MAS Aerospace and Engineering signed a three-year deal with SpiceJet covering C and D checks on the Indian carrier's 19 current and 12 incoming 737NGs. MAS will service aircraft at its Hyderabad facility, a joint venture with GMR Aerospace Engineering, when it enters operation in the 2011 first quarter.
Airbus delivered its 6,000th aircraft, an A380, to Emirates Monday in Hamburg. It is EK's eighth A380 and the 25th delivered by the manufacturer. Airbus's 5,000th delivery was an A330-200 in December 2007 and its 1,000th an A340-300 in March 1993.
Bombardier Commercial Aircraft President Gary Scott yesterday said the manufacturer is in "advanced discussions with some customers" for CSeries orders and that he would "be surprised if we don't announce another order in the first half of next [fiscal] year," beginning Feb. 1. Scott was speaking to reporters in Dublin. Lufthansa and Lease Corp. International are the only customers so far and have ordered a combined 50 firm aircraft and 50 options.
Aer Lingus announced the departure of Deputy CEO and COO Niall Walsh, effective immediately. EI CEO Christoph Mueller will assume Walsh's duties temporarily with assistance from Chief Engineer Fergus Wilson, the airline said. A search for a new COO is underway.
Iberia's merger with British Airways could be concluded next month, according to Caja Madrid Chairman Miguel Blesa. The head of IB's largest shareholder (23%) told reporters, "We're on the right track. I think February will be decisive for the deal. There's not much left that needs agreeing to, if anything at all. I don't know if it will be [signed] in February but it won't go past March," according to Reuters. The merger MOU was signed in November ( ATWOnline, Nov. 13).
Irish air traffic controllers at Dublin, Cork and Shannon represented by Impact plan to strike for 4 hr. this afternoon. The Irish Aviation Authority said controllers are demanding a 6% pay increase and that it already has suspended 12 who "stopped doing work on a number of ongoing projects." IAA said the 6% increase would cost the authority €6 million ($8.6 million) per year and would be passed on to airlines.
Lufthansa's roller-coaster relationship with its pilots hit another snag Friday when the Vereinigung Cockpit union, dissatisfied with the lack of a settlement in long-running talks regarding pay and working conditions covering 4,500 pilots, opened a strike ballot. VC staged a strike in summer 2008 and has a longstanding demand for a 6.4% pay raise for crew flying mainline, Lufthansa Cargo and Germanwings aircraft ( ATWOnline, July 24, 2009). The ballot will close Feb.
Airbus announced the promotion of Executive VP-Customer Services Charles Champion to head of engineering, effective April 1. He will succeed the retiring Patrick Gavin. Turkish Airlines promoted Head of Marketing and Sales Faruk Cizmecioglu to VP-sales & marketing.
AeroLogic, the joint cargo venture between Lufthansa and DHL Express, added two 777-200Fs in December, doubling its fleet to four of the type. It will launch weekend service from Frankfurt to both Atlanta and Chicago O'Hare during the current winter schedule, as well as daily Leipzig-Hong Kong service (nonstop four-times-weekly). It plans to take delivery of additional 777Fs in June, July, September and December. "Demand for Europe to Asia and Europe to US remains stable, despite the weakened world economy, and is expected to increase in the mid-term," AeroLogic said.
Boeing on Friday said it had completed "initial airworthiness testing" on the 787, "a milestone [that] will enable more crew members to take part in flights" and allow more Dreamliners to join the flight test program. Since the first 787 flight on Dec. 15, 15 flights have occurred, accumulating nearly 60 hr. in the air ( ATWOnline, Dec. 23, 2009). The aircraft has been flown to an altitude of 30,000 ft. (9,144 m.) and a speed of Mach 0.65. Initial stall tests and other dynamic maneuvers have been run.
US Air Transport Assn. reported that its third-quarter airline cost index fell 36% year-over-year to 185.3, a decline that compares to the 1.6% fall in the US Consumer Price Index. The average price paid for fuel slid to $1.94 per gal. from $3.51 in the third quarter of 2008, although the average cost of a fulltime-equivalent worker climbed 7.6%. Fuel and labor accounted for nearly 50% of airline operating expenses, ATA said.
Japanese Transport Minister Seiji Maehara said Friday that the government-backed Enterprise Turnaround Initiative Corp. of Japan will announce Japan Airlines' restructuring plan on Tuesday, while the troubled carrier tapped into an emergency credit line to allow it to maintain operations in the meantime.
