Adrian is Auckland bureau chief for Aviation Week, based in New Zealand. He covers commercial aviation in the Asia-Pacific region.
Adrian was previously based in Aviation Week’s Washington office for nine years, writing for a range of the group’s publications and covering many aspects of the commercial aviation industry. He has won Australasian and international awards for his aviation writing.
Prior to joining Aviation Week in 2002, Adrian covered aviation industry and policy issues for two other publishing companies in Washington. He has also worked for newspapers in Texas and New Zealand, covering a wide range of topics. Adrian graduated from Auckland University with a degree in history and English in 1992.
Frontier last week announced plans to sell four aircraft to improve its cash position, and stressed that while it can put more of its Airbus fleet on the market if it wants to improve liquidity further, this is not an attractive option. The airline said the cash it will gain from the sales depends on which of its 22 Airbus aircraft it sells. The aircraft all have varying levels of payments remaining, so they would net Frontier anywhere from $5 million to $16 million per aircraft.
Air New Zealand plans to suspend its Los Angeles-Fiji flights and instead expand its code-share with Air Pacific to cover this route. The carrier said it will stop the three weekly flights between Los Angeles and Nadi, effective April 26. Air NZ will code share with Air Pacific on six of its weekly flights to Los Angeles, instead of the current four. Air Pacific will use Boeing 747-400s on this route.
Adrian Schofield, Jennifer Michels and Benet Wilson (Washington)
Keeping fare and yield momentum rolling looks to be the key to weathering economic recession for U.S. airlines, as surprisingly robust demand remains a rare bright spot in an otherwise gloomy financial outlook.
