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VB Safety Problems?

 
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Old 6th Jun 2002, 19:21
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Thumbs down VB Safety Problems?

Heard on the grapevine that VB Cabin crew are having a few saety related problems. About one incident per week was the figure touted.

In a specific incident, the Purser involved thought it would be a funny idea to give the "BRACE" command over the PA during taxi in. Unfortunately, one of the passengers didn't see this as particularly amusing and reported the incident to CASA, who are conducting an investigation.

I received this second or third hand; anyone out there verify it?

If so, it is a damning indictment of the airline's general attitude. I know this has been discussed recently on a different thread, but I believe this specific incident deserved one of it's own. The girls may be pretty, but they are as dumb as fence posts if they believe this sort of stuff is acceptable.
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Old 6th Jun 2002, 21:54
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I am a FA for another airline but have bumped into DJ FAs in the past... They seem like switched on little cookies. I don't think they are dumb (as a general rule) but it is more the 'vibe' of the company.... Alot of the Pursers are the original girls that hadn't flown before and get too carried away with the whole 'Virgin Flair' thing. I think they just don't know how far is too far. They are told to be different in alll that they do without much guidence or boundries.

The above is just an observation of mine and my own opinion of the girls that I have met. I have only ever met one that I wouldn't give the time of day to. The rest, like I said, are pretty down to Earth and seem switched on.

Perhaps with the ex-AN people coming in things may settle down. I don't doubt their safety performence though. Didn't they evacuate a 737 for CASA in record time?
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Old 7th Jun 2002, 04:40
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Have to agree balance.

Seen some real dumb assed stuff first hand.
Would hate to see what happens in a real evacuation.

Quite a number of the girls are now not stating what they do and who for , because of the FHM thing.
Perhaps Vougue may have been a classier thing to do.

*A number of girls are not with the idea that you wait for the seat belt sign to go off and Aircraft to stop before opening Cabin doors.

*Cabin Supervisors giving the Ok for the crew to resume service after the Captain has put the seat belt sign on .
Captain then found out and gave a good blast to the
C Supervisor. He was listening through the Interphone.
C Supervisor could see no wrong with it........

*One of the C Crew sitting on the floor chatting to pax in the Aisle, wondering why C Supervisor told her to get up ?????

*Administer Oxygen to pax while Hyperventilating......

*Swearing and Bitching in the Galley in earshot of Pax.....

This may be a veture off track of the original post , however it all reflects the image of the mass employment factory.
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Old 7th Jun 2002, 07:13
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Michael Stipe,

as you have clearly indicated in the cabin crew forum you are indeed a VB cabin crew member yourself, if what your saying is the case then I beg you to report this to CASA.

Yes the girls are pretty blah blah blah, but I for one would have a heart attack if someone told me to brace brace brace.

It is not acceptable and not funny.
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Old 7th Jun 2002, 07:14
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Exclamation

Re the last two points

Pulse chicks are told to administer oxygen to pax as part of their
training. Hyperventilation can be a symptom of hypoxia, which is
why oxygen is administered.

As for swearing etc in the galley - all cabin crew are guilty of this
worldwide! No airline is immune from it - certainly don't want the
pax to hear of course - some voices however carry further than
other sadly! If you haven't already, you soon develop a knack
for whispering in the galley!

As for the other points - why as a VB crewmember
would you do it???!!! Suppose it's only natural in a company
that expands as rapidly as they do to not have a firm grasp
of what happens around the network!

Must just be a minority that do this though surely??!
Mr Seatback 2 is offline  
Old 7th Jun 2002, 08:02
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Talking

GOOD GRIEF!

Another negative thread about DJ! What is wrong with you people?

If you look in the galley's of the OA 742's, there is a plaque that was left there from the aircrafts days at SQ;

Speak softly, work quietly.
What the OA crews made of this, heaven knows, but perhaps some other carriers might want to follow thier lead.
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Old 7th Jun 2002, 08:24
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I've flown with DJ numerous times, a few with very young cabin supervisors but have always found them most professional, aware of safety requirements and they always seemed to maintain a good situational awareness. They acted in a mature, friendly, professional and structured way.

Sure there might be a few in there that do silly things, but I could post here about a recent Qantas flight where on a 767:

1. 4 of the 7 flight attendants missed the safety demo because the smoking light wasn't flicked!