Tiger Airways has taken a bold gamble and ignored the less-than-enthusiastic endorsement of its IPO from regional analysts to price it at the maximum S$1.65 ($1.19) per share ( ATWOnline, Jan. 12). The potential S$246.8 million raised from the IPO that closes today will be used to pay down debt and finance new aircraft. The offering comprises 155.6 million new shares and an additional 9.6 million from investor Indigo Partners. The shares are expected to begin trading on Jan. 22.
US Dept. of Transportation fined United Airlines $30,000 for failing to include the 7.5% federal excise tax in fares published on its website during a 60-hr. period. UA was fined $75,000 last August for failing to provide proper notice of taxes and fees at the first point of publication and for publishing one-way fares without making it clear that those fares were valid only on a roundtrip ticket. DOT suspended half of the August fine and stipulated that it would have to be paid only if UA committed another violation in the ensuing year.
Jamaican government said last week that Air Jamaica's acquisition by Caribbean Airlines was "expected to be consummated" over the weekend. The deal was expected to include an equity infusion but will require the government to pay JMD27 billion ($298.8 million) toward JM's 2010 capital expense budget, debts and costs required to cover "the redundancy of hundreds of employees." The government appointed a new five-member board chaired by insurance executive Denis Lalor to oversee JM's divestment and transition to Caribbean along with President and CEO Bruce Nobles.
Pinnacle Airlines announced the closure of a $10 million credit facility with Independent Bank of Memphis. The funds will provide Pinnacle with working capital until it receives a federal income tax refund estimated to be worth $38 million. The company said it also modified a $25 million spare parts loan "to reduce certain liquidity requirements."
Air Berlin CCO Christoph Debus told Reuters that the carrier plans to launch service to northern Iraq this year. Lufthansa last week said it will begin flying to Erbil (as well as Baghdad) from Frankfurt and Munich this summer. Cargoitalia began serving Dubai twice-weekly, replacing Almaty as the outbound stop on its Milan Malpensa-Hong Kong service. Almaty will remain the stop on the return flight. From Jan. 21 it will replace Toronto with Chicago O'Hare as a stop on one of its twice-weekly transatlantic routings that also includes New York JFK.
Austriair is the name of a new scheduled airline based in Vienna that initially plans to offer flights to Munich, Frankfurt and Stuttgart onboard three leased E-195s in the spring. Austrian business jet, charter and ACMI operator map will operate the aircraft. Local media reported that the E-195s will have only 100 seats and a separate business class cabin, with fares cheaper than Austrian Airlines but more expensive than Air Berlin. No launch timetable was available.
Lufthansa Group airlines flew 13.42 billion RPKs in December, up 19.1% from the year-ago month, against an 18% lift in capacity to 17.53 billion ASKs. Load factor rose 0.8 point to 76.6%. Lufthansa Passenger Airlines flew 9.39 billion RPKs, up 4.2%, while ASKs increased 2.7% to 12.22 billion and load factor climbed 1.1 points to 76.8%. Swiss International Air Lines flew 2.31 billion RPKs in December, a 2.4% increase year-over-year. Capacity fell 3.5% to 2.85 billion ASKs, lifting load factor 4.7 points to 81%.
The US Commodities Futures Trading Commission last week proposed to set position limits for futures and option contracts in the major energy markets in a move hailed by the Air Transport Assn. According to CFTC, the Notice of Proposed Rulemaking is intended "to prevent excessive concentration in these markets, consistent with CFTC's statutory framework to prevent or diminish excessive speculation that may be a burden on interstate commerce."
Aer Lingus pilots represented by the Irish Airline Pilots Assn. accepted annual pay cuts of €30 million ($43.5 million) that were recommended by an Irish Labor Relations Commission arbitrator. The reductions are part of EI's continuing effort to implement a €97 million savings program, which the airline has said is being held up by pilots' reluctance to agree to cuts ( ATWOnline, Dec. 3, 2009).
Australian scientists are claiming that they are achieving the world's best production rates of oil from algae grown in open saline ponds, taking them a step closer to creating commercial quantities of biofuel.
While IATA welcomed the results of the Copenhagen summit, key airline leaders separately expressed concerns that the lack of consensus from political leaders at the conference means that the airline industry is entering a period of confusion, inefficiency and risk mitigation.
US Air Transport Assn. American Airlines, Continental Airlines and United Airlines initiated a legal challenge in the UK High Court of Justice against aviation's inclusion in the EU's Emissions Trading Scheme, arguing that it violated the Chicago Convention, the Kyoto Protocol, the US-EU open skies agreement and is "contrary to the customary international law principle that each state has complete and exclusive sovereignty over the airspace above its territory."
