions everywhere are done by independent contractors who have contracts w the cruise ship company. So essentially, the question is meaningless. The air operator may be doing cruise ship flights one day and independently booked flights the next day.

One other point. You have minimal or zero more legal rights if the cruise ship booked tour goes bad as opposed to an independently booked sure. Just read your cruise contract.

There is an higher element of risk when you fly on a small plane than a large airliner. In AK, planes. Article is a bit old but it is still accurate - http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/explainer/2010/08/nofly_zone.html

DON

All cruise ship excursions everywhere are done by independent contractors who have contracts w the cruise ship company. So essentially, the question is meaningless. The air operator may be doing cruise ship flights one day and independently booked flights the next day.

 

One other point. You have minimal or zero more legal rights if the cruise ship booked tour goes bad as opposed to an independently booked sure. Just read your cruise contract.

 

There is an higher element of risk when you fly on a small plane than a large airliner. In AK, planes. Article is a bit old but it is still accurate - http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/explainer/2010/08/nofly_zone.html

 

DON

Actually, no. My question is not meaningless.

Having been in the air taxi and airline game up here all my life I'm a tad familiar with what goes on:

1. Many air taxis refuse to have anything to do with the cruise lines. Was this one of them?

2. Even though the air taxi operators who contract with the cruise line normally conduct much other charter and scheduled business, including flightseeing, there is often a huge difference between the pertinent aspects of a optional land excursion available under a cruise line arranged flightsee than an air taxi's "other" operations.

3. Regarding your remark: "You have minimal or zero more legal rights if the cruise ship booked tour goes bad as opposed to an independently booked sure. Just read your cruise contract." The fact is, many air taxis do not engage with cruise lines under contract scenarios since the lines stipulate many additional protections that the air taxis prefer not to provide, E.G. much higher levels of liability insurance.

4. In addition, your remark: "All cruise ship excursions everywhere are done by independent contractors who have contracts with the cruise ship company." You say "all". Generally speaking this is true but not necessarily in Alaska. For instance, many years back HAL bought out Chuck West's--West Tours. West Tours provided many shore excursions themselves in addition to operating a number of ships. HAL continued to do so. For instance, their Grey Line franchise came with the West Tours buy out, including a very large chain of hotels.

What I am trying to get at here is whether or not these folk booked their flight through Princess. Since the flightsee was conducted deep in the interior of Alaska there is a good chance this particular air taxi concern doesn't do much business with cruise lines or cruise line passengers. However, there is also the possibility that Princess did include them as one of their "Optional Land Excursion" packages within or in addition to one of their "Cruise Tours".

I'm still looking for my answer.

From what I have heard....the people who were on board that plane that went down were on an independent tour up to the North slope...Haven't heard anything since a day or so ago, but I believe that it had nothing to do with the cruise line...People.....know who you book your air tours with.....:)

People.....know who you book your air tours with.....:)

Right on.

Back in 1975 a pilot for an air taxi goofed up big time. He committed the cardinal sin of "scud running" over the featureless terrain of Bering Glacier during the dead of winter. Striking the glacier at high speed he smeared the aircraft over a hundred yards or so of the frozen surface. Fortunately for the pilot, he came out of the wreckage unscathed. Not so for his passenger, who would suffer the rest of his life from injuries. The medical bill alone exceeded one million. "Pilot Error" big time.

The passenger did not have medical insurance anywhere near what it took to cover his bills. The Air Taxi firm's insurance maxed out at 100 K per passenger.

The Air Taxi began bankruptcy proceedings in order to go out of business. Turned out though that the flight had also involved a weekly "mail run" which the air taxi operated under contract with a large airline. In the contract the airline had inserted plenty of legalese to protect it in the event of a negligent accident by the air taxi. The passenger took the 100 K from the air taxi insurance and went after the airline. The airline took the case all the way to the State Supreme Court. So much for their Philadelphia lawyer drawn up contract, they lost it all.

