KLM 591

KLM 591 is the flight that brought us to Johannesburg.  Somehow that acronym stands for Royal Dutch Airlines, hence the stopover in Amsterdam.

If you’re considering flights to Jo’burg, I would recommend KLM.  The flight attendants were friendly and all spoke competent English, the food was decent and they took good care of us, especially the folks travelling with kids.  (Bob liked the free alcohol.)

Officially, of course, we didn’t fly on KLM.  We flew Northwest Airlines, in compliance with the US government’s “Fly America” rule. 

Under this law, all air travel paid for with government funds (like my Fulbright scholarship) must be on an American carrier, with very limited exceptions.  And the fact that a foreign airline offers superior service at a lower price is not one of them.

At some point some administrative agency issued a ”clarification” that it counted as a US airline so long as there was a code share with a US carrier.  So in practice all the rule really means is that you fly on KLM, but you have to buy the ticket from Northwest.

This creates several disadvantages for the flyer.  Because so many American travellers are legally prevented from purchasing foreign tickets, the US-based airlines don’t really have to compete with the other airlines.  Their tickets are more expensive, and don’t offer the same flexibility in terms of stopover visits, open-return dates, and one-way options.  

Bob and I probably spent an extra $600 to comply with the Fly America rule, even though we weren’t really flying on an American flight!  Multiply that by every time a federal employee flies, and you’re starting to look at a considerable source of waste in government spending.

So, to my American audience:   please write your representatives and ask them to scrap the Fly America Act, so federally-funded travellers can purchase the cheapest tickets available and stop paying more than everybody else to ride on the same damn plane.