Japan Airlines (JAL) is to trial a new dual-antennae product from GoGo, named 2Ku, which the supplier claims will give airlines fast, reliable and affordable broadband worldwide. 2Ku, which is expected to enter commercial service in 2015, uses two low-profile antennae to increase in-flight data bandwidth and coverage. These are the same antennae as GoGo uses for its Ground to Orbit (GTO) technology, but instead of having a return link to the ground 2Ku will upload and download data from a range of Ku-band satellites, giving global coverage.
Alaska Airlines has applied to U.S. and Mexican regulators to provide seasonal service between its main hub at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport and Cancun, Mexico. The airline submitted its application to the U.S. Transportation Department and Mexico’s Direccion General de Aeronautica Civil on April 7 to begin daily, seasonal service between the two cities starting Nov. 6.
United Airlines has won the right to operate a daily flight between San Francisco and Tokyo’s Haneda Airport, the U.S. Transportation Department (DOT) ruled on April 4. Hawaiian Airlines challenged the DOT’s tentative ruling in February that awarded the slot pair to United. Hawaiian argued its proposed Kona-Haneda service would stimulate U.S. economic growth by increasing inbound tourism from Japan.
Boeing is preparing for two more aircraft to join the 787-9 flight-test and certification program, and says that very few issues have arisen during the test process so far.
Virgin America will add a second daily nonstop flight on July 8 between Austin and San Francisco, re-deploying capacity from its San Jose-Los Angeles route, which the carrier has announced will cease May 14.
Airbus is holding “very preliminary“ talks with some of its A350 customers about a ten-abreast configuration in economy class. The denser layout would allow the manufacturer to add around 25-30 seats and raise overall capacity of the A350-900 to nearly 350 seats. “For now only a small number of customers is interested, but this will increase undoubtedly as the aircraft matures,” Airbus Cabin Marketing Manager Claire Newcombe said on the sidelines of the Aircraft Interiors Expo in Hamburg, Germany.
Comac may not become competitive with Boeing and Airbus even when the Chinese state company produces its next aircraft—a widebody intended for co-development with Russia—says the U.S. think-tank Rand, citing Western industry managers in China.
Singapore Airlines will be the first carrier to fly the Airbus A380 to India, after the government lifted a ban on operating these very large aircraft to the world’s second-most populous country. “We have been keen to operate the Airbus A380 to India and are glad that the Air Services Agreement [ASA] between Singapore and India now allows us to do so,” says Singapore Airlines Senior Vice President-Marketing Planning, Lee Wen Fen.
Boeing and General Electric are planning meetings with Iran Air to discuss the airline’s urgent requirement for aircraft and engine spares following approval from the U.S. Treasury Department to export specific parts for commercial aircraft under a temporary sanctions relief deal.
Russia’s largest airline, Aeroflot, has withdrawn the last Soviet-era legacy type—the Ilyushin Il-96 widebody—from its fleet. The first aircraft out of six of this type was retired in October; the last aircraft, #96008, operated its final commercial flight on March 30 from Tashkent to Moscow’s Sheremetyevo Airport, the airline’s home base. According to Aeroflot, the type is now being replaced by Boeing 777-300ERs.
Alaska Airlines plans to use a mix of fleet renewal and implementing RNP approaches at its home base at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport to meet its goal of cutting carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions. The Seattle-based carrier plans to reduce fuel consumption by 20%, calculated by gallons per RPM, by 2020. Much of the gain will be through fleet renewal, Paul McElroy, a spokesman for Alaska, tells Aviation Week.
Lufthansa chose the CFM Leap-1A engine for the last part of its Airbus A320NEO order, a deal totalling more than €1 billion ($1.37 billion) covering engines for 40 aircraft.
Air New Zealand is preparing for the delivery and operational debut of its first Boeing 787-9, the highlight of a pivotal year in the airline’s widebody fleet renewal program. The carrier will be the first to get the stretched -9 version of the 787. Its initial aircraft is on track for delivery in June, and was rolled out of Boeing’s Everett, Wash., paint hangar with a new black livery on April 5. This is the fifth -9 to be assembled, but unlike the first four it will not be used in the flight-test and certification process.
Persian Gulf hub airports increasingly are becoming the transit points of the world, siphoning off traffic between Europe, North America and Africa and Asia, a study by Amadeus and Oxford Economics shows.
Apr. 8-10—MRO Americas 2014, Phoenix Convention Center, Phoenix, Ariz. Apr. 9—MRO Military 2014, Phoenix Convention Center, Phoenix, Ariz. June 10-11—MRO Eastern Europe, Baltics and Russia, Sheraton Warsaw, Warsaw, Poland July 16-20—Farnborough Commercial Manufacturing Briefings and Farnborough Air Show, U.K.
Boeing suppliers are developing “a sense of acceptance” that the manufacturer’s push for a 15% reduction in supply chain costs won’t ease up even as the economy improves, an informal survey of several major suppliers by Canaccord Genuity finds. Whether the push will succeed remains to be seen.
Eighteen years after Boeing and General Electric teamed up to develop the Boeing Business Jet (BBJ) version of the Next Generation 737, the first corporate derivative of the follow-on 737 MAX has been launched by an undisclosed customer.
European research is amassing an array of technologies that could be applied to a future 90-seat regional turboprop to significantly reduce noise and emissions. An evaluation of technologies being developed under Europe’s Clean Sky public-private research program indicates a 2020-time frame advanced turboprop would have a 48% smaller airport noise footprint and reduce emissions by 23% for carbon dioxide and 43% for nitrogen oxides.
Inadequate regulatory oversight was the most common contributor to fatal air transport accidents from 2009-13, and among the most cited factors in all accidents, an International Air Transport Association (IATA) analysis reveals. IATA examined 432 qualifying accidents in the five-year period, including 94 with fatalities, and broke down the causal factors in each accident sequence. It then categorized the factors into five broad categories: Latent conditions, (external) threats, flight crew errors, undesired aircraft states, and countermeasures.
