PSA Airlines Still Exists

Above, a PSA Airlines 727-200 jet. Wikipedia Photo.

Back in the 1970s, whenever I flew around California (usually for GOP state conventions) or to Las Vegas, Nevada, I often flew with PSA Airlines or Western Airlines. My first flight was with PSA Airlines from San Jose, California to LAX in 1974. 

I was using Google to read about PSA (short for Pacific Southwest Airlines) after reading about the current troubles with Spirit Airlines and found that the airline still exists.

Above, yours truly about to board a PSA Airlines plane in 1974. Photo by Max Bettman.

According to the AI-generated overviews: 

Does PSA Airlines still exist?

Yes, PSA Airlines still exists and is a major, growing regional airline operating as a wholly owned subsidiary of American Airlines Group. It operates under the American Eagle brand, focusing on short-haul flights with a fleet of Bombardier CRJ jets, operating over 700 daily flights to nearly 100 destinations.  

PSA Airlines originally stands for Pacific Southwest Airlines, a prominent West Coast carrier founded in 1949 and known as "The World's Friendliest Airline". Today, PSA Airlines operates as a wholly-owned subsidiary of American Airlines Group, using the historic name to protect the trademark. 

 

20 Defunct U.S. Airlines

Above, yours truly about to board a PSA jet in San Jose in 1974. Photo by Max Bettman.

Remember when air travel was like an event?  During those days, passengers dressed up, enjoyed meals and cocktails and had great service.

Nowadays, air travel is more like being herded like cattle and not being treated better than cattle.

Above, Max Bettman and I inside a PSA jet in 1974. Photo by Mitch Geriminsky.

Many airlines have gone out of business or have merged with others. Daily Passport has listed 20 defunct U.S. airlines. There's two on the list that I had flown with: Western Airlines and Pacific Southwest Airlines (PSA). I had been inside a TWA Boeing 747, but never flown with them. Since I used to live near LAX, friends and I went to TWA's maintenance yard there one night in 1970 and we were allowed to tour inside one of their new Boeing 747s.

The article begins with: 

The U.S. airline industry is more consolidated than ever before. The so-called “Big Four” airlines — American, Delta, Southwest, and United — now control nearly three-quarters of the U.S. market. But that wasn’t always the case. After the federal government deregulated airlines in 1978, a rainbow of airplane tail colors could be seen at airports across the country. Over the years, many of these airlines merged with larger carriers, while over 100 airlines went bankrupt. Take a trip down memory lane and learn more about 20 defunct U.S. airlines you might remember flying at some point.

To read the full article, go here.

Winchester Mystery House

Above, a 1988 adult ticket to the Winchester Mystery House.

Back around 1988, we took a family vacation to Northern California. During this trip, we went to Big Sur, Monterey, Klamath and Sacramento. We also stopped in San Jose to tour the famous Winchester Mystery House, built by Winchester Repeating Arms heiress Sarah Winchester.

From Wikipedia:

The Winchester Mystery House is a mansion in San Jose, California, that was once the personal residence of Sarah Winchester, the widow of firearms magnate William Wirt Winchester. The house became a tourist attraction nine months after Winchester's death in 1922. The Victorian and Gothic-style mansion is renowned for its size and its architectural curiosities.

It is sometimes claimed to be one of the "most haunted places in the world", but there is no evidence to support this belief. Much of the lore regarding the Winchester House and its owner is fanciful, unverified, and often provably false. 

The Winchester Mystery House is still open for tours today. For information, check the official website by going here. 

San Jose Mayor: Firearms Will Be Confiscated For Non-Compliance

Looney Left Report

Followers of this blog are aware (at least they should be) that the city of San Jose, California passed an ordinance last month requiring gun owners to obain liability insurance and pay a fee to the city.

Immediately, a lawsuit was filed to put an injunction on the ordinance's enforcement.

Well, the Democrat mayor has now stated that if gun owners don't obtain liability insurance or pay the fee, their guns will be confiscated.

The Gateway Pundit reported:

San Jose’s city council passed a measure last month requiring gun owners to pay a $25 “harm reduction” fee and liability insurance or relinquish their firearms to the government, making the city the first in the nation to impose an annual fee on law-abiding, firearm owning citizens.

The city’s Democrat mayor, Sam Liccardo insists the new ordinance, allowing law enforcement officials to seize firearms from those who refuse to pay the fees, will ultimately reduce crime and establish “a new kind of framework for gun safety,  Slate reports.

Allowing law enforcement to seize firearms from those who refuse to pay the fee makes will ultimately reduce crime, the Liccardo told the publication.

To hell with that idea, I sure wouldn't comply if I lived in San Jose, Commiefornia!

To read more, go here.

2nd Amendment Group Sues San Jose Over Gun Bill

It was inevitable that the city of San Jose, California would be sued over their sweeping new gun bill, but sued they were.

Yahoo News reported:

A gun rights group has filed a lawsuit against the City of San Jose, California, after the city passed a gun bill it argues will reduce firearms-related incidents.

"The City of San Jose has taken the unprecedented step of requiring virtually all gun owners within its city limits to pay unspecified sums of money to private insurance companies and an unspecified fee to an unidentified government-chosen non-profit simply to exercise their constitutional right to own a gun," reads a lawsuit filed by the National Association for Gun Rights Tuesday.

At issue is bill passed Tuesday by the City of San Jose that will require gun owners to purchase liability insurance and pay "use fees" that the city plans to invest in "evidence-based initiatives to reduce gun harm."

