Travel Roundup: Bing Travel's Shutdown, Spirit Airlines Buys Air Jamaica?, Weekend's Third Amtrak Fatality and More
Electrical fire shuts down Bing Travel -- An electrical fire in Seattle shut down Bing Travel, Microsoft Corp.'s new search engine, for 36 hours over Independence Day weekend. The fire started Thursday night in Fisher Plaza, an area that houses studios and servers for Web sites and television. While Bing Travel was offline, Microsoft diverted users to Orbitz, another of its partners, a spokeswoman for Microsoft told reporters. Power was restored on Saturday. The company also released a statement saying that they felt they had the service up as quickly as possible. Bing Travel apparently had no backup servers to rely on during the incident. [Source: Seattlepi.com]
Spirit Airlines buys Air Jamaica? -- Spirit Airlines acquired Air Jamaica in a possibly government-led effort to save the money-losing national airline. The Jamaica Gleaner newspaper reported that a deal was struck and cited unnamed government sources. Spirit spokeswoman Misty Pinson refused to comment on the story. Jamaica Prime Minister Bruce Golding said Air Jamaica was losing $141 million a year. [Source: Associated Press]
Third Amtrak fatality in San Francisco Bay Area over weekend -- A 35-year-old woman was struck and killed by an Amtrak train after it left the Jack London Square station in Oakland, Calif. Sunday morning, the third Amtrak fatality since Friday. The train's passengers were not hurt. Previously a 69-year-old woman was killed Friday when she was hit just north of the Berkeley, Calif. station. The train was stopped for 90 minutes to investigate the fatality, but when released it struck and killed a 38-year-old man. Amtrak said all three were trespassing on the railroad tracks. [Source: San Jose Mercury News]
Pimental named president of Azamara Cruises -- Royal Caribbean Cruises Ltd. appointed Larry Pimentel to the position of president and chief executive officer of Azamara Cruises. Pimentel will report directly to Richard D. Fain, chairman and chief executive officer of Royal Caribbean. Pimentel has more than 25 years of travel industry experience, serving as president, chief executive officer and co-owner of the Seadream Yacht Club, Cunard Line and Seabourn Cruise Line. [Source: Royal Caribbean]