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Hurricane Ike: Continental shifts its hub from Houston headquarters

While airlines have been posting passenger updates about Hurricane Ike on their websites all day, one — Continental Airlines — also has been temporarily transferring its business operations to an off-site facility, according to a release from the airlines.

Houston is a hub for Continental. The alternate location wasn’t given in the release; it was described only as “outside the city of Houston.” Continental says it will maintain operations away from its 1600 Smith St. location until the storm passes.

Houston’s airports closed Friday and will be shut Saturday as well because of the storm. Many airlines said they hoped to get operations going on Sunday morning.

Continental passengers may make a one-time date or time change to their tickets without penalty if they were scheduled to travel between now and Wednesday to or from Houston, Austin, Dallas/Fort Worth or San Antonio. Check Continental’s website for details and date restrictions.

Delta Air Lines is extending a one-time change offer to fliers to or from Austin, Brownsville, Corpus Christi, Harlingen, Houston, Laredo, McAllen and San Antonio; click here to check on details.

JetBlue is waiving fees for passengers flying to or from Houston and Austin within certain date periods; check the website for details.

Ike stirs memories of Galveston’s 1900 hurricane

Houston airports to shut down as storm nears

Hurricane Ike storm tracker

– Mary Forgione, Los Angeles Times staff writer

[Photo: The tidal surge from Hurricane Ike cause waves to overtake the service road along Interstate 45 near Galveston, Texas, on Friday; Scott Olson / Getty Images]

This entry was posted on Saturday, September 13, 2008 at 6:24 am by Mary Forgione and is filed under Airline travel, Southern States, Texas. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a comment, or trackback from your own site.

3 Comments on “Hurricane Ike: Continental shifts its hub from Houston headquarters”

Diarna Lindsay Says:
September 13th, 2008 at 8:06 am
I live in Austalia but have a Dear friend in Houston. My thougths are with you all at this moment. Please let this all be right & everyone safe.
Aussie thoughts & wishes.
D xxx
Andrew Rigby Says:
September 13th, 2008 at 4:59 pm
With a little more investigative research, you’d learn the off-site facility is actually a cold-war era bunker, capable of holding two thousand persons for two weeks…
faahope Says:
September 14th, 2008 at 5:08 pm
Acting Chief, Complaint Center Operations October 14, 2007
Melissa Ehlinger Office of Inspector General
1200 New Jersey Ave. S.E.
Washington, D.C. 20590-0001

Based on your evaluation and the closing of my case number 07IH-B33-I-000 from the OIG, I
will put you on record as believing that the FAA has told the first responders and the emergency
management of the state of Florida of the change in critical infrastructure and key resources. I
will also put you on record as believing that the FAA has a valid and exercised backup plan that
Jacksonville ARTCC can and will take over for the Miami ARTCC Center if indeed there is a
disaster in Miami.

You state in your letter that “The Miami Air Route Traffic Control Center (ARTCC) Contingency
Plan outlines the administrative and operational responsibilities of each supporting ARTCC and
TRACON in the event of a major facility/system outage or prolonged interruption to Air Traffic
Control services. Execution of this plan would not impact external air traffic services and would
provide the same service without negatively impacting vulnerability or recovery from events such
as terrorism or hurricanes. Public services such as emergency air response and key resources
associated with its efficiency are not impacted.”

As stated in the news September 25, 2007 that when Memphis ARTCC center went to ATCZero
it was a 250 nm area that was down. Let me remind you that if the FAA had a valid and true
contingency plan I would have imagined that one of the 5 surrounding ARTCC Centers that
boarder the Memphis ARTCC center would have taken over and assumed their air space.
There are a few questions I have for you. Since Jacksonville is 283 nautical miles from Miami
and 435 nm from Key West how do you think they will help south Florida after a disaster? If the
FAA has a real working and proven backup plan why didn’t any of the other 5 ARTCC Centers
take over for Memphis when it went to ATCZero? If one of them had assumed that air space who
would have taken over that centers air space?

I also have to assume that you have proven paper work that the FAA has done this in an exercise
since it is stated in the Homeland Security Act of 2002, NIPP, Presidential directives 5, 7 and 8,
the National Response Framework, the National Strategy for Homeland Security and that the
results were positive and acceptable to the department of Homeland Securities standards and
approval.

I challenge you to reopen my case and walk into any ARTCC center and at random ask a
controller if they have been trained to take over another ARTCC centers airspace in an
emergency. Or ask the controllers how often they have actually seen these plans and been trained
for this plans. When they tell you that they have never seen these plans and you ask to see the
plans you will see written on the envelopes “On a need to know basis.” I challenge you to force
the FAA to do an exercise and prove that they can do what they have written on paper. I have
filled out a FOIA to have you send to me all the paper work from my case.

I can promise you that not if but when a disaster happens in the United States and when the FAA
cannot really do what they have written on paper as a disaster recovery plan, I will hold our
government and the FAA responsible for the lives that will be lost. The FAA was lucky in New
Orleans after Katrina because the ARTCC Center in Houston was unaffected.