/ Cory Doctorow / 5:09 pm Mon Aug 10, 2009

Woman books entire jetliner biz-class so her dog can fly with her

An Israeli woman spent $38,000 to book the entire business-class cabin of an El Al jet from Paris to Tel Aviv so that her beloved dog could fly with her and be spared the trauma of the cargo hold.

Woman flies business class with pooch (Thanks, Tamar!)

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  3. The article says $32,000. My guess is that it was a small plane. What would that 32,000 buy? 4 business class seats? 8 on sale?

    Sad none-the-less.

  4. Lessee, six hour flight, on a light private jet at about $2500 per flight hour, $3000 miscellaneous landing fees, international fees, etc. totals about $18,000 one way. Not to mention all this is for a dog’s benefit.

    Just goes to show, intelligence isn’t a prerequisite for having a lot of money.

  5. I know that I’m supposed to react with horror, condescension, and mockery, but, you know, isn’t it basically a good thing if people with a whole crapload of money spend as much of it as possible? I mean good for the world economy, good for those of us with less money, etc.?

    So I say: rich people of the world! Build some ridiculous houses! Spend lavish amounts of money on artist-types to decorate them! Hire contractors and freelancers and pilots and animal trainers and use them to throw yourself a private circus! Move that damn money around! Throw lavish parties and hire two-thousand poor musicians to play an orchestral funk version of the Star Wars theme song! Go crazy!

  6. Hmm… the article says 4 hours. So if that’s correct, chartering a small private jet would have been more like $13,000. First class, too… :)

  10. While this doesn’t completely isolate the economy class passengers from the pooch, I appreciate her efforts not to inconvenience other people.

    (I’m a bit sensitive because Air Canada recently decided to let pets fly in the cabins…and while I totally understand why, as an allergy sufferer, I can not be in the same cabin as a cat. My lungs do some serious implosion. Needless to say, when the Lung Association broached the subject to Air Canada, they got the brush off. Le sigh. My solution is to designate a minority of certain flights as pet-friendly, and let those who would want to take the pets pay a slightly higher price. Because my lungs really can’t afford it if you decide Fluffy needs to come along to Toronto.)

  11. That would have bought a great deal of food or school supplies. Can someone please just take her money away and divide it amongst the nearest homeless shelter evenly? kthnx bai

  12. Considering that animals weigh less than people and airlines are saving on fuel costs, I’m amazed they aren’t all pushing for “pet-friendly” flights. Of course, dealing with air rage from something with fangs and claws would be a problem. Then again, the pets won’t be getting drunk either.

  14. I hope the dog bites her, and then somehow manages to speak/cough the following sentence:

    “GIVE TO CHARITY”

  16. “I’m a bit sensitive because Air Canada recently decided to let pets fly in the cabins…and while I totally understand why, as an allergy sufferer, I can not be in the same cabin as a cat. My lungs do some serious implosion.”

    … while we’re at it, let’s also ban all perfumes, deodorants, and hair products, as well as all food containing peanuts, almonds, or shellfish. Oh, and if you own a cat, make sure you’ve thoroughly washed all your clothing, baggage, and your hands before boarding if you’ve handled the cat in the last 6 hours.

    I don’t mean to be a troll (really!), and I’m sorry to hear about your lung-implosion situation. But I don’t think the fact that certain people have severe cat allergies is at all good grounds for banning cats (which travel in carriers they aren’t allowed to leave during the flight and are usually limited to a handful per aircraft). I believe you if you say that the cat will affect you anyway, but you’re an outlier. I leave Air Canada to figure out your accommodations (maybe you can move to the furthest possible seat from the cat? Maybe they can help you choose a flight that has no pets booked on it?) just as they would figure out how to accommodate a passenger with a severe nut allergy — but a blanket ban on feline travel isn’t the answer.

    For what it’s worth, I’m not a cat person and have mild cat allergies myself. But my dog flies with me in-cabin when I vacation — why shouldn’t he get to come with me to visit the woods on the East Coast?

    (I only pay $100 bucks a pop to bring him each way though.)

  18. A bit on the excessive side heh? I love my dog, but I don’t think Id ever go to that extreme. Man, and people are losing their jobs, livelihoods and homes in these economic times and she can go and waste money like that.

  19. I really don’t think it’s all that excessive. If she has the money to spend I don’t see how it’s wrong for her to spend it that way.

    @12 “Man, and people are losing their jobs, livelihoods and homes in these economic times and she can go and waste money like that.” This really has no bearing on what she spends her money on.

    There seems to be the mistaken impression that everyone that has money and can spend it on expensive things is the enemy of people that can’t. I really agree with @3 in what he said.

  20. Sorry, but I just have to say this sounds like a scene from a Daniel Silva novel. Gabriel Allon, perhaps?

  21. VALCHAEL @19: There seems to be the mistaken impression that everyone that has money and can spend it on expensive things is the enemy of people that can’t.

