Flying With Poles

[master]

Thanks for collecting and posting this very useful information. I will use it if I am fortunate enough to be able to travel to Hawaii this year for the Masters Nationals.

[rainbowgirl28]

Two emails I got recently:

Becca, I used AirTran from Atlanta to Washington, DC to fly my poles to the Indoor Championships at Landover for a hefty $89 each way – but AirTran did take poles! I tried negotiating via email reminding them that Southwest only charges $50 each way but they were firm on $89. (The counter in Atlanta tried to charge more but I had brought the paperwork with me to verify the $89 charge each way.) No problems with the poles on the DC side except when I went to get my rental car – which was on the 4th floor of the parking garage. Fortunately, the stairwell had an open middle as well as wide staircase – but it was still 4 floors by myself (the Avis folks that had no customers anywhere in sight and did not offer any assistance). However, when I arrived back at the parking garage to drop off my rental the check-in lady asked if I would like to have one of her co-workers drive me down to my terminal (with my poles) so I wouldn’t have to repeat the stairwell adventure. Lesson learned: ask the rental car people to come pick you up so you don’t have to walk your poles when you may not have to…

Hey Becca,

On a recent trip to the Indoor Combined Events Champs I did some research (and made some calls) to find (very excitedly) that Jetblue will fly poles. They fly 2 jets, and I forgot to check on the second, but their Embraer 190s will fly poles. My tube was 17' so any should be fine. They charged me $80 but it was one of the easiest trips I've had flying with poles.

Unfortunately, on the other hand I found out that United has increased their charge to $150. I was stoked to find a cross country ticket home (Boston to California) for only $279....then learned at the counter that my poles were going to cost me $300 round trip. I was far from stoked.

[vaultman18]

I recently flew to Boston for Nike on USair and only payed $15 each way for a tube of poles. They said they would take tubes up to 16' and under 50 lbs as regular checked luggage.