Northwest airlines - no longer safe for peanut allergic people!

[bhoffman]

I'm sure most of you know that as of 2/1/09 Northwest airlines has switched to Delta's policy of serving peanuts on the plane. I have been in contact with FAAN and they are urging people to contact northwest through their website nwa.you know what and complain about the change. Recycled air on the plane ensures that anyone with an airborne allergy cannot fly this airline anymore. For those of us in the Detroit area this is not good. My sons allergist told us not to have him fly northwest anymore. PLEASE take 5 minutes and contact Northwest and tell them how unacceptable this policy is! Maybe if we all pull together we can make a change!

 

[SueM in MN]

there was a big article about it in our paper since Minneapolis was the headquarters for Northwest. They are doing it, as you mentioned, to be consistent with their new parent company, Delta. The reason Delta gave for the change is that their home state, Georgia, is a big peanut producer and they are supporting their home state farmers. At least in the article, the attitude of the company was that they:

• knew the change would cause hardship for some customers
• knew they would lose some customers over the change
• felt that supporting peanut farming industry was important
• felt that Delta had served peanuts for a long time and it was 'important' for Northwest to come into compliance with Delta's policy on serving peanuts

I was surprised, but maybe not so much.

 

[bhoffman]

I saw that article, there were several and CNN was covering it as well. I'm not super surprised either. It's just hard to watch your childs world get smaller and smaller....being in Detroit Northwest is our MAJOR airlines so this is a real problem for us.

 

[Selket]

This hits hardest when an airline has a hub near you so flying other airlines could be more expensive. The peanut allergy BB (http://www.peanutallergy.com) has a board just for discussing airlines and there is some discussion there on NW.

I don't know if you have Jet Blue near you -we love them. We've also had great luck with United.

I"m probably not telling you anything you don't already know - except I hate to fly. I was a nervous flyer anyway but now I guess at least I don't worry about crashing as much now that I have my son to worry about. We sometimes plan longer trips just so we can drive and it not seem like we spent the whole vacation driving. I want to go out to California sometime in the next few years and I'm hoping Jet Blue is still around...

 

[peemagg]

We like Airtran out of Flint. They serve either pretzels or those delicious gourmet cookies. That may be an option for those of you in the Detroit area. I believe Airtran flys out of Detroit too.

 

[Brenle]

I'm sure most of you know that as of 2/1/09 Northwest airlines has switched to Delta's policy of serving peanuts on the plane. I have been in contact with FAAN and they are urging people to contact northwest through their website nwa.you know what and complain about the change. Recycled air on the plane ensures that anyone with an airborne allergy cannot fly this airline anymore. For those of us in the Detroit area this is not good. My sons allergist told us not to have him fly northwest anymore. PLEASE take 5 minutes and contact Northwest and tell them how unacceptable this policy is! Maybe if we all pull together we can make a change!

We usually fly southwest and inform them of a peanut allergy. They serve an alternate such as pretzels. I also try to get the first flight out, and we also preboard to wipe the seats down completely that our family will be using. Hopefully you can present your situation to Northwest and they can help with your concerns. Good luck.

 

[homedad]

can you were a mask, I had a doubvle lung transplant and due to my immune system I always wear a mask when flying, i have yet to get sick and I've flown with some sick sounding people

 

[bhoffman]

That is a great suggestion of the mask. We actually asked his allergist last week about that and he said that he did not know of a mask that would work. Apparently the peanut protein particles (say that fast! ) are so small they could get through any mask he knew of. It would work for us if we knew of one that would work....

We actually live closer to Flint than Detroit so Airtran will work for us. Northwest is just a better option based on where we usually travel to (out of the country to the caribbean, etc.) but are very thankful that we do have a few options left. It is just crazy though that it is so important to them to serve the peanuts when they could just as easily serve pretzels!

Thank you for all the suggestions!

 

[rosegirl]

Great. One more reason NOT to fly NW, which I dislike for poor service reasons, anyway. Appreciate the update, anyway!