Author: Joseph Alba
Joseph Alba
Mr. Alba was previously Editor of the Airport Press for 12 years covering both local as well as global aviation news. Prior to this, Mr. Alba had Executive positions in Systems Engineering and Marketing with IBM World Trade, and had foreign assignments in the Far East and Latin America earning three Outstanding Achievement Awards. Mr. Alba also directed a new function dealing with Alternate Fuels for Public Service Electric & Gas company in New Jersey and founded a Natural Gas Vehicle Consortium consisting of car company executives and fleet owners, and NGV suppliers in New Jersey. Mr. Alba was a founding partner of ATA, an IT Consulting company which is still active in Central and South America. After leaving the armed forces, Mr. Alba’s initial employee was the U.S. Defense Department as an analyst.
Dear Metropolitan Airport News readers,The Port Authority of NY/NJ has operational responsibility for facilities spanning a 1,500 square mile area within the New York metropolitan area. These facilities include seaports, bridges, tunnels, rail, bus depots, office towers, airports as well as numerous administrative, and material support structures that are sprinkled throughout their operational area.The broadness of this mission grew out of a seemingly innocuous statement made by the founding authorities representing both the states of New York and New Jersey in 1921; “To undertake any project concerning any transport mode as long as it would promote commerce, trade and public good.” The Port…
The U.S. Air Force has successfully integrated quad-legged Unmanned Ground Vehicles, known popularly as “robot dogs,” and this innovative idea may be a new way to secure facilities and protect travelers at civilian airports. According to a recent armed services news release, the first official quad-legged Unmanned Ground Vehicles were delivered to Tyndall Air Base on March 22nd. The purpose of the Quad-legged Unmanned Ground Vehicles (Q-UGVs) is to add an extra level of protection to the base. The robot dogs, designed by Ghost Robotics and Immersive Wisdom, are the first of their kind to be integrated onto a military…
While the FBI has issued a nation-wide alert for domestic terrorists who ostensibly are trying to take control of the government, and by politicians who have stationed 1,500 National Guard troops in DC ; without an incident in a month since the capital incursion; the real, not imagined, danger, seems to be a story for the back-pages, and only appears in a government agency Press Release. The real problem is real people doing real things to down one of our commercial airliners with hundreds of people aboard. There are three kinds of laser light events; Distraction and Startle: an unexpected…
Just imagine, it’s the Fall of 2021, and the worst seems to be over and American business is back in business. There is still a degree of anxiety about being at work, and people as a whole are still cautious about crowding and tight quarters in any environment; whether it be a department store, an airplane, or a DMV office. Even after full distribution of the vaccine, businesses are still taking some of the same precautions for their employees and client’s safety. The primary precautions such as distancing, and sanitization remain as basic precautions, and situations with people density means…
Draft legislation from congressional committees were made public for the Democrats’ big COVID-19 relief package. The House Financial Services Committee revealing plans to provide $14 billion in aid to airlines for payroll costs, along with $1 billion for airline contractors. The additional “Payroll Support Program” money for the airline industry counts as the “first surprise” as Democratic-run committees begin the work of writing the relief bill, said Height Capital Markets analyst Hunter Hammond. “We are a bit surprised at the inclusion of airline aid, given that it was not a part of the Biden American Rescue Plan, but this should be a…
Amazon announced on February 4th that it will open a 336,350-square-foot delivery station at 640 Columbia St. and a 151,000-square-foot station at 280 Richards St. in Red Hook next year. Its 211,000-square-foot delivery station at 2300 Linden Blvd. in East New York is now officially open for business. The Linden Boulevard station will create more than 80 full and part-time jobs, according to the company. “These new delivery stations represent Amazon’s unwavering commitment to safety, technological innovations, and skilled teams who are obsessed with delivering for our customers,” Amazon spokeswoman Emily Hawkins said in a statement The logistics facility on Columbia Street is…
When I first read this press bulletin from Atlas Air, I thought it was an old headline that was erroneously posted in a recent blog. When the headline was verified; it underscored my feeling about an airplane that is both timeless and resolute. Atlas Air Worldwide announced that it has ordered four new Boeing 747-8 freighters in a transaction that furthers the company’s strategic growth plan. The aircraft will enable the company to meet strong customer demand in the airfreight market, particularly the fast-growing e-commerce and express sectors. The order is valued at approximately $1.5 billion at current list prices.…
The articles in the New York press regarding the Healthy Terminals Act tested our resolve to get the most informative and balanced information from whatever sources had thorough clear and readable details on New York State Bill # S6266D The Bill The Healthy Terminals Act was passed by the New York Legislature in the summer of 2020 and signed into law by Governor Cuomo on December 31st, and the ramifications will begin to take affect after the special panel decides on wages and benefits that will apply to the “covered” workers. * When the Governor signed the bill, the “fiscal…
New York Governor Cuomo today – Dec. 21 – announced that in the wake of a new, highly contagious variant of the COVID-19 virus found in the United Kingdom, British Airways and Delta Airlines have voluntarily agreed to require a COVID-19 test before allowing passengers to board planes traveling from the United Kingdom to New York. News of Delta’s agreement to require testing broke just after the Governor’s briefing concluded. With this move, New York joins the list of 120 countries with a similar requirement on flights from the U.K. The Governor has asked Virgin Atlantic, the other airline that runs flights…
You will not be sitting next to a horse or a pig on your next flight in the future after the U.S. Department of Transportation issued new rule on service animals on airplanes as of December 3rd. The new rule provides a narrow definition of a service animal as a dog that has been “individually trained to do work or perform tasks for the benefit of a person with a disability.” It also limits the number of service animals with which an individual may travel to two and psychiatric service animals must be treated in the same manner as other service…