Berlin Tempelhof will close for good on Oct. 30. Final scheduled flight at the historic 85-year-old facility will be an 8 p.m. Cirrus Airlines service to Mannheim aboard a Do-328.
TAM flew 1.96 billion domestic RPKs last month, up 9.3% year-over-year, against an 18.3% hike in capacity to 2.91 billion ASKs. Load factor dropped 5.6 points to 67.1%. International RPKs rose 32.9% to 1.2 billion while ASKs climbed 26.8% to 1.65 billion, lifting load factor 3.4 points to 72.6%. WestJet flew 1.12 billion RPMs in June, up 17.9% from the year-ago month. Capacity rose 23.1% to 1.45 billion ASMs and load factor fell 3.4 points to 76.5%.
Tunisair announced a capital increase of $14 million through the issue of 16.2 million new shares on the Tunis bourse that will be distributed to existing shareholders at a ratio of one new share for every five held. Shares carry a nominal value of TND1 ($0.85)
US Airways reported a $567 million net loss in the second quarter, reversed from a $263 million profit in the year-ago period, citing "the staggering increase" in fuel prices. The loss is partly the result of net special items of $466 million including a goodwill impairment charge of $622 million. Absent the special items, the quarterly loss would have been $101 million, reversed from a profit of $261 million on a similar basis in the 2007 second quarter.
A slowing economy and the ripple effects of the Sichuan earthquake helped produce a 23% year-over-year drop in Chinese airlines' combined net income in the first half of 2008 to CNY3.7 billion ($540.9 million) from CNY4.8 billion in the year-ago period. China Eastern Airlines reported a CNY368 million profit while Air China enjoyed a 5.5% increase in operating revenue to CNY24.21 billion in the first half. Passenger boardings totaled 16.6 million. CA did not release its profit figure in its mid-year work report.
Kuwait parliament on Monday gave final approval to the privatization plans of Kuwait Airways. The state plans to sell 40% of the carrier to the public and 35% to a long-term investor within two years. The airline, which operates 17 aircraft, is expected to be privatized within 10 months ( ATWOnline, Jan. 10).
SkyEurope Airlines will close eight routes and ground two of its 15 737-700s for the coming winter schedule. Chairman Jason Bitter confirmed that it will drop routes from Bratislava and Kosice to Cork, Dublin and Birmingham as well from Prague to Sophia and Lisbon. He said rising fuel prices have made operating certain longer routes uneconomical.
Honeywell won a 10-year extension on its contract with Southwest Airlines to provide MRO for avionics and mechanical products on 737s. Contract covers up to 520 aircraft plus future deliveries and includes Honeywell APUs, HMUs, lighting, components and wheels and brakes.
Boeing said it received an offer from TRC Capital Corp. to purchase 2 million shares of common stock, representing less than 1/3 of 1% of its outstanding shares, at $63 per share. The manufacturer said it "does not express an opinion and does not make a recommendation as to whether shareholders should tender their shares in TRC's mini-tender offer."
LOT Polish Airlines President and CEO Dariusz Nowak told ATWOnline that LOT is restructuring ahead of its planned privatization, a process that will be its "biggest challenge." He said one move will be to add more charter flights to its low-fare subsidiary Centralwings, which operates 737 Classics. He said the company is looking to position Centralwings as "a kind of mixed charter and maybe LCC flights to some selected points." He said the mainline has adopted some of Centralwings' low-cost strategies in order to reduce its own cost base.
SR Technics signed a five-year, $165 million Integrated Engine Solutions agreement with South African Airways Technical covering maintenance of the CFM56-5Cs powering SAA's A340s.
Delta Air Lines launched five-times-weekly New York JFK-Lyon aboard a two-class 757-200. Air New Zealand launched twice-weekly Auckland-Beijing aboard a 777-200ER Royal Jordanian will launch twice-weekly Amman-Kiev on Aug. 17 aboard an E-195.
Transaero flew 7.97 billion RPKs during the first six months of 2008, up 55% year-over-year. Passenger numbers climbed 56% to 2.1 million, a company record. The Russian carrier added two 747s, four 767s and one 737 during the semester. It now operates 37 aircraft. Copa Airlines flew 481.1 million RPMs in June, up 24.8% year-over-year, against a 21% increase in capacity to 598.6 million ASMs. Load factor rose 2.5 points to 80.4%. SkyEurope Airlines transported 344,383 passengers last month, up 4.4% from the year-ago month. Load factor fell 2.1 points to 77%.
Cargolux Airlines International took delivery of its 16th and final 747-400F powered by Rolls-Royce RB211-524H-Ts. New aircraft comes with a unique livery, with the traditional red-and-white stripes fading away instead of reaching to the tail. This hints at a revamped design to be introduced on the 747-8F, Cargolux noted. From 2009 on, it will receive 13 GEnx-powered 747-8Fs that gradually will replace the -400F fleet.
Airline CFOs around the world are pessimistic about industry finances over the next 12 months, expecting soaring costs to erode profitability further despite rising traffic, according to the IATA Business Confidence Index released yesterday.
News from Travel Technology Update: Travelport plans to roll out its new travel agency desktop in early 2009 with a number of "wow factors," including access to the Sabre and, eventually, Amadeus GDSs. Development of the new work environment took a leap forward with the acquisition of G2 Switchworks' "Kestrel" point-of-sale application in April, Flo Lugli, Travelport GDS' senior vice president, commercial, said. Travelport also gained 18 former G2 employees.
Air Cargo Management Group reported that US domestic airfreight and express revenue increased just 1% year-over-year in 2007 to $32.81 billion, a "slim" gain it attributed to fuel surcharges.
Thai LCC One-Two-Go Airlines, which suffered an MD-82 crash last September that killed 89, will suspend some or all of its operations from today until Sept. 15 while it restructures. An English-language statement on its website said the carrier would be "operating a reduced schedule" during that period, but press reports out of Thailand cited other statements from One-Two-Go indicating a total grounding and citing financial problems as the cause.
Worldwide Flight Services was selected by Asiana Airlines to provide cargo, ramp and passenger handling services at stations at Paris Charles de Gaulle, Lille, Lyon, Marseille, Strasbourg and Toulouse. Asiana operates thrice-weekly Incheon-CDG.
AirBridge Cargo, the scheduled 747F airline owned by Volga-Dnepr Group, said it likely will not achieve profitability this year despite a more-than-doubling of first-half 2008 revenue to $210 million from $96 million in the year-ago period.
Midwest Airlines yesterday unveiled a revised flight schedule that will feature elimination of service to Fort Lauderdale, Fort Myers and San Diego and an enhanced codeshare agreement with Northwest Airlines.
Parker Aerospace reached a 10-year deal with Bombardier to develop and manufacture fly-by-wire flight control systems for widebody programs. Work will begin with the CSeries. Contract value is estimated at $3.5 billion over the life of the programs.
Austrian Airlines will cut winter schedule capacity by 5% from its original plan and will remove three aircraft from its fleet next year as part of its effort to negotiate "the current crisis in the aviation industry," it said. Service to London City will end Aug. 18 and flights to Chicago O'Hare will end at the conclusion of the summer schedule. Other "targeted" reductions will occur in Europe over the winter.
