Etihad Airways CEO James Hogan, speaking with The Australian in Abu Dhabi, said the carrier has been able to maintain loads on Australian routes but has seen pressure on yields. "If you look at Melbourne and you look at Sydney, the two Sydney flights are certainly averaging 80% and so is Melbourne," he said, "And what's pleasing is the two premium cabins are holding up too.'' Hogan added that Etihad already is experiencing some improvement in cargo and some reversal in yield decline.
World airline passenger traffic was down 1.1% in August compared to the same month in 2008, an improvement over the 2.9% year-to-year decline in July, IATA reported. With ASKs off 2.5%, industry load factor reached 80.9%, up 1.2 points over the same month last year. Freight performance also improved, from a negative 11.3% in July to a negative 9.6% in August.
Welcome Air, a small regional carrier based in Innsbruck and owned by Swiss Lions Air Group AG, is in the process of taking over Air Alps, an independent Austrian regional that is 76% owned by BZS Holding, a consortium of several Italian companies. Air Alps connects regional airports such as Bolzano, Rimini and Parma with Rome Fiumicino and also flies between Perugia and Milan Malpensa. It operates the flights in cooperation with Alitalia. "The plan for the merger is well underway and could be completed soon," an Alitalia source told ATWOnline.
Air Berlin and Pegasus Airlines started their cooperation Monday by cross-linking their websites. Passengers will be able to book 17 additional connections from Germany to Turkey as well as 26 routes within Turkey. Pegasus belongs to ESAS Holding. ESAS also is AB's largest shareholder with an 18% stake. Separately, AB announced that it will add 10 new destinations and 54 new nonstop services, especially from Cologne, Stuttgart and Memmingen/Munich West, starting Nov. 1 following its takeover of TUIfly's scheduled flight operations.
British Airways launches its all-business-class service between London City and New York JFK today. The service, which will be offered twice-daily by mid-October, will be operated on specially configured A318s with 32 lie-flat business class seats. The launch flights bear numbers formerly used for Concorde services, BA001 to BA004. "For the first time, New York has a tailor-made premium service to the London Canary Wharf area on its doorstep," said BA Executive VP-Americas Simon Talling-Smith.
Lufthansa Consulting signed a deal with UTair to identify new network growth opportunities for the Russian carrier, starting in July and due to be completed in September.
Bernstein Research raised concerns that while passengers are returning to the skies, the large number of aircraft to be delivered in 2009-10 potentially could lead to excess capacity over the next two years and thus more deferrals.
Air India's flight schedules could be disrupted this week after nearly 400 management pilots proceeded with a threatened wildcat strike beginning last Friday to protest cuts in their flying allowances, according to India's Economic Times. The pilots are not allowed to form a union, which is why they resorted to wildcat action. A spokesperson for AI said the airline "had not heard anything from the pilots [about the strike]. They have gone to the media rather than coming to us.
ST Aerospace announced yesterday that its commercial pilot training operation ST Aviation Training Academy has partnered with Singapore-based LCC Tiger Airways for A320 pilot training under STATA's Multi-crew Pilot License curriculum. STATA was created by ST Aerospace two years ago to respond to projected demand for significant numbers of new pilots in the Asia/Pacific region over the next 20 years ( ATWOnline, Sept. 5, 2007).
AJW Aviation expanded its power-by-the-hour contract with Czech Airlines to include an additional two A320s and two A321s. The program is set to cover the entire OK fleet of 33 aircraft by 2016.
Finnair introduced daily Helsinki Vantaa-New Delhi service Sept. 25. Alaska Airlines last week launched daily Houston Intercontinental-Seattle Tacoma service using 737-800 equipment. Jet Airways begins daily Hong Kong-New Delhi service Sept. 30 using an A330-200, complementing existing service from Mumbai to HK, It will launch twice-weekly Bangkok-Gaya-Varanasi service Oct. 6.
Flybe is interested in acquiring parts of bmi and officially confirmed its interest to Lufthansa "quite awhile ago," Chairman and CEO Jim French told ATWOnline.
Japan's transport minister said on Japanese TV Sunday that he will not force Japan Airlines, Asia's largest carrier by revenue, into bankruptcy, according to the Associated Press. "We will not crush and liquidate [the airline]," Land, Infrastructure and Transport Minister Seiji Maehara said on a TV Asahi talk show. "It's just impossible," AP reported him as saying.
