Airbus will decide whether to raise production rates for the A350-1000 later this year, according to Chief Operating Officer-Customers John Leahy. “I would like to see more -1000s built,” Leahy said on the sidelines of the International Air Transport Association (IATA) annual general meeting in Cape Town. Leahy points out that he has seen a strong rise in demand for the largest member of the A350 family, and that he is pushing hard internally for Airbus to increase production rates.
Bombardier expects to double the size of the installed fleet in Africa over the next 3-5 years, according to Chet Fuller, senior vice president of sales and marketing. The fleet will then double again within an even shorter period of time, Fuller predicted on the eve of the International Air Transport Association (IATA) annual general meeting in Cape Town. “Africa is shaping up to be a tremendous market,” Fuller says. Bombardier currently has 200 aircraft operating with 61 airlines in the region.
Finnair has to continue improving the productivity of its European network and outsourcing more parts of the network could be an option, the carrier’s new President and CEO Pekka Vauramo told Aviation Week on the sidelines of the International Air Transport Association (IATA) annual general meeting in Cape Town.
AerCap will generate $20 million in after-tax net income in the second half of this year from the 10 Airbus A330s it is acquiring from Latam Airlines Group and leasing back to the South American operator, leaders of the Amsterdam-based lessor say. The 10 A330s, which already are in the group’s fleet with an average age of four years, are part of a 25-aircraft, $2.6 billion sale-leaseback agreement that also includes nine new Airbus A350-900s and four new Boeing 787-9 jets that Latam is scheduled to receive from 2014-2018.
Apr. 16-18—MRO Americas 2013, Georgia World Congress Center, Atlanta, Ga. Apr. 17-18—MRO Military 2013, Georgia World Congress Center, Atlanta, Ga. May 7-8—Civil Aviation Manufacturing Conference, Charlotte, N.C. May 14-15—MRO Regional - Eastern Europe, Baltics and Russia, Radisson Blu Lletuva Vilnius, Lithuania Sept. 9-11—NEXTGEN AHEAD—Air Transportation Modernization Conference, The Dupont Circle Hotel, Washington, D.C. Sept. 24-26—MRO Europe 2013, ExCe London Exhibition & Convention Center, London, U.K.
Airbus has two major development programs underway and eight years of orders to fill. So it is understandable that as concrete begins flowing on its fourth A320 production site—the first in the U.S.—it is using a proven layout as it focuses on keeping its assembly lines humming. “We really need the supply chain to run like clockwork,” Airbus North America President and CEO Barry Eccleston told an audience full of suppliers at Aviation Week’s Civil Aircraft Manufacturing (CAM) conference last month. “We are looking for faster decision-making.”
The White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) on May 29 told federal agencies to prepare their fiscal 2015 budget requests with three levels of spending in mind, including 5% and 10% cuts from the projection laid down in April with the 2014 request. The budget-crafting guidance represents the first formal recognition of the long-term effects of the 2011 Budget Control Act (BCA), whose first round of widespread, automatic sequestration rescissions took effect in March and led to FAA furloughs and the threatened closure of 149 contract towers.
The U.S. Transportation Department (DOT) has tentatively approved InselAir Aruba’s request for authority to begin service to the U.S., waiving a requirement in the U.S.-Netherlands air transport agreement that a carrier must be “substantially owned and effectively controlled” by nationals who are permanent residents of Aruba.
British safety investigators are recommending that Airbus “formally notify” all operators of A320-family aircraft about a May 24 incident in which the two fan cowl doors on both engines detached from a British Airways A319 departing London Heathrow for Oslo with 75 passengers and five crewmembers. An interim report reveals that two safety nets designed to verify cowls are latched—mechanics’ procedures and pilots’ procedures—did not work as designed, as the aircraft left the gate with its cowls unlatched.
Most constituents in the global air transport industry agree that there is enormous potential in developing the African aviation market. But they also agree that actually realizing it will prove much harder.