2. It was not rerun! Bad luck if you didn't know how to put on a life jacket I guess.

3. Crew did not check pax on the last 20 rows before t/o or before ldg, if you were in those rows your seat belt could be undone, seat reclined and bags everywhere and they would never have known.

4. Didn't bother collecting meal boxes from the back 5 rows, some were sitting on spare seats during the approach.

5. No FA's at the overwing exits as pax left the a/c.

6. No prelanding announcement of any type made by CSM.

A clear breach of CASA and company policies.. a bad crew, at the end of a long day with a fairly empty aircraft.

Every company has them, lay off DJ... the majority do an excellent job and we all know it.
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Old 7th Jun 2002, 12:33
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Sonique

Funny, the 6 sectors I have done with VB, have never
seen any of the "incidents" that you have claimed over
the many months, more than that my kid who has been
flying with VB for over 18mths has not either, I have just
done a search of your posts on this site and think you
may be a little peeved with your rejection from Virgin
Blue, also checking Micheal Stipe's 75 posts notice that
nowhere does he claim to be VB cabin crew, what he does
claim is that he is going out with one of the girls from there,
but back to why VB did not think you have the "Virgin Flair"
I have gathered some of your posts here together from
the "cabin crew" forum as well as a few from D&G, and I
think if your honest with yourself, even you can understand
why you did not make it.

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27/7/2001

Sweet N Innocent - I here what you are saying but methinks you are missing the point. How can one truly show their qualities as a " team player " if the others in the team (i.e - virgin blue interview) are...well.....to put it bluntly - " idiots ". After attending Virgin Blue interviews myself I have come to the conclusion that team work is not looked on at all - it seems your ability to flirt, paint faces and sing is all that is required.

Three of the other interviewees in my interview did not know what a Boeing 737 was...go figure. How can anyone make good of a group interview when the candidates aren't fit for the position or interview in the first place ?

Good Luck at QF ! see you at centrelink in 6 months time with the rest of my fixed term mates !
-----------------------------------------------------------

23/8/2001

Virgin Blue airline are a joke, I need to get this off my chest.

Their so called award winning reservations staff are morons with lousy customer service...and the guest relations department....please ! how pathetic - Virgin don't see the customers as guests....they see them as nieve people who they can sell their stupid Virgin merchandise and ridiculously overpriced food to in-flight...and to top it all off....it is served by stupid blonde twits who call themselves cabin crew ! ( little do the public know that these staff are chosen for their ability to sing and dance at an interview...not because of their customer service skills, apparently working in the delhi at coles supermarket is sufficient )

The Virgin blue hiring process is horrible...they are pi**ing off more people than actually fly with their airline, their cruel approach to recruitment and boycot of applicants due to their involvement with another airline carrier previously or the fact that your " boobs " just don't quite look good enough in the uniform.

Go to hell virgin, I'm suprised you didn't cancel the flight on purpose just to annoy a qantas applicant. Who wants apply for a job as cabin crew with you and end up face painting and singing stupid songs for a career as a so called safety professional.........maybe you should rename your cabin crew to cabin clowns .......thats what they look like.

And you reckon you made a $500,000 profit ? hahaha.....funny the spreadsheet was not released to the public......I find it amazing that the much publicised start up costs of millions of dollars was made back in 12 months of operation..........who do you think you are fooling.....The Australian population may look dumb, but were not.

[ 23 August 2001: Message edited by: Sonique ]

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26/8/2001

EVACU8,
If the Virgin Blue people you trained are now working for QF that means that they didn't like working for Virgin.....which means that they didn't like acting like clowns in the cabin. Yes, you are right in saying that the company likes the crew to act like that...however....that is why the FAAA is here. If the crew felt unprofessional or unhappy acting the way they do then they could easily protest about it.

None of us here have ever doubted the intelligence or enthusiasm the Virgin crew have for the job...but,what I am doubting is the lack of customer service
experience these people have. Your new QF crew members from Virgin would have got their experience from being flight attendants with Virgin... but what prior experience did they have before joining Virgin ?

