this was the part that perked my ears up:

Max number of falcons per aircraft type:

A320, A321, A319, EMJ 195 EMJ 175= 10 FALCONS
A310, A340 = 15 FALCONS

nifty.

I want to ride on an airplane with a falcon. Are they kept as pets in areas that this airline services? I can't think of another common reason they'd need to regulate the falcon to aircraft ratio.

Apparently it's pretty common around in that area: Falcon Hospital for Pampered Pets in Abu Dhabi

The UAE apparently "invented the falcon passport". I must have a falcon with its own passport.

No first class for falcons? fail!

In the middle of a chain of emails discussing fantasy football waivers, I just asked the BF if I could have a falcon. He said, "Like Roddy White?", thinking I was still talking about football players. I lol'd.

Do falcons attack owls? For some reason I think they do.

I will now endeavour to fly this airline on the offchance that I might get to sit next to a falcon!

Funny, I just got back from the UAE. I saw no falcons either on the plane or in the air, but I met at least two dozen camels.

These may not be pets in the Western sense. I think falconry is a popular sport/hobby in the middle east.

wokerant: Yeah, the article punchtothehead linked to said falconry is outlawed in the UAE, but owners still take their birds to other countries to hunt.

This one time, I was on this 14-hour flight from San Francisco to Kartouhm? So anyway, there was this falcon in the seat behind me and all he did the whole flight was scream and bounce up and down on the tray table behind my seat and his handler just put his earbuds in his ear and messed with his iPhone and didn't do anything about it. Just before we were FINALLY about to land in Sudan and I could officially start my vacation that little bastard leaned forward and regurgitated a partially digested shrew right over my seat back and down into my lap. It was at that point that I swore I'd never fly Royal Jordanian again.

I have NO frigging idea whether what pup said is true or not. If I ever meet up with her again, I'm demanding to see her passport, though.

Check the post for h placement, danf. Rookie mistake.

I understand afterward the CIA gave her a refresher course, though.

Anyway, there's an interesting connection between falconry and world events:
Falconry and al Qaeda
No, no, really. Really!

As ancient as the sport is, though, the modern incarnation is relatively recent.

I went to take a friggin walk by the friggin reservoir
A wishin' for a friggin quid to pay my friggin score
My head, it was a-achin', an' me throat was parched and dry
And so I sent a little prayer a-wingin' to the sky

And there came a friggin falcon, and he walked upon the waves
I said "A friggin miracle!" and sang a couple staves
Of a friggin churchy ballad that I learned when I was young
The friggin bird took to the air and spattered me with dung

I fell upon my friggin knees and bowed my friggin head
And said three friggin Aves for all my friggin dead
And then I rose upon my feet and said another ten;
For the friggin bird burst into flame and spattered me again

The burnin' bird hung in the air just like a friggin sun
It seared me friggin eyebrows off, and when the job was done
The burnin' bird shot 'cross the sky, just like a shooting star
I ran to tell the friggin Priest. He bummed me last cigar

I told him of the miracle, he told me of the rose
I showed him bird crap in me hair, the bastard held his nose
I went to see the Bishop, but the friggin Bishop said:
"Go home and sleep it off, you sot - and wash your friggin head!"

I came upon the friggin wake of a dirty rotten swine
By name of Jock O'Leary, and I touched his head with mine
Ol' Jock, he sat up in his box and raised his friggin head
And his wife took up a candlestick and beat the bugger dead

Again I touched his head with mine and brought him back to life
His smiling face rolled on the floor - this time, she used a knife
And then she fell upon her knees, and started in to pray:
"'Twas 40 years, O Lord," she said, "I've waited for this day!"