To read more, go here.

California City Passes First Gun Law Requiring Annual Fees, Liability Insurance

Looney Left Report

My "honorary sister" passed on the following story to me.

Even before reading it, I had a feeling that it had to be about a Northern California city (not that cities in Southern California are any better, at least not anymore).

Sure enough, it was about a Northern California city.

Fox News reported:

A California city has passed the first-of-its-kind gun law that will require gun owners to purchase liability insurance and pay an annual fee on their weapons. 

San Jose city council members voted to approve the new law, which requires gun owners to pay about
$25 a year as well as administrative costs to the city. Gun owners also must pay for liability insurance, which covers losses or damages resulting from "any negligent or accidental use of the firearm," within six months of acquiring a weapon.  

The new plan has no set deadline to go into effect, but opponents have already sought an injunction. The Firearm Policy Coalition says the law is "burdensome, unconstitutional, and prohibited by California law" for gun-owning citizens, ABC 7 reported. 

This is obviously an unconstitutional law.

To read more, go here.

Flying With Pacific Southwest Airlines (PSA) In 1974

Above, yours truly about to board a "PSA Grinningbird" in San Jose.

This morning, I scanned some photos from April 1974 of the first airplane flight I took.

It was aboard a Pacific Southwest Airlines (PSA) Boeing 737 or Boeing 727, I don't exactly remember which. Max Bettman, Mitch Geriminsky and I were returning to Los Angeles from a Republican State Central Committee Convention in San Jose in which then-Vice President Gerald R. Ford was the headliner.

Above, Max Bettman and your truly aboard the PSA jet.

In our Hawthorne High School alumni Facebook page, I started a discussion on PSA. I scanned the accompanying photos to post in the discussion. 

Above, Mitch Geriminsky. Photo by Armand Vaquer.

On PSA, according to Wikipedia:

Pacific Southwest Airlines (PSA) was a United States airline headquartered in San Diego, California, that operated from 1949 to 1988. It was the first large discount airline in the United States. PSA called itself "The World's Friendliest Airline" and painted a smile on the nose of its airplanes, the PSA Grinningbirds. Opinion L.A. of the Los Angeles Times called PSA "practically the unofficial flag carrier airline of California for almost forty years."

The airline initially operated as an intrastate airline wholly within the state of California. This strategy which avoided the steep costs from federal regulation would later serve as the model for Southwest Airlines, doing in Texas what PSA had done in California. After the Airline Deregulation Act of 1978, PSA expanded to cities in other western states, and eventually to several cities in Mexico.

In 1986 PSA became the first of two airlines that merged into the existing USAir, followed by Piedmont Airlines in 1987. The PSA acquisition was completed in 1988. USAir changed its name to US Airways in 1997. In 2005, after its second bankruptcy filing, America West Airlines acquired US Airways, continuing with the name until it merged with American Airlines in 2015.

Above, a shot of a PSA stewardess. Photo by Max Bettman.

 

It's Getting Cheaper To Fly To Hawaii

Above, a view of Diamond Head from Waikiki. Photo by Armand Vaquer.

If you live in or near Northern California and want to vacation in Hawaii, you're in luck!

An expansion of air routes with low-cost airfares are being offered.

AFAR Media reported:

With fares as low as $159 one-way, our winter travel plans just got a serious boost from Southwest Airlines’ major Hawaii expansion. 

Low-cost carrier Southwest Airlines is adding several new Hawaii routes from Sacramento, Oakland, and San Jose with one-way fares starting as low as $159. 

As of mid-January 2020, the airline will have new, daily service between Sacramento and Honolulu. There will also be new nonstop service to both Lihue Airport on Kauai and Hilo International Airport on the Island of Hawaii from both Oakland and San Jose—this will be the first time Southwest will be servicing those two Hawaii hubs. 

The flights are all currently bookable for travel into early March and range from $159 for a one-way flight midweek up to $448 for a one-way fare during the weekend, with the bulk of flights landing in the $200 to $350 range each way.

To read more, go here. 

California's Drought Continues: No Measurable Rain In Bay Area In January

Too Many People Making The Problem Worse

December in the San Francisco Bay Area and other parts of Northern California had one of the wettest Decembers on record.

Then, we moved into January and the rains all ended. For the month of January, the total amount of rainfall in the Bay Area and Sacramento was...zip, zero, nada.

This is the first time on record that no measurable rainfall dropped on the Bay Area for a month.

According to the San Jose Mercury News:

For the first time ever, San Francisco, Oakland and Sacramento have recorded no rainfall for the month of January -- nada drop. 

San Jose has received a record-low .02 inches, and no rain is forecast for at least a week. 

Adding more ominous news to California's historic drought, the Bay Area's rainy season has swung from boom to bust, with the month of January wrapping up as the driest on record. 

"Dismally meager," is how the state Department of Water Resources on Thursday described the precious Sierra snowpack, which has plummeted statewide to 25 percent of its average for this time of year.

February is generally the wettest month of the year. Hopefully, we will have a normal or above-normal month of rainfall.

California is having a tough time with this drought. We've had others before, but we've never had such an explosion in population growth. There's just too many people here and the state is trying to bring in more "water-sucking" people (according to the People's Republic of California blog).

It has gotten so bad in Southern California, that it seems that the weekend freeway traffic in L.A. is worse than during work days.

To read more, go here.