As far as safety goes, it is ok for you to sit on your high and mighty 747-400 on your SYD-LAX flight knowing that you are safe with the best airline in the world.....but would you feel safe on a Virgin Blue boeing 737-400 which stopped on the taxiway at BNE because the purser had not closed the L1 door properly ?? TRUE STORY....and you want to know the reason why ? She was too busy entertaining the guests by singing over the PA system.

That is not acceptable for any airline.

[ 26 August 2001: Message edited by: Sonique ]

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6/10/2001

Virgin Blue Interviews
Does anyone know what Virgin Blue look for in their Cabin Crew??? I have just received my rejection letter from them and immediatly set about ringing up the people I swapped phone numbers with on the day. Well to my surprise not one of these people received a call back either!!!

Now this group of people make up a slightly motley crew --- some young, some old, some quite, some bubbly, some expereinced and some wannabees-- so surely there would be at least one who would meet their criteria!!

So now you can understand my curiosity!!!

I don't need any sympathy over this as I only applied to VB because I heard Qantas won't be recruiting again until the end of next year(is this true??), and they are who I really want to work for!! But still my curiosity runs rampant!!!

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23/3/2002

Dr Hibbert,I'd be keen to hear more details re the small group of f/a's who had a win against VB re: age discrimination. It is clearly obvious that VB are not interested in anyone over 30 and any males or females under 175cm height. How pathetic.For those of you on the cheap no frills VB bandwagon ask yourself this question.....would VB hire your wife as an f/a ? NO.....why ? because most of you would have a wife over the age of 30.....does that make her useless ? NO it doesn't........... = DISCRIMINATION

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23/3/2002

Theo Racle,Fact - Age of cabin manager on my last VB flight = 22 years Eldest cabin crew member aboard - 26 years Number of male crew aboard = nil Average Number of times each crew member giggled during safety demo - 2

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29/5/2002

druckmefunk,

Get your hand off it mate. Who gives a toss about the mode of transport or ticket prices ? I care about SAFETY of the lives on board and making sure that the people who are the crew on my flight are able to cope professionally in an emergency and conflict situation such as the one explained on the first post.

Having close ties with VB I can tell you that I am not impressed with the current standard of recruitment for cabin crew - I can assure you that reacting calm in an emergency is DEFINETLEY not the first thing the recruitment girls look for in their candidates......and it SHOULD BE. I would hate to think what would happen on any Virgin blue flight when an emergency arises and the person in charge of the cabin is your " ex coffee club " 21year old waitress with blonde hair carrying her packed lunch from mum& dad in her cabin bag....it's a scary thought. What scares me even more is the fact that virgin blue in June are putting through a school of 90 cabin cabin crew recruits in the same class.....can anyone assure me that with such a large group of teenagers in the one ground school that VB can be positive that they will all be up to scratch with their EP's before they begin flying.......surely not.

I'm all for VB in the australian market but will not stand for giggly cabin crew who don't know what to do in a situation which requires the upmost seriousness.

If your sick of the old f/a's at QF then fly Qantaslink and check out the youthful gorgeous and professional flight attendants that Sunstate, Eastern, NJS and Impulse have to offer.......the crew on these aircraft could certainly teach the VB girls a lesson.

---------------------------------------------------------------
29/5/2001

andy your obviously not paying attention to the real issue at hand. What we are all getting at is how the people in the cabin are trained to deal with this, or in fact the " lack of ". The fact that VB are not hiring capable people and are solely looks motivated rather than safety motivated.

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1/6/2001

Well when you do a demonstration to the pax of " bum aerobics " mid flight and hire ex gold goast meter maids as flight attendants then you can kinda expect that the public might get that perception. Virgin Blue = YAWN

Heard on a recent VB flight out of SYD

Male F/a - " Everyone say hello to Candy, Candy is one of our new f/a's, she used to be a gold coast meter maid "

Candy - " Red Faced, giggle giggle, then shakes her chest "

Male f/a - " MMMMMMMM, can you imagine candy in a bikini "

( true story, f/a's name changed for privacy )

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In my day this was called an attitude problem, anyway all
the best with your Qantas interviews.

Wirraway
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Old 7th Jun 2002, 12:52
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Thumbs up

Here! Here!

Well said Wirraway!

......some people.....
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Old 7th Jun 2002, 13:01
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And on that note

click!
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