Ask the pilot

The Five Continent Club is considerably more extensive, with no fewer than 17 members from Alitalia to EgyptAir. Again, however, we discover only two entries from the United States, this time United and Continental. Northwest, its Asian wanderings notwithstanding, visits only three continents in total; U.S. Airways, a mere two. At Delta and American, it's four. Southwest? One. A look at our biggest players:

American Airlines (North and South America, Europe, Asia)
Delta (North and South America, Europe, Asia)
United (all except Africa)
Continental (all except Africa)
Northwest (North America, Europe, Asia)

Continents aside, doubtless many of you are asking which airline flies to more countries than any other. Not as easy as it sounds. The vagaries of Pacific and Caribbean island nationhood, along with the complexities of airline alliances and subsidiary operations, make that extremely difficult to determine. Air France would be my guess.

The whole which-airlines-go-where discussion brings up one of the more vexing and misleading things encountered in the travel pages of newspapers and magazines. In the "How to Get There" boxes that accompany most destination features, we're commonly told all sorts of half-truths: that United flies to South Africa, for instance, or Northwest to Ghana. "The cheapest fares from Boston to Cairo," claimed one paper's Sunday travel section recently, next to a story about Egypt, "are $795 on Delta Air Lines." That's a great price, but Delta doesn't fly to Cairo. What's shown, usually, are fare quotes taken from online sources that bundle code-share affiliations under a single name. Indeed Delta is more than happy to sell you a ticket to Cairo, though in truth you'll be riding on its SkyTeam partner, Air France. The carriers themselves don't make this any clearer on their Web sites. American Airlines' downloadable timetable advertises service to, among other places, Abu Dhabi and the Ivory Coast. Only through the fine print do you realize these flights are run by alliance partners.

Where scheduled operations fail to venture, charters sometimes dare. Indianapolis-based ATA has flown on-demand military contracts worldwide for years. Ditto for World Airways, an MD-11/DC-10 operator headquartered in Virginia. World's assignments routinely take crews as far afield as Afghanistan and Angola. Elsewhere, Germany's LTU is famous for its far and wide leisure charters. Same for Lauda Air, the long-haul holiday specialist from Vienna.

But if the spirit of Pan Am's far-flung voyaging is carried on by any American successors, the cargo realm is the place to look. UPS and FedEx, owners of 325 and 265 jetliners, respectively, maintain substantial hubs in the Middle and Far East. FedEx runs its AsiaOne hub at Subic Bay, Philippines, and its EuroOne center at Paris-Charles de Gaulle. It recently commenced the first-ever freighter nonstops between mainland China and Europe with a daily Shanghai-Frankfurt trip.

DHL is another example. Well, sort of, since the shipping giant does not own any single large airline, instead preferring to contract with numerous independents in different countries, which then outfit their planes in DHL's red and yellow livery. Neither is DHL any longer a U.S. entity, although it was started by three Americans in 1969 -- Adrian Dalsey, Larry Hillblom and Robert Lynn, from whom the company's initials are taken. Those who've traveled know that DHL's name and logo are more widely recognized than those of either UPS or FedEx, reaching into the globe's most remote and distant regions.

Perhaps most interesting of all is New York-based Atlas Air. Little known outside the biz, Atlas specializes in heavy-lift charters and lease arrangements to just about anywhere and everywhere. Its 30-plus aircraft are the industry's largest all-cargo 747 fleet (and their tail markings, I'll add, are resplendent).

All right, but I'd be remiss if I didn't point out that the seeming isolationist tendencies of American passenger carriers is to some degree the product of geography. North America, if you haven't noticed, sits between two enormous oceans. The long-haul efforts in crossing those oceans present all sorts of risky and expensive challenges, and they are not to be embarked upon whimsically. And we're a big nation. Five hours east of California is New Jersey; five hours east of Germany is Turkmenistan. Flying to Tunisia strikes the average American as exotic; for the average Italian it's a 90-minute flight and a long weekend. And admittedly, nostalgic reminiscing about the past is a foolish and naive way of analyzing the present. For all its intrepid trailblazing, what did Pan Am end up with? Bankruptcy and liquidation in 1991.

Nonetheless, the floundering of our country's airlines, while everyone else's seem to be soaring, feels on some levels like an indictment of our entrepreneurial spirit.

- - - - - - - - - - - -

Do you have questions for Salon's aviation expert? Send them to AskThePilot and look for answers in a future column.

Story finder (3 ways to search Salon)

Search terms:

Salon the Web

Salon Directory (browse by topic)