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.
FAA recently decided to end a program that assigned controllers full-time to agency headquarters to provide a controller liaison and feedback on modernization programs. The agency told the last nine liaison controllers assigned to headquarters that they will return to ATC duties as of July 29, the National Air Traffic Controllers Association said. The number of controllers in the program has steadily decreased this year, NATCA said. FAA told the union that the move was done as part of cost-cutting initiatives.
The U.K.'s National Air Traffic Services (NATS) last week reported the company's largest ever profit for the fiscal year ending March 31 partially due to record traffic. NATS posted a GBP68.8 million (US$121.6 million) pre-tax profit, compared to a GBP1.8 million profit in the 2003/2004 fiscal year and losses of GBP29.1 million and GBP79.9 million in the two previous periods. NATS will pay its first-ever dividend to shareholders, with the government and an airline coalition the major stakeholders.
UPS last week refused to meet its pilot union's demand to present a final contract offer by July 1. The carrier said it would not recognize the "artificial deadline" set by the Independent Pilots Association because the negotiations are still under the control of the National Mediation Board (NMB). The NMB ordered a recess in the contract negotiations. If it agreed to the union demand, UPS would "in effect circumvent the negotiating process and block the efforts of the federal mediator."