If that pilot had been on a Cruise Line sanctioned flight, then the required insurance would have taken care of everything. If the airline had been smarter they would have stipulated that the air taxi provide much more coverage on a per passenger basis and provide coverage for the airline as well, like some cruise lines do.

I could go on and on with similar Alaskan anecdotes but that would be too repetitive.

As for "read your contract". Good advice. Unfortunately the about the only legitimate "contracts" for an air taxi flightsee that I've seen are the ones that you get if you book through a cruise line.

Having flown many-many air taxi and airline flightsees myself as a commercial pilot and witnessed many more from a management standpoint, I hardly recall seeing or requiring anybody to sign a contract beforehand. However, in recent years, I'm aware of and I have signed a sort of disclaimer form for a helicopter flightsee in Hawaii and the other day I put a couple of friends on a glacier hike where the guiding outfit required them sign a similar agreement. Guess you could call those contracts but I doubt it as they appear to me to be merely questionable attempts to reduce the potential negligence of the operator in order to minimize liability. Sort of like the contract the airline thought they had.

When I OPed this thread I didn't stop to think that I would give some "heartburn". It is true that there are a lot of very good and very safe air taxi operators out there who don't affiliate with the cruise lines. In fact, one of my good friends is in that category, he has a small air taxi and has been accident free for over four decades. I highly recommend him. But as a general rule, it appears to me that the cruise lines, at least the three we use, go to a lot of effort to insure they contract with the best, from a safety and reliability standpoint, as well as require additional protections as I've previously alluded to.

Never forget, a little due diligence eliminates blissful unawareness and the potential for a lot of grief. One lesson I was taught early on in the flying business, "never make assumptions unless you absolutely have to". I have used and taught that rule for over 6 decades and it has no doubt saved my rear on more than one occasion.

All cruise ship excursions everywhere are done by independent contractors who have contracts w the cruise ship company. So essentially, the question is meaningless. The air operator may be doing cruise ship flights one day and independently booked flights the next day.

 

While rare, the bus trip I took into the Yukon (several years ago) was done by a Princess employee. She was hired by Princess and had done it several years and was planning on coming for future years. She had a job where she was off summers and this was perfect for her.

I did look and it appears Princess does have several flights to the Arctic Circle from Fairbanks. Though from the description, they look different compared to the article listed above.

 

I'm still looking for my answer.

Unless someone on this forum knew those 3 passengers, none of us would know if that specific flight was contracted thru Princess.

If you want to know, call the vendor, and ask them.

Unless someone on this forum knew those 3 passengers, none of us would know if that specific flight was contracted thru Princess.

If you want to know, call the vendor, and ask them.

I seriously doubt this was a cruise line connected flight. Fairbanks to Bettles (Gates of the Arctic) to Deadhorse (Prudhoe) to Barter Island???? Sounds almost like the polar bear trip laughing husky is going on. I know it was rough on us one year to find someone to fly us out of Prudhoe to ANWR but we did find someone. I wanted to see just how far that pump station was from Prudhoe, how many caribou I could see and if with horizontal boring, pulling the oil out of ANWR was going to impact ANYTHING as so many believe. NOPE-just a lot of tundra, caribou who LOVE the warm oil pipes in Prudhoe and very desolate country.

Wish we would have gone a little further north that year for the chance to see polar bears but 2 days and a night camping in ANWR was about enough for me and DH's wallet.

I look through the excursion books each spring just to see if they are offering anything new and have never seen such an extensive flightseeing tour. And it would almost have to include an overnight in Deadhorse just due to the timing.

The Princess tour to Prudhoe is bus up, bus back or ONCE in a great while, Princess will offer an Alaska Air flight to Prudhoe with land transport back to Fairbanks. But generally, that tour is the exclusive area of Northern Alaska Tour company (great, great tour-beats the heck out of the bus both ways).

I'm glad everyone survived. After flying around Iraq and Afghanistan in everything from a Blackhawk to some little 6 seater plane (THAT was spooky), flying in Alaska is not scary in the least as long as you have a competent pilot and a good plane.