Air Transport World

Lufthansa Cargo is planning to set up a partnership with an airline outside of the Lufthansa Group by the middle of this year as well as with a second carrier in 2015, CEO Karl Ulrich Garnadt confirmed at the carrier’s annual results conference.

Southwest Airlines has announced it will double flights from Washington National Airport (DCA), including seven nonstop routes.

Rating agency Standard & Poor's (S&P) has given European low-cost carrier Ryanair a BBB+ long-term credit rating and said the outlook for the airline is stable.

AirAsia India has received its first aircraft, an Airbus A320, in the southern Indian city of Chennai.

Manston Airport in Kent, in the UK Southeast, has begun a period of consultation with staff over the possible closure of the airport.

Lufthansa Technik (LHT), which has been performing some Airbus A380 wing rib feet repairs for over a year, is about halfway through the repairs.

Lithuanian leisure carrier Small Planet Airlines will launch Airbus A320 flights from Tripoli International Airport to Dusseldorf, London Gatwick and Paris Charles de Gaulle airports at the end of March.

L-3 Link Simulation & Training is expanding its Asian Aviation Training Centre (AATC) in Bangkok with an ATR 72-600 full flight simulator (FFS) and an ATR 72-600 flat panel trainer (FPT).

Vietnamese low-cost carrier VietJet has taken delivery of the third of its recent four-aircraft Airbus A320 order from leasing company AWAS.

Aircraft News

Briefs from the March 24, 2014 issue of ATW's Skypaths

1. January-June 2013. 2. January-May 2013. * Includes Regional operations. Source: ATW Research, direct airline reports.

Debris spotted in the south Indian Ocean appears to be wreckage from missing Malaysia Airlines MH370. Malaysia’s prime minister and the airline’s Group CEO have both issued statements saying new data and analysis shows the aircraft, a Boeing 777-200, went down in a remote area of the ocean west of Perth.

Mobile satellite communications specialist Inmarsat leveraged a “groundbreaking but traditional mathematics-based process” to analyze data from other flights that use its satellite network and establish a pattern that helped investigators nail down Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 final flight path as traveling south over the Indian Ocean, an Inmarsat executive explained.

Singapore-based Tiger Airways Holdings, parent company of the Tigerair group of low-cost carriers, has placed an order for 37 Airbus A320neos—but canceled nine Airbus A320ceos currently on order.

Air France-KLM has selected GE Aviation GEnx-1B engines to power 25 Boeing 787s on order plus 12 leased Dreamliners.

Ethiopian Airlines is exceeding its goals under its long-term Vision 2025 strategy, according to comments made by CEO Tewolde Gebremariam.

German public services trade union Verdi has called for a warning strike over wages on Thursday regarding Frankfurt Airport operator Fraport, which could further affect flights through Germany this week.

Shandong Airlines reported a 2013 net profit of CNY389.08 million ($63.2 million), down 34% compared to a net income of CNY589.81 million in 2012.

Etihad Airways and Latvian flag-carrier airBaltic have expanded their codeshare agreement.

Sukhoi Civil Aircraft Co. (SCAC) delivered the first of two leased Superjet SSJ100s March 21 to new Russian customer Centre-South Airlines.

People

Footnotes: * International only. 1. January - June. 2. January - May. 3. Includes Regional operations. 4. Combined American Eagle, Executive Airlines and American Connection. 5. Combined traffic for SkyWest Airlines and ExpressJet Airlines. 6. YTD 02013 from 4/26/13

Source: Airports Council International

Southwest Airlines has announced a doubling of flights from Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport (DCA), including seven nonstop routes. The