MADRID—MRO providers must rethink how they do business both with competitors and airlines, even if it means seemingly counter-intuitive moves like taking on more financial risk and cooperating with traditional rivals, several senior industry executives said during a panel at MRO Europe. “In the past, a lot of financial risk was taken by the operator,” TAP Maintenance & Engineering Vice President-Marketing and Sales Carlos Rulvo said. “Today, an MRO organization has to be willing to accept more of that themselves.”
MADRID—GE Aviation is increasing its investment in big data analytics to flag potential engine performance trouble spots and has used some of this learning to revamp its engine support portal, company executives said. Speaking at MRO Europe in Madrid, GE Aviation General Manager-Services Marketing Bill Dwyer said the company’s focus is now on prognostics, or using data to turn unscheduled events into scheduled maintenance.
MADRID—Executives from Air France Industries KLM Engineering & Maintenance (AFI KLM E&M) and Bombardier Aerospace agreed there is still some way to go before bonded repairs will be accepted on primary composite structures. Regulators only allow bolt-on metal repairs to primary composite structures on the latest generation of aircraft—just like standard metallic-build versions—because of concerns over the strength, quality and durability of manually bonded repairs.
With the official launch of its first flights to Singapore, MIAT Mongolian Airlines has signaled its intention to significantly extend its east-west route network—potentially to the U.S. and Australia. The Mongolian flag carrier’s network also serves Japan, China, and Korea to the east, and Berlin and Moscow to the west, from its base at Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia.
Philippine Airlines (PAL) has signaled it may defer an order with Airbus for at least some of the 46 aircraft it has on order from the manufacturer. “We have to discuss with Airbus,” PAL Executive VP and GM Jaime Bautista said. Bautista noted that any deferment would “entail cost,” but did not elaborate on the potential scale or scope of any changes. According to Airbus’s latest delivery schedule, PAL’s 46 outstanding orders include 25 A321ceos, 18 A321neos and 3 A330-300s.
Indonesian flag carrier Garuda Indonesia has placed an order for 50 Boeing 737 MAX aircraft. The contract is for 50 737 MAX-8s and includes a conversion of Garuda’s outstanding order for four 737-800s to the new aircraft type. Deliveries will start in the third quarter of 2017. The decision to confirm such a significant order may be part of CEO Emirsyah Satar’s drive to cut operating costs.
While American Airlines continues to limit some tickets purchased from Argentina because of concern over the future value of the country’s pesos, United Airlines and Delta Air Lines continue to operate normally from Argentina, the airlines tell Aviation Week.
Southwest and Virgin America marked Monday’s end to the Wright Amendment at Love Field by launching services on 10 total routes, including two—Los Angeles and Washington Reagan—that pit the carriers against each other. Southwest will grow its seven destinations to 17 by early January. Virgin America, swapping one gate at Dallas/Fort Worth for two at Love Field, also serves San Francisco and will add New York LaGuardia later this month. Both airports are in Southwest’s Love Field plans.
FAA’s Chicago En Route Center came back online early Monday morning, ending a 17-day outage that required creative approaches such as the use of adjacent facilities to maintain traffic flow and led FAA to stand up a review of air traffic center interruption-contingency plans.
The head of Air France-KLM is not giving up on his strategy to participate in the growth of low-cost carriers (LCCs) and confirmed plans to set up a new subsidiary in France if pilots do not agree to expand Transavia France. The new airline will use “new aircraft that are arriving in the coming months,” according to Air France-KLM Chairman and CEO Alexandre de Juniac.
AviationWeek Conferences & Exhibitions For a complete list of Aviation Week’s upcoming events, and to register, visit www.aviationweek.com/events Nov. 4-6—MRO Asia, Singapore EXPO Convention and Exhibition Centre, Singapore Nov. 19-20—A&D Programs, Wigwam Resort, Liltchfield Park, Ariz. Jan 13-14, 2015—MRO Latin America, Buenos Aires, Argentina
Upcoming Events To list an event, send information in calendar format to Donna Thomas at [email protected] . (Bold type indicates new calendar listing.) Oct. 15-17—World Passenger Symposium 2014, The Hilton Bayfront, San Diego, California, www.iata.org/events/passenger-symposium/Pages/index.aspx
Airlines for America (A4A) president and CEO Nicholas Calio has launched an aggressive lobbying campaign ahead of next year’s FAA reauthorization debate in Congress, telling U.S. lawmakers they need to act to “level the competitive playing field” for U.S. airlines facing stiff competition from Middle East and Asian carriers.
Singapore-based Tigerair, seeking to improve cash flow and put unneeded aircraft to work, is sub-leasing some of its leased Airbus A320s to Indian low-cost carrier (LCC) Indigo. With up to 20 out-of-service aircraft on its books, Tigerair parent Tiger Airways Holdings (TAH) has signed a deal to deliver 12 A320s to the Indian carrier between October 2014 and March 2015.
MADRID — The European airline market remains too fragmented, with 35 carriers handling 80% of traffic compared with just four in the U.S., AerCap Holdings Head of EMEA Kenneth Wigmore said at MRO Europe 2014.
FAA Thursday began flight tests to confirm that the agency is on track to transfer air traffic back to controllers at the Chicago En Route Center starting late Sunday night, the agency said.
Arguing that Delta Air Lines “... is making a joke of the route proceeding,” by flying between Seattle and Tokyo Haneda only enough to keep the authority under Department of Transportation (DOT) rules, Hawaiian Airlines is asking the federal government to reopen the application process for the rights.
Qantas has tapped Aviation Technical Services (ATS) to help the carrier improve maintenance efficiency on its 737 fleet. ATS, which counts 737 mainstay Southwest as one of its largest customers, will apply its engineering and maintenance management expertise to help Qantas fine-tune everything from material availability to staffing. “We want to step back and reassess what and how we should be managing our maintenance program,” said Qantas Executive Manager of Engineering Chris Nassenstein.
The European Commission (EC) has called for an “urgent” meeting of the joint committee that governs the U.S.-EU open-skies agreement to discuss the U.S. Transportation Department’s (DOT) delay in approving Norwegian Air International’s (NAI) application to serve the U.S.
