| Journal: TWUK | Section: |
| Title: | Issue Date: 07/08/00 |
| Author: | Page Number: 13 |
| Copyright: Other |
The recent Concorde crash has made the travel industry think about the consequences of such a disaster and how to deal with it
Noel Josephides
I was at the Farnborough air show last week as a guest of TAP Air Portugal.We are as close to TAP as we are to the smaller airlines we work with.
I always like to think that, if there is a problem with some aspect of Sunvil’s operation or if any business colleagues want to discuss an issue, they can just pick up the phone and talk to me.
In the same way, I can pick up the phone to Jose Moreira, TAP sales manager, at any time and Dick Eastaugh, our TAP sales representative, knows Portugal and the Portuguese intimately.
This is the strength and advantage which smaller organisations have.
I will be so sorry if all such smaller airlines are swallowed into large, impersonal and inefficient conglomerates.
I must say I was pleased that the British Airways/Olympic Airways deal came to nothing.
While we were at the show the news came through about Concorde.
A shiver went up my spine when I heard.
You may think me callous when I say my thoughts were not only with those who were suddenly killed but also with those who had created and operated this magnificent machine.
Sunvil’s offices are below Heathrow’s flight path and I watch Concorde often.
However, being responsible for a business I always live with the fear that, one day, a disaster will strike some part of our operation and, like Concorde’s designers, Air France, BA, those who service the aircraft and anyone who had anything remotely to do with its operation, we too will be hauled over the coals by a holier than thou press.
Every crank, every obscure body had something to say about this crash.
Yes, there is a risk that an aircraft could crash on the Sunvil building when coming in to land at Heathrow and I am sure one day, an aircraft will crash on London – but so what.
When your number comes up, it comes up.
The best of us make mistakes. If you don’t want to risk dying in a crash then don’t get on an aircraft.
A machine is a machine and will, one day, develop a fault where you least expect a fault to develop, not matter how well it is maintained.
The last two years have seen weekly conferences on disaster management for the travel industry.
Yes, we do have a plan at Sunvil but take it from me, when disaster strikes it will be when we least expect it, when Chris Wright, our operations manager, has a problemwith his phone and whenI’ve forgotten mine in the car.
We are literally frightened into thinking we have to flyout relatives at enormous cost, put them up indefinitelyin hotels, provide counselling andso on and so forth.
Let me make it quite clear to anyone booking a Sunvil holiday.
All of us here will do our level best, as every other company would, but we won’t bankrupt our company catering for modern-day demands.
If that results in very bad publicity then so be it because the whole thing has really gone too far.
“I am sure one day an aircraftwill crash on London -but so what. When your numbercomes up,it comes up”