EOS, all-business class airline, ceases flying

This is sad and a bit of a shocker. Sad because EOS was a dream airline. They did everything right and made flying fun again. A shocker because there were no warning signs, other than those hovering over the airline industry in general ($120 oil, tight credit, and the recession).

EOS' last flights will be today (Sunday). Is the all-business-class model dead? What's going to happen to L'Avion? SilverJet appears to have the all-business New York to London route to itself, now that both MaxJet and EOS are gone.

And so who's next? Someone will be next. There are a lot of smaller, newer discount carriers out there with funny names. Our vote is that they go first.

We're afraid that shortly the US will be dominated by four post-merger airlines: United, Delta, American, and Southwest. We do hope that JetBlue survives (Lufthansa's investment in it may help). Perhaps there will be an Airtran/Frontier/Midwest/Whoknows merger. Will Alaska Airlines be able to make it on its own? What about Express Jet, USA3000, and Spirit in the US; WestJet in Canada; and Alitalia, Zoom, and Eurofly overseas?  These are interesting times in the airline industry as they are elsewhere.

Honestly, if you're planning on flying anywhere this summer, we'd strongly recommend that you either:

1) Fly on a big name airline (United, Delta, Southwest, Continental, American, US Air, Northwest, British Airways, Lufthansa, Singapore, JAL, etc)

or

2) Use a credit card and make sure that your travel will be completed within 60 days of the time the charge will appear on your credit card statement. If your airline goes caput, you're protected by the Federal Fair Credit Billing Act if you contest the charge in writing within 60 days of the charge's appearance on your statement.