Delta Air Lines has made the self-service booking, check-in, loyalty program and shopping functions on its website available in Spanish. It added that it will introduce Spanish and French check-in kiosks early next year.
KLM announced it will not reinstate service to Beirut, even after the airport is fully operational, as "the route was already loss-making." Partner Air France intends to resume flights from Paris Charles de Gaulle. WestJet will operate seasonal thrice-weekly Toronto-Nassau service Nov. 5-April 26. Air Sahara applied for approval from the Indian government to launch daily Delhi-Guangzhou flights from Nov. 7. The airline said it also plans to begin services to Maldives and Bangladesh this winter.
Northwest Airlines DC-10-30 en route from Minneapolis to Mumbai via Amsterdam yesterday abruptly returned to Schiphol Airport shortly after departure, at which point 12 passengers were arrested by US air marshals for "suspicious" behavior. News reports from Amsterdam said passengers were using mobile phones in flight, attempting to pass phones among one another and ignoring "fasten seatbelt" signs. Other reports said some passengers had suspicious-looking plastic bags.
US Dept. of Justice yesterday waded into the dispute between Northwest Airlines and its flight attendants, arguing in a Statement of Interest filed with the US District Court for the Southern District of New York that the Assn. of Flight Attendants-CWA does not have the right to strike because the parties still are bound by the Railway Labor Act.
London Stansted passengers will not face a strike by baggage handlers and check-in staff this weekend ( ATWOnline, Aug. 21) after the TGWU and GMB unions reached a two-year labor deal with Swissport. GMB said the company offered an 11% pay increase.
Cathay Pacific starting putting its stamp on Dragonair yesterday, appointing Kenny Tang as CEO designate of the Hong Kong carrier a day after shareholders of the involved companies approved Cathay's takeover ( ATWOnline, Aug. 23). Tang replaces Stanley Hui, who resigned earlier in the day. Tang joined CX in 1979 and became GM-corporate finance in 1994, COO of Air Hong Kong three years later and GM-cargo for CX in 2000. He was seconded to Swire Pacific two years ago as MD of Taiwan's Taikoo Motors.
ANA, Hawaiian Aviation Contract Services and Sojitz Corp. last week established a new Honolulu-based flightcrew leasing company called Crew Resources Worldwide that will provide pilots for ANA and other carriers.
El Al reported a second-quarter loss of $15.1 million, according to press reports, a reversal from the $29.9 million earned in the year-ago quarter before increased foreign competition, fuel costs and war devastated the bottom line. Revenue increased 2% to $429.2 million. A full-year loss is expected ( ATWOnline, July 20). The carrier took another hit this week when the Israeli government signed a deal with Alitalia to be the preferred carrier for officials flying internationally.
Australia-based Virgin Blue announced a 12% lift in net profit to A$84.5 million ($64.4 million) for the nine-month fiscal year ended June 30 despite a 35% surge in fuel costs. The carrier changed its year-end accounting period to June 30 from Sept. 30 after Toll Holdings, Australia's largest transport group, acquired the airline's majority owner, Patrick Corp. ( ATWOnline, April 17).
CSA Czech Airlines President Radomir Lasak this week reported half-year losses of CZK773 million ($35.2 million), widened from a CZK240 million loss in the first six months of 2005 but CZK20 million less than forecast, the CTK Czech News Agency reported. The carrier expects a full-year loss similar to the CZK496 million suffered last year ( ATWOnline, June 7) but intends to return to the black in 2008.
Pinnacle Airlines, a Northwest Airlink partner, has been notified by NWA that the company is ready to begin renegotiating its Airline Service Agreement, according to a recent filing with the SEC. The current service contract prohibits Pinnacle from operating aircraft with more than 50 seats. In addition to its exclusive agreement with Northwest, Pinnacle CEO Phil Trenary said the Regional will continue to look for other opportunities and has completed work on a second certificate enabling it operate aircraft for other partners.
US FAA released a final albeit interim rule finalizing slot limits at Chicago O'Hare that originally were imposed on a temporary basis in 2004. The rule takes effect Oct. 29, 2006, and terminates Oct. 31, 2008, at which point it is expected that the opening of a new runway under the O'Hare Modernization Plan will allow the airfield to accommodate more than "50,000 additional forecast operations" annually.
Boeing announced that China Airlines will use the Maintenance Performance Toolbox and will be the first carrier to use it in conjunction with Boeing's Maintenance and Engineering Management application, which CI adopted last year.
Pulkovo Airlines Tu-154M's flight data and cockpit voice recorders were recovered yesterday by workers sifting through the debris of Tuesday's crash near Donetsk in Ukraine that killed 170 passengers and crew ( ATWOnline, Aug. 23). "Both recorders seem to be in satisfactory condition," Russian Transport Minister Igor Levitin said, adding that the devices will be sent to Moscow for examination.
A Pulkovo Airlines Tu-154M en route from Anapa to St. Petersburg carrying 160 passengers and 10 crew crashed yesterday in Ukraine, killing all aboard. The crash was the third and deadliest in the region in less than four months, following the Armavia A320 accident in May ( ATWOnline, July 27) and the S7 Airlines A310-300 overrun at Irkutsk last month ( ATWOnline, July 11).
IATA and China's General Administration of Civil Aviation signed an MOU to "further the safe, efficient and sustainable development of China's air transportation system," IATA said. The agreement focuses on cooperation in safety, traffic management, training, fuel, technology and other areas.
LTU German Airlines majority owner Hans Rudolf Woehrl said he wants to use the proceeds of the sale of dba to Air Berlin ( ATWOnline, Aug. 18) to strengthen the financial situation of the Dusseldorf-based leisure carrier. He told Die Welt that he wants to improve the product, especially in business class. Woehrl is expecting LTU to lose €10-€15 million ($12.9-$19.3 million) this year. No financial details have been released about the sale of dba.
Pan Am World Airways liquidation trust said last week it soon would receive $30 million from the Libyan government, to be paid out to 15,000 former Pan Am employees and other creditors by year end, as part of a settlement reached last year in which Libya acknowledged its involvement in the 1988 bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 over Scotland.
Southwest Airlines plans to launch daily Albany-Tampa service from Oct. 29 and daily Reno/Lake Tahoe-Chicago Midway flights from Dec. 4. It also announced frequency increases on 10 additional routes. Qantas and Jet Airways concluded a codeshare arrangement that will expand Qantas's network within India from Sept. 6. It will codeshare on Jet flights from Singapore to Delhi and Mumbai, offering connections to all Australian capitals. The codeshare will complement Qantas's thrice-weekly A330 Singapore-Mumbai service.
Lufthansa CityLine took delivery yesterday of an 84-seat CRJ900, the first of a dozen that will come into the fleet this year. They will be replacing 50-seat CRJs as the company continues reconfiguring its fleet. "With the new aircraft model, Lufthansa CityLine is taking a major step forward economically and technologically and is thus ideally prepared to face up to the future competition," MD Thomas Drager said. First destinations for the new type include Munich, Brussels, Lyon, Munster/Osnabruck, Nice, Oslo and Geneva.
