Malachi O'Neill

Time for a recap about aviation charter pricing. The aviation charter market is not the same as airlines. The airline is obligated by law to fly their route once it is published. They are going no matter how full the seats. The flip-side is that as the departure date gets closer they can - and obviously do - charge a much higher price on that seat. It's fixed inventory and also expiring. Airlines by nature of their business model will charge much higher prices the longer you wait to book It just is. Charter Market: Flies only when booked. Won't just fly willy-nilly and then hope to fill seats. Price is almost always competitive. Lots of changes to the industry the last few years has made it even more so. Is there last - minute price hikes during peak periods like the airlines do? Sure. But not nearly as frequently as the airlines do. The charter market has to compete for each leg. So why do prices tend to increase during the holidays, and particularly as you get closer to the date of travel? On the surface it appears that the charter companies are simply raising their prices and gouging customers. Largely not the case. We've discussed this. Each flight segment is competitive. The reason that prices go up is due to overall industry-fleet availability. The industry-wide fleet really is not that large. On peak holidays, nearly every viable aircraft will be flying at some point. (You have to compare category to category. A small 4 seat Cessna reciprocating single-engine is not the same category as a twin-turbine powered aircraft). With nearly every aircraft getting nearly completely booked for the peak week like Thanksgiving, starting today, really, you have to start expanding your search radius for available aircraft. That search radius is called repositioning. That is metal being pushed through the air with a lot of fuel. It costs just as much as a "live leg". The larger the radius, the repositioning, the larger the cost of your flight - the "live-leg". Charter providers by and large are not gouging their customers. It's too competitive to be able to do that for anyone that wants to stay in the game. I have to have this discussion regularly, particularly around the holidays.

What possible reason should the Mercator ever be used in an online or digital format, other than absolute laziness or historical description of maps in general?

Veteran's Day.

per @grok "Part 135 Business Jets: 0.05–0.15 per 100 million" "Yes, that rough range checks out. Recent NTSB data shows on-demand Part 135 fixed-wing fatal accident rates around 0.06 per 100k hours. Factoring typical business-jet speeds and passenger loads converts it to roughly 0.05–0.15 deaths per 100 million passenger miles—still far safer than cars or walking."

Could actually be a great rule. Doom-scrolling ONLY allowed if on a treadmill.