REPLY COMMENTS OF DONALD L. PEVSNER, Esq.: 

 

 COMES NOW Donald L. Pevsner, Esq., pro bono publico, and files these Reply Comments to the 

Request For An Exemption filed by 

JetBlue Airways Corporation in this Docket on March 4, 2010, which was later seconded by Delta Air 

Lines, Inc.: 

 

 (1)JetBlue Airways Corporation and Delta Air Lines, Inc. are requesting an exemption from the 

requirements of 14 C.F.R.# 259.4, and specifically subsections #259.4(b)(1) and (b)(2) thereof, which 

would otherwise impose severe financial penalties upon these air carriers for keeping their passengers on 

board their aircraft at JFK International Airport, New York, New York, for more than three (3) hours during 

the multi-month time period for closure of Runway 31L/13R at JFK during CY2010. 

 

 (2)There is no rational reason why an exemption of any sort should be granted by DOT that would 

permit the stranding of any airline passenger on an airport tarmac for a period of more than three (3) 

hours, for any reason whatsoever. Indeed, if alleged "JFK gridlock" should ever transpire, the 

passengers could easily be removed by bus transport for movement back to their departing terminals 

while leaving the "gridlocked" aircraft 

where they are on the taxiways, and untangling any such mess at a later time without passengers forced 

to remain on board. Further, a period of three (3) hours for such tarmac strandings without imposition of 

the heavy financial penalties specified in 14 C.F.R. #259.4 is already far too liberal in favor of the airline 

industry: doubtless a direct result of their well-heeled lobbying efforts in Congress. 

 

 (3)JetBlue Airways Corporation, in particular, needs to get its proverbial act together as to its present 

failure to adjust to the new status quo

for its online connections at JFK Terminal 5. Specifically, this commenter was stranded overnight at 

Burlington, Vermont Airport by JetBlue on Sunday, March 7, 2010. Its scheduled Flight #55, a 7:00PM 

departure fom BTV to JFK, was held at the BTV gate as a result of a 7:00PM ATC communication closing 

JFK to arriving flights for a lengthy period due to "heavy departing traffic at JFK". This flight did not 

actually depart BTV for JFK until after 9:15PM. My connecting flight, JetBlue Flight #1087, was 

scheduled to depart JFK for CLT at 9:45PM. At about 9:00PM, a P.A. announcement was made on board 

the aircraft, advising that "passengers connecting to Charlotte (CLT) and Raleigh (RDU) will miss their 

JFK onward connecting flights, and should deplane here." On arrival at the gate podium, about 8 

passengers were advised that an overnight stay at a BTV-area motel would be at their own expense (my 

room cost me $69.30), and that onward flights would have to be rebooked for Monday, March 8. The lead 

JetBlue gate agent "blamed JFK" for the problem, and used this "justification" to deny all of the stranded 

passengers an airline-paid motel voucher. When several passengers voiced their indignation, including 

this commenter, this gate agent "pushed the panic button" and actually summoned the Burlington Police 

Department as JetBlue's ultimate "solution" to this fiasco: directly caused by its own minimum-connectingtime scheduling incompetence and negligence. Further, only a handful of seats remained on the next, 

6:00AM JetBlue departure for JFK on Monday, March 8. It does not take a rocket scientist to realize that 

a scheduled arrival into JFK at 8:34PM falls right in the middle of the peak departure period for Europeanbound flights of 6:00-10:00PM. JetBlue's failure to adjust its minimum connecting times at JFK to a 

problem with which it has been intimately familiar for many months is a scandal that must be cured by the 

Department at the earliest possible moment, with fines and/or other penalties imposed for this carrier's 

total disregard of its connecting passengers' well-being on point. 

 

 ****(4)The Department is hereby requested to make an immediate study of departure delays that are 

currently being caused by the above-described runway closure situation at JFK. Then, on an emergency 

basis, it must immediately impose the mandatory lengthening of "Mininum Connecting Times" for all 

departing flights--both domestic and international--at JFK that are causing passenger strandings upline, 

or at JFK itself, with severe financial penalties imposed on any air carrier or foreign air carrier that does 

not comply with such amended Regulation in this Docket or in a new, additional curative Docket that will 

eliminate this gross threat to millions of affected online and offline connecting passengers for the 

remainder of the runway closure period at JFK. 

 
(5)For the purposes of such further, amendatory regulation, on an emergency basis, "Minimum 

Connecting Times" are present in the reservations-system computers of every air carrier and foreign air 

carrier. It is a relatively simple matter, further, for the carriers to re-program their computers to designate 

connections shorter than newly-lengthened connections as so-called "illegal connections", so that such 

stranding-prone prior connections could no longer be ticketed per se online by either the carriers or the 

major travel-agent CRS systems. 

 

 

 WHEREFORE I have set my hand and seal on this eleventh day of March, 2010. 

 

 

 

_____________________/s/________________________(Seal) 

 DONALD L. PEVSNER 

 Attorney-at-Law [pro bono publico] 

 2010 Valle Cay Drive 

 Vilas, NC 28692 

 TEL.: (828)297-7823 

 FAX.: (828)297-7824 

 EMAIL: DonPevsner@aol.com