Buoyed by strong domestic GDP gains and global economic recovery, Chinese carriers enjoyed robust growth in the domestic and international markets in August. According to CAAC, Chinese airlines transported 22.64 million passengers in August, up 41.6% over the year-ago period, while cargo traffic jumped 18.1% to 390,800 tonnes. Passenger load factor improved 1.7 points to 79.9%.
Perth-based Skywest Airlines is moving to acquire up to four A320 family aircraft to satisfy an upswing in demand for resource industry charters and to launch new international routes to Southeast Asia destinations. The airline deferred its announced plans to acquire the aircraft when the economic downturn struck last year, but yesterday MD Hugh Davin said it has "dusted off plans" to order up the aircraft, a new type for the regional.
Air France is still studying the possibility of launching high-speed train services in Europe under its own brand in cooperation with a partner, although the project will not take off as initially planned in 2010 when the intra-European rail transport market opens up, the carrier confirmed to ATWOnline. AF declined to comment on a report in Les Echos that talks between the airline and Veolia about a partnership have stopped.
US Airways closed its previously announced common stock offering, raising $137.3 million in aggregate net proceeds from the sale of 29 million shares including an overallotment of 2.7 million shares. Proceeds will be used for general corporate purposes. Citi underwrote the offering.
Lufthansa said Friday that award miles earned on its and subsidiary Swiss International Air Lines' frequent-flyer programs can be used for "voluntary carbon offset donations." LH and Swiss have expanded their carbon dioxide compensation program "to allow passengers the opportunity to counterbalance their individual share of the carbon emissions generated during their flight." Previously, LH allowed passengers to donate cash voluntarily to the myclimate foundation in Switzerland to help offset their share of a flight's CO2 emissions.
Air India last week announced a cut in productivity-linked incentive payments due to more than 7,000 employees, retroactive to August. Cuts will range from 25% to 50% depending on the amount. Those earning more than INR200,000 ($4,140) per month will see their bonuses reduced by half.
MTU Maintenance Hannover, an affiliate of MTU Aero Engines, said it secured engine maintenance contracts worth approximately €50 million ($73.6 million) "over the past few weeks." Largest deal is with Air New Zealand covering MRO on 38 CF6-80C2s used to power its 747-400s. MTU did not identify the remaining customers. Delta TechOps signed an open-ended extension of its MRO agreement with Ethiopian Airlines covering its PW2040 engines.
ILFC last week announced the following lease deals and deliveries with 21 airline customers: Two new A330-200s to Garuda Indonesia for 84 and 86 months respectively, one new 777-300ER to V Australia for 148 months, one used 737-500 to Aerosvit for five years, one used 737-300 to Sharjah-based AVE.com for five years, one used 747-400F to Air Atlanta Icelandic for 54 months, two used A320-200s to Moscow Vnukovo-based Avianova for 58 and 59 months respectively, one used 757-200ER to Madrid-based charter carrier Mint Airways for four years, one used 737-800 to Sun Country Airlines for 51 mo
Jazz Air is eyeing a return to Toronto City Centre after having been forced out by an exclusivity agreement struck between the Toronto Port Authority and Porter Airlines. "We operated at the island airport for 18 years before we were evicted," Jazz CEO Joseph Randell said during a recent investment conference, according to The Globe and Mail. "We're looking forward to getting back in there.
Finnair announced a 10-year sale/leaseback transaction with Engine Lease Finance Corp. on one new CF6-80E1 spare for its A330 fleet. Engine is worth €13 million at list prices, AY said.
Frontier Airlines, which is set to emerge from bankruptcy on Oct. 1 as a subsidiary of Republic Airways Holdings, suffered a $2 million net loss in August, which it attributed to expenses associated with bankruptcy. It lost $5.6 million in August 2008. It showed dramatic improvement on the operating level, reporting a $10.2 million operating profit compared to a $3.3 million surplus in the year-ago month. It said August net profit would have been $10.2 million excluding special items. Mainline unit revenue fell 8.2% to 10.17 cents while passenger RASM was down 12.6% to 9.31 cents.
