SIA master of spin

SIA yesterday had its inaugural Airbus A380 flight from Singapore to Japan but the flight didn't end up in Tokyo Narita as planned but instead was diverted to Nagoya due to bad weather.
The Singapore carrier has been sending out press releases announcing every first A380 flight in an effort to drum up free publicity.
But what to do in the case of the Tokyo service? After all, does a PR hack really want to send out a press release highlighting that passengers have been inconvenienced and sent to the industrial city of Nagoya rather than to Tokyo where they were suppose to be headed?
Solution. Completely ignore the troubled Singapore-Tokyo Narita flight and instead highlight the return leg Tokyo Narita to Singapore.
SIA today sent out a press release headlined: "Singapore Airlines flies inaugural A380 flight from Tokyo."
It makes no mention of the Singapore-Tokyo leg that was diverted yesterday to Nagoya due to bad weather.
And technically Tokyo-Singapore is not SIA's inaugural Japan service but that doesn't seem to matter SIA's PR department.
Don't let the truth get in the way of good puff piece as they say.

Singapore airshow has dearth of commercial aircraft

The Singapore Airshow 2008 is both a civil and a military airshow but you wouldn't know it going by the aircraft on display in the static display area.
The Airbus A380 (MSN 001) was certainly impressive and dominated the static display because if its size.
But the only other commercial aircraft on display was a Britten-Norman Islander, a tiny aircraft that only seats 10 passengers. Talk about going from one extreme to the other.

What was predominately on display was business jets and military aircraft.
Don't get me wrong. The selection of business jets on display was impressive because there were aircraft from the likes of Bombardier, Embraer, Hawker Pacific and others.
And the US and Singapore military was out in force with an impressive line up of fighter jets as well as a Boeing B-1 bomber and some military transports such as the Lockheed C-130.

But - because I am a journalist that focuses on commercial aviation - I was really hoping to see more commercial aircraft.