Continental leaves SkyTeam and joins Star Alliance

Hurry up if you plan to redeem SkyTeam points for Continental flights:

Regarding SkyTeam, Continental intends to end its participation in the Sky Team Alliance after the last scheduled flight on Oct. 24, 2009.
We continue to work through the details of our planned exit from SkyTeam and entry into Star Alliance, but anticipate our participation in Star Alliance will begin promptly after we leave SkyTeam. We are committed to providing our OnePass members with opportunities to earn and redeem miles over an extensive network.
We will be working hard with our good partners at SkyTeam, and our future good partners at Star, to make the transition from SkyTeam to Star Alliance as smooth as possible.

source: email from Continental.