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☆ The origin of Elon Musk’s feud with Bill Gates, according to Musk’s new biography
▼ + stars: | 2023-09-11 | by ( Paul Glader | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +4 min

The meeting went sideways, according to Walter Isaacson’s new biography, “Elon Musk,” which hits stores Tuesday. “Hey, I’d love to come see you and talk about philanthropy and climate,” Gates texted Musk in 2022, Isaacson wrote. “Most philanthropy was “bulls—,” Musk told Gates, estimating only 20 cents of each dollar made a difference that way. Gates could “do more good for climate change by investing in Tesla,” Musk said, according to Isaacson. When Gates sent documentation about his philanthropic work and followed up with a text to Musk, Musk asked if he was still holding a short bet against Tesla.

Persons: Bill Gates, Elon Musk, Walter Isaacson’s, “ Elon Musk, Musk, Gates, “, Isaacson, Isaacson —, ” Gates, ” Musk, Melinda, Melinda Gates, Warren Buffett, Mark Zuckerberg, Michael Bloomberg, texted Isaacson Organizations: CNN, Elon, Microsoft, Melinda Gates Foundation, Tesla Locations: Austin , Texas, Washington , DC

☆ Bill Gates and Elon Musk: An excerpt from Walter Isaacson's new biography of Musk
▼ + stars: | 2023-09-10 | by ( Walter Isaacson | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +7 min

The following is adapted from Walter Isaacson's biography "Elon Musk," publishing Sept. 12. "Hey, I'd love to come see you and talk about philanthropy and climate," Bill Gates said to Elon Musk when they happened to be at the same meeting in early 2022. In the rarefied fraternity of people who have held the title of richest person on Earth, Musk and Gates have some similarities. Gates had shorted Tesla stock, placing a big bet that it would go down in value. "How can someone say they are passionate about fighting climate change and then do something that reduced the overall investment in the company doing the most?"

Persons: Walter Isaacson's, Elon Musk, Bill Gates, Gates, They'd, Rory, schedulers, Musk, Omead Afshar, they'll, I'd, shorting Tesla, Claire Boucher, Grimes, Tesla, Walter Isaacson, Jennifer Doudna, Leonardo da Vinci, Steve Jobs, Albert Einstein, Benjamin Franklin, Henry Kissinger Organizations: SpaceX, Tesla, Washington , D.C, Twitter, CNBC, Tulane University, CNN Locations: Austin, Washington ,

☆ Flight disruptions continue on peak July Fourth travel day, with United faring the worst
▼ + stars: | 2023-06-30 | by ( Leslie Josephs | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +6 min

Flight delays and cancellations continued to mar thousands of Fourth of July travelers on Friday, with United Airlines passengers bearing the brunt of the problems. United Airlines has fared the worst with disruptions, with half of its mainline flights arriving late during that six-day period amounting to average delays of 106 minutes, according to FlightAware data. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg called United out for the flight disruptions, saying the airline's disruptions were "elevated but moving in the right direction." United said late Thursday that it expected cancellations and delays to continue to improve into the holiday weekend. "It led to massive delays, cancellations, diversions, as well as crews and aircraft out of position," Kirby wrote in a staff note, which was seen by CNBC.

Persons: Pete Buttigieg, United, schedulers, Ken Diaz, Garth Thompson, Scott Kirby, Monday, Kirby, Joanna Geraghty Organizations: JFK International, Airlines, Transportation Security Administration, Federal Aviation, United Airlines, O'Hare, U.S, JetBlue Airways, Transportation, Association of Flight, Air Line Pilots Association, United, FAA, Newark Liberty International, New, CNBC, JetBlue Locations: New York City, Canada, East, Chicago , Illinois, U.S, New York, United, New Jersey

New York CNN —Hundreds of thousands of US airline customers were stranded this week as severe weather grounded planes and led to canceled flights. As of 8:30 am ET, FlightAware tracking service reported there were 687 flights canceled and another 1,200 delays. Although that’s better than the 2,200 canceled flights in each of the last two days, or the more than 16,000 delayed flights between Monday and Tuesday, it’s hardly a smooth-running operation. Staffing shortageThe US air travel system is unable to recover quickly from widespread weather problems, because it doesn’t have the bodies to deal with the disruptions. The airline canceled 461 flights this past Saturday and Sunday and delayed another 1,972 flights, according to data from flight tracking site FlightAware.

Persons: that’s, it’s, Ed Bastian, ”, Scott Kirby, Kirby, ” Kirby, United, “, Paul Thacker, ” Thacker, “ ”, ” Michelle Maciel, Pete Muntean, Gregory Wallace Organizations: New, New York CNN, Federal Aviation, Airport, Transportation, Administration, FAA, Newark Airport, United, United Airlines, CNN, Newark Liberty International Airport, Association of Flight, DC, Greyhound Locations: New York, Boston, New York City, Madrid, United’s, Newark, Toronto, Denver, Portland Oregon

☆ Southwest explains its meltdown to Congress
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-09 | by ( Gregory Wallace | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +4 min

Washington CNN —Congress is set to receive new evidence Thursday of internal chaos at Southwest Airlines over the Christmas holiday meltdown. The Senate Commerce committee is set to question Southwest executive Andrew Watterson, alongside Southwest pilot union president Casey Murray, Sharon Pinkerton of the Airlines for America trade group, Paul Hudson of Flyers’ Rights, and economist Clifford Winston of The Brookings Institution. It’s a mess down here.”A photograph of the message, which shows the extent of the airline’s breakdown, is included in testimony the Southwest Airlines Pilots Association union, SWAPA, plans to present at the hearing. Southwest CEO Bob Jordan apologized and the airline offered reimbursements for passengers’ costs, along with bonus points. The union criticized the airline for giving executives stock options in the wake of the meltdown while employees lost profit sharing pay because of the airline’s financial hit due to the meltdown.