    I’m sure I’d feel the same way if I was struggling to put food on the table and somebody was spending thousands of dollars so their pet had a bit more legroom for 4 hours. True, people are free to spend their money as they wish, but it’s perfectly understandable that many of the have-nots feel a sense of injustice.

  24. Woman charters jet for herself and dog at great expense = neutral.

    Woman has enough money to do so at these prices = worrying.

    Woman does so while watching homeless people starve to death = unconscionable.

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  26. So, a rich bitch flew her dog business class: in consequential, meaningless, cliché, boring.

  30. You know what? This isn’t even inconsequential. Consider the amount of fuel that was wasted carting just this woman and her dog around; fuel that we can’t recover and was burned wastefully into extra air pollution, further damaging the earth so that a dog could travel.

    This offends me; and I’m not a hippy, as solely wasteful and evil. Why not offer other passengers the chance to fly for free with her then? Why not put some cargo in there and make the most of it. Instead we have a big section of plane wasted.

    She’s not REALLY contributing to society as a whole either, her money goes into the airline and spreads out, but all of the traveling passengers who WOULD have been on that plane now go on another plane, causing more pollution and waste, while only adding what they would have. The net result is in fact a negative, owing to the pollution costs more than anything else.

  31. And what about any possible allergies to dog hair from the even 1 of the rest of passengers ?. So, because she has the means she can get away with that?.

    It would have been even more impressive if she had bought all the seats so that her dog and the rest of the passengers did not have to suffer any trauma or allergy.

  33. I don’t understand the negative reactions here. People are acting as though the money ceased to exist when she spent it, as though she had set it on fire or something.

    I’m no economist, but isn’t this a good thing? Couldn’t the headline have read, “El Al flight from Paris to Tel Aviv sells every seat, achieves great fuel economy”?

    I understand the resentment from those who are struggling, but this woman is basically helping ensure that El Al employees keep their jobs. I really don’t see how this harms anyone.

  34. >>10

    I’m deeply sorry about your allergies, but I think you got the brush-off because cats and dogs have been flying inside airplane cabins for decades now with minimal incident. Maybe not Air Canada, but I assure you, if you’ve taken other airlines, there’s a good chance you’ve flown with an animal in the cabin and not even known it.

    (And vice versa, you may have had an allergic reaction when no animals were present; the airlines can’t do much about people who bring pet dander inside the aircraft on their clothes or baggage.)

  35. @#33

    No, she isn’t. She’s wasting productive space and time for her dog. The money spent on fuel DOES vanish into the ether (for the most part) and the wasted productive space and time (for the air hosts) is money down the drain too.

    This is indicative of the mindset among some people that says if I can afford it, why can’t I do it?

    Because some things are simply immoral.

  37. Actually, she is harming a lot of people- that’s the problem. I’m not an uptight guy, but I can’t ignore the inter-connectedness of everything in this world (and universe.) Just on an obvious level, she’s harming our already-fucked-up environment by wasting a shitload of jet fuel so Fido can travel along. For the people claiming it’s good that she spends money, that’s just not how it works, folks. Think of a human body and the blood that flows through it. If the blood were to flow from the heart to your left hand and then back to the heart again, over and over, without going anywhere else, the rest of your body would quickly expire, which would end up killing even the left hand and the heart. Our economy works the same way. Having her blow on her money into the bank accounts of an airline isn’t exactly spreading the wealth, and in the end, hurts everyone, including her.

    And for what, again…? Her capricious whims? Yeah, that’s a whole ‘lotta bullshit, no matter what relativist theory you want to throw her way.

  38. I think this is wonderful; that she has the freedom to finance her stupid pet obsession with money she probably worked to earn. Or someone, somewhere worked to earn, anyway–even if she got this money by whoring herself out for $100/hour for 320 hours. She (or her rich daddy/boyfriend/benefactor) earned that money by being a productive member of society, perhaps producing goods or services that were exchanged for that money…I’m oversimplifying it, but my point is that its HER MONEY so who the eff cares what she does with it!
    (PS. I love cats. if I could afford to take a vacation and also to buy plane tix, I’d fly my cat with me. I love my little kittybitty-fluffywuffikins!)

  41. I’m more shocked by the judgemental comments than her actions. Who are any of you to tell her or anyone else how to spend their money? If you have the money to have internet access and a computer you’re already a gazillion times wealthier than millions of people on the planet so shouldn’t you give up all that stuff and give your money away instead? How wealthy must I be before you get to start judging me? $20K? $50K? $1millionK?

    Judging others is I think one of the worst traits one can have. Choose your own moral compass, live by it, be an example, and shut up.

  42. I guess she could have been more charitable by giving some of those tickets away for free on the condition that the takers couldn’t complain about the dog, but on the whole this is one of the least horrible ways I’ve seen rich people waste their money.

    It’s a hell of a lot less waste than chartering a private jet, and people do that every day.

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