Will I still fly with Cebu Pacific Air?

I'm sure you've all read the news about their planes that overshoot in Davao and lately the one that skids off NAIA runway. Indeed, it's not the year of Cebu Pacific for the number of mishaps they had for the first 6 months of 2013. I have no idea really if it's the plane, pilot, weather or the runway. I surely wouldn't want to be part of their PR as of the moment. They're probably having a hard time right now trying to think of ways on how to uplift the image of the company. Anyway, as for me.. I'm glad I wasn't in any of the said flights but I'm also thankful that all members of the crew and passengers are all safe and sound.

But the question now is.. will I still fly with CebuPac? YES.

Let's go back in time shall we? In case you didn't know, exactly 5 years ago I published a travel entry in my personal blog about my first ever trip with Cebu Pacific that gave me my first ever online/blog award courtesy of the said airline during the Wordpress Wordcamp in the Philippines. Sadly, I wasn't able to backup my old blog but thanks to web archive you can read my "winning" entry here. Let me share some photos from that trip to Palawan in 2008.

My first official photo op with the CebuPac airbus after landing in Puerto Princesa. I was all praises for the airline company since our flight was on time and had no problems whatsoever. Again, the photos here are from 2008 ok? :)






We stayed at The Legend Hotel, ate at Badjao restaurant, dropped by Baker's Hill which was one of the newest property/tourist destination back then owned by a family friend/relative, visited the Mitra ranch and crocodile farm and of course island hopped at Honda Bay and traveled almost 2 hours to Sabang to check out the famous Underground River. It was definitely one of my most memorable family trips ever! I instantly fell in love with Palawan and I couldn't wait to come back real soon! :)

So anyway, back to the original topic here. Will I still fly with Cebu Pacific? Y-E-S.. Yes! I mean come on people! From the very beginning we all knew that they're a budget airline. If flying with a limited budget, one should definitely expect something really bad or even worst to happen. 

I've had a couple of bad experiences with them but the worst would be the time when Paolo and I decided to go to Boracay for our anniversary during the rainy season, can't remember exact dates but I'm pretty sure it was between July-August. We booked round trip tickets (during one of their usual seat sales) for Caticlan and as expected.. our flight got delayed for hours and then diverted to Kalibo. Our original ETA in Caticlan was probably around lunch time but after all the hulabalooh delays.. we finally arrived around 7:00PM in Kalibo. Delayed and diverted flights wasn't even the worst part. Airlines usually provide airport transfers for cases like this but sad to say there was none for us. Since it was getting late and too dark for land travel going to the island, we decided to just spend the night in a motel like/creepy room for rent few walking distance away from Kalibo airport. It was seriously one of the worst nights of my entire existence. I swear, naawa ako sa sarili namin. :(

From then on, I've learned my lesson.. never book a trip going to Boracay during the rainy season and most important of all is to get travel insurance. At least with travel insurance, you get a little something in return for all the hassle they may or they have caused you.

The latest news about Cebu Pacific may have given them a bad image or whatever but I believe that people will still continue to patronize the airline and book/fly with them in the future. You know what they say in PR/Marketing: bad publicity is still publicity. In fairness to Cebu Pacific's tagline: "It's time everyone flies!" they really do make it possible for almost everyone to fly. I know some who used to travel by land/sea to get to their provinces 'coz its cheaper but thanks to seat sales they can now afford to ride a plane that could bring them to their destination as soon as possible.

Get what I mean here? The main goal is to save and honestly.. our family probably saved a couple of thousand pesos (maybe hundreds!) by booking trips with Cebu Pacific. Thanks to them we've been to Hong Kong, Malaysia, Singapore, Cambodia, Taiwan, etc. and few days from now I'm flying again but this time to Incheon, South Korea. They're top airline of choice according to my flight diary account.

Anyway to end this post, I'd like to say that accidents happen on a daily basis and for a reason. Maybe no one will ever know why it happened or what the future has in store for us. As a Catholic, the best suggestion for everyone would be to always pray. It may sound too simple but to quote Ted Dekker in his book Blink; "Prayer may just be the most powerful tool mankind has." --- AMEN!

P.S. This is not a sponsored post. I just wanted to share my personal insights regarding the issue.
P.P.S. The prize I got for my "winning" blog post in 2008 was 2 round trip tickets to any local CebuPac destination. Decided to fly to Cebu for my birthday (May 2009) but I'm reserving that entry for my future posts. Goodnight! :)