☆ Southwest pilots detail the Christmas meltdown chaos
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-08 | by ( Gregory Wallace | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +4 min

CNN —Congress is set to receive new evidence Thursday of internal chaos at Southwest Airlines over the Christmas holiday meltdown. It’s a mess down here.”A photograph of the message, which shows the extent of the airline’s breakdown, is included in testimony the Southwest Airlines Pilots Association union, SWAPA, plans to present at a Senate Commerce committee hearing. “No updates here,” another cockpit computer message to pilots read. Southwest CEO Bob Jordan apologized and the airline offered reimbursements for passengers’ costs, along with bonus points. The union criticized the airline for giving executives stock options in the wake of the meltdown while employees lost profit sharing pay because of the airline’s financial hit due to the meltdown.

☆ Southwest pilots' union calls vote to authorize potential strike as contract talks sour
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-18 | by ( Leslie Josephs | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +2 min

Southwest Airlines pilots' union plans to hold a vote that could give it the power to call a potential strike, a move that comes weeks after the carrier's holiday meltdown further strained ties with its workers' unions. Southwest and the Southwest Airlines Pilots Association have been in negotiations for a new contract for years. Union leaders have focused on better work rules and scheduling for Southwest workers. The union's president, Casey Murray, said it was the first time the union has held a strike authorization vote. "This decision is not one based on emotion, but I would be lying if I said that I wasn't angry," Murray wrote to pilots.

But a plan to move heavy oil quickly from inventories at the Petroboscan joint venture with state-run company PDVSA is facing delays because of lack of dredging at Maracaibo Lake's navigation channel, the people said. Petroboscan has instructed vessels since to limit their draft after loading at the Bajo Grande oil terminal. That means about 250,000 barrels of Boscan heavy crude can move at a time through the channel linking Bajo Grande to the Caribbean Sea. In a sign that Chevron expects to expand operations quickly, the oil producer has begun advertising for Venezuelan contract administrators and cargo schedulers. The company wants to assemble a trading team to market oil from Venezuela and expand its role in the four projects.

☆ How Southwest Airlines Melted Down
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-29 | by ( Alison Sider | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

When Southwest Airlines Co. reassigns crews after flight disruptions, it typically relies on a system called SkySolver. This Christmas, SkySolver not only didn’t solve much, it also helped create the worst industry meltdown in recent memory. Airline executives and labor leaders point to inadequate technology systems, in particular SkySolver, as one reason why a brutal winter storm turned into a debacle. SkySolver was overwhelmed by the scale of the task of sorting out which pilots and flight attendants could work which flights, Southwest executives said. Crew schedulers instead had to comb through records by hand.

☆ Why Southwest is still melting down
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-29 | by ( David Goldman | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +6 min

Still, Southwest canceled another 2,300 flights today, long after its rivals had resumed normal service. Here’s why is Southwest taking so long to get its operations back on track: Southwest got unlucky with the location of the storm and its timing. And outdated scheduling technology left Southwest scrambling to match crew with planes. Bad luckThe storm hit Chicago and Denver hard, where Southwest has two of its biggest hubs – Chicago Midway airport and Denver International airport. Although Southwest says it was fully staffed for the holiday weekend, illness makes adjusting to increased system stress difficult.

☆ Southwest asks HQ employees to ditch normal jobs to pitch in to get flights back on track, leaked memo says
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-28 | by ( Taylor Rains | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

Southwest Airlines is battling an operational meltdown, canceling over 9,000 flights since Sunday. The carrier asked corporate employees to volunteer to work eight-hour shifts to help with crew scheduling. The shifts would be in lieu of normal day-to-day work duties, according to an internal memo. The shift would be worked instead of each employee's normal day-to-day duties and the memo does not mention incentives like extra pay. Captain Mike Santoro, vice president of the Southwest Airlines Pilots Association, told Insider on Tuesday that the airline's scheduling software is "outdated" and needs an upgrade.

☆ Southwest says its travel meltdown was partially caused by a 'scheduling issue' and that it'll reimburse 'reasonable requests' for meals, hotels, and travel
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-27 | by ( Taylor Rains | Paul Squire | Rebecca Cohen | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

Southwest Airlines in part blamed a "scheduling issue" for thousands of flight cancelations during the holidays. Southwest said it would reimburse "reasonable" requests like meals, hotel stays, or other transportation. The company also said it'd honor "reasonable" reimbursement requests from customers for things like meals, hotel stays, or other ways to travel to their destination. Southwest captain Mike Santoro, vice president of the Southwest Airlines Pilots Association (SWAPA), told Insider that the airline's system is having so many issues, schedulers are sorting out flight crews by hand. Customers who want to rebook their flight or get a refund can go to the airline's "Travel Disruption" page.

☆ Frustrated Southwest pilot and union rep says the airline's flight meltdown was caused by outdated scheduling software
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-27 | by ( Taylor Rains | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +5 min

Southwest Airlines has canceled nearly 2,600 flights so far on Tuesday after canceling over 2,900 on Monday. For example, he explained one flight had two pilots and three flight attendants assigned to a flight but needed one more flight attendant for the plane to legally fly. There were several deadheading flight attendants onboard, meaning they were being flown to another city for an assignment but were "ready, willing, and able to work" that flight as well. "Even though we had a crew available, [scheduling] had no idea those flight attendants were in the back of the airplane." The latter's systems failed to keep up because flight attendants use a system largely reliant on phone lines, Montgomery told KHOU.

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