Dutch safety officials faulted air traffic controllers at Amsterdam’s Schiphol Airport for a high-profile loss-of-separation event in November, but said the safety of the two commercial aircraft approaching the airport for landing was never in jeopardy. In a final report, investigators reveal a series of missteps by controllers, including deviation from standard procedures, missed clearances and a lack of communication in handling an Airbus A330-200 arriving from the UAE and a Boeing 737-800 arriving from England. The two aircraft came within 0.6 naut. mi.
Boeing has elected to build key elements of the engine nacelle for the 737 MAX at its recently developed 787 assembly line in North Charleston, S.C., as part of continuing efforts to expand its commercial aircraft footprint beyond the borders of its home state of Washington. The establishment of the Propulsion South Carolina team marks the first significant extension for the facility into a program beyond the 787, and will cover the design and assembly of the inlet for the CFM Leap-1B which will power the 737 MAX.
June 5-6—RTCA 2013 Global Aviation Symposium, Walter E. Washington Convention Center in Washington, DC, www.symposium.rtca.org/June 6—National Business Aviation Association Business Aviation Regional Forum, White Plains, N.Y., 703-783-9000, www.nbaa.orgJune 11-14—6th Chaotic Modeling and Simulation International Conference, CHAOS 2013, Yeditepe University, Istanbul, Turkey, www.cmsim.org/ June 12-13—Airline & Aerospace MRO & Operations IT Conferences - EMEA, Park Inn Hotel, London Heathrow, U.K., www.aircraft-commerce.com/conferences/EMEA2013/Home.asp
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Click here to view the pdf Top Carriers: Las Vegas - Los Angeles, May 15-21, 2013, Ranked By Scheduled Seats Top Carriers: Las Vegas - Los Angeles, May 15-21, 2013, Ranked By Scheduled Seats Daily Each Way
Boeing has delivered its 50th 747-8 with the handover of a passenger variant to Lufthansa, the airline that took delivery of the first 747-8I in April 2011. This aircraft is the airline’s seventh 747-8 and its 82nd aircraft from the 747 family. The 747-8 program launched with delivery of a freighter variant to Cargolux Airlines in October 2011. So far, Boeing has delivered 35 freighters and 15 Intercontinentals, including eight of the Boeing Business Jet variants.
Aer Lingus’s determined efforts to steer clear of a Ryanair takeover and remove Europe’s largest low-cost carrier as one of its biggest shareholders received a boost from the U.K. Competition Commission, which asserts that Ryanair’s 29.8% stake in Aer Lingus could reduce competition on routes between the U.K. and Ireland. Consequently, the commission says, “Ryanair may have to reduce its shareholding in Aer Lingus Group.”
There is no shortage of candidates for feedstocks from which to make biofuels, from camelina to poplar and switchgrass to wood chips. But it is taking time to find ones that can be sustainably cultivated, harvested and transported in the quantities required to make commercial volumes of jet fuel.
Singapore Airlines (SIA) has committed to buying 30 Boeing 787-10X aircraft, but only if the airframer formally launches the program. The deal, unveiled on May 30 by the airline, calls for all 30 787-10X deliveries to be made in the Star Alliance member’s fiscal year starting April 1, 2018. SIA also announced a follow-on order for 30 Airbus A350-900s with options for 20 more that can be converted to the larger A350-1000. The latest A350-900 firm orders are scheduled for delivery in SIA’s fiscal year starting April 1, 2016.
Competition in Malaysia’s medium-haul market is set to intensify, with Malindo Air disclosing that it plans to operate some of the Boeing 787-8s that its parent company, Indonesia’s Lion Air, has on order.
Sun Country Airlines wants to increase its fleet size by at least two aircraft per year for the next three years as part of a “conservative” growth plan, and the Minneapolis/St. Paul-based low-cost carrier is asking the U.S. Transportation Department (DOT) to remove a fleet-size restriction that would prevent it from doing so.
Airbus is expecting to book more than 800 gross orders in 2013, an increase of more than 100 over its previously stated target for the year, EADS CEO Tom Enders told the company’s annual general meeting in Amsterdam. In 2012, the airframer targeted 650 orders and booked 914 gross orders for a net order intake of 833 aircraft after cancellations. Rival Boeing booked 921 net orders in 2012.
