There’s lots of stuff in the news, most of it not good—surcharges are going up, fees are going up, aging airplanes. But right now it’s all about the ongoing tragedy in Myanmar, where the death toll may be up as high as 100,000 and disaster relief is being stymied by the government.

One of the people I know who is at the forefront of the relief effort is Richard Walden, from Operation USA (www.opusa.org). Like many other relief agencies, they have staff in Bangkok that is waiting for visas that haven’t come yet.

The Burmese have said they don’t want a lot of foreign relief workers in the country. That’s typical [of Burma], but the relief workers who go there would be able to get their electrical grid back up, get supplies into the country. Getting it distributed is another problem.

From Peter Greenberg Worldwide Radio - May 3, 2008

WHERE IN THE WORLD WAS MATT LAUER?

So, did you figure out where in the world is Matt Lauer?

He went to Buenos Aires, then Amsterdam, Laos, Istanbul, and for his last day on Friday—a real magical mystery location—the Seychelles Islands.

Talk about a technical challenge to get the satellite signal up from there, but they did it!

And after his amazing week, Matt will be back on the Today show this coming Monday.

HOTELS GOING “GREEN”

On “Late Night with Conan O’Brien” last week we had a lot of fun talking about “Green Week.”

That’s right, they booked people whose last name started with Green. The actor Seth Green, Peter Greenberg … you get it.

Well, we had a lot of fun talking about hotels saying they’re being eco-friendly when in fact, they have a whole lot more work to do.

As part of Green Week on NBC, our very own Peter Greenberg joined actor Seth Green on “Late Night with Conan O’Brien.”

Get it? Because their names have “Green” in them?

So what did Conan and Peter discuss?

Well, the conversation turned very gross, very quickly.

From Peter Greenberg Worldwide Radio

DELTA-NORTHWEST MERGER, WHAT WILL HAPPEN?

I’ve been talking about the impending merger between Delta and Northwest and it was finally announced last week.

However, the real thing that has to be discussed is not that mergers happen, but that we just went through two weeks with five successive bankruptcies in the airline business. Four out of the five stopped flying altogether—the fifth, Frontier, is still flying—but you know it’s a struggle out there.

April 15, 2008 – From Peter Greenberg Worldwide Radio

SEVERE TURBULENCE

Only two words can describe what went on in the past couple of weeks of travel news: severe turbulence.

That’s right, American Airlines canceling 2,400 flights … The FAA in meltdown … Frontier Airlines, the fourth airline in two weeks to declare Chapter 11, although Frontier is still going to be flying.

There’s more chaos overseas at Terminal 5 at Heathrow and it just keeps getting worse. British Airways is now saying they’re delaying the move of all of their U.S. flights and long-haul services to Terminal 5. It ain’t going to happen until June. Maybe the lost bags will show up by then.