Abu Dhabi-based Etihad Airways is introducing Duesseldorf as its third destination in Germany. The carrier, which is the national airline of the United Arab Emirates, will offer four weekly flights from its hub in Abu Dhabi, UAE, starting Dec. 16.
Bangkok Airways will add two more Airbus A319s to its fleet in the next seven months and plans to lease a fourth Airbus A320 next year. The airline wants to add the extra A320 by November 2012, says Peter Wiesner, senior VP-network management. The carrier has not yet decided if it will be a new or used aircraft, or what its seating configuration will be, Wiesner tells Aviation Week on the sidelines of the Aviation Outlook Australia Pacific conference in Sydney.
Emirates is still waiting to hear whether it will be allowed to fly Airbus A380s into major Indian airports, but it does not think there will be a long-term holdup. Both Emirates and Lufthansa have said they want to operate A380 routes to India, but so far the government has not approved the use of the aircraft at Indian airports. Local media are reporting that this is partly to protect Air India, which is due to receive its first A380 this year.
The U.S. airline industry is a few months away from achieving 10-year milestone since having a “large aircraft” accident, says John Hickey, FAA’s deputy associate administrator for aviation safety. That milestone accident happened on Nov. 12, 2001, when an American Airlines’ Airbus A300 crashed soon after taking off from New York John F. Kennedy International Airport.
The need to be part of American Airlines’ historic narrowbody airplane order, coupled with the pressure to respond immediately to the market challenge posed by the Airbus A320NEO (new engine option) program, clearly was the deciding factor in Boeing’s offer of the new engine 737.
The China market has become so important to Gulfstream that the U.S. aircraft-maker has decided to change the name of the Gulfstream G250, in an effort to do away with the negative connotations associated with that sequence of numbers. Instead the aircraft will be called the G280.
By Leo Schefer, president, Washington Airports Task Force Congress has good options with which to resolve differences over the FAA reauthorization bill, now heading for its 21st postponement, but they require expanded scope for discussion between the House and the Senate, as well as tough public policy decisions, rather than disguised earmarks.
All Nippon Airways (ANA) has disclosed that it is launching a joint-venture, low-cost carrier in Japan with Malaysia’s AirAsia. AirAsia Japan aims to apply for an air operator’s certificate from the Japanese authorities in September and start flying in August 2012, says ANA, which will own 51% of the joint venture, while AirAsia will have 49%. The new carrier will be based at Tokyo Narita International Airport and serve domestic and international routes, it says.
An increase to the $2.50 passenger security fee is on the table in discussions on a debt ceiling deal, but key House staffers think it will be taken off. The increase would not go to pay Transportation Security Administration operations, but would go to a general fund, and no one has the stomach to push that through, they say. Authorizers on the House side have not been briefed on the proposal, but say they have been told it is being discussed “at a very high level.”
As its installed base of aircraft in Africa grows, Embraer is looking at building its footprint on the continent to support the operations of the aircraft. The move comes not just as the fleet of E-Jets grows, but also as ERJ-145 family aircraft are finding a second life in the continent, says Mathieu Duquesnoy, Embraer VP for airline markets in the Middle East and Africa. “We are analyzing what should be the best penetration of customer support,” he notes, both in terms of training and spared support.
Boeing’s decision to develop a re-engined version of its 737 jet enabled it to win a share of American Airlines’s record-setting order for 460 narrowbody jets, but rival Airbus was the clear victor in this battle.
American Airlines management has committed to divesting the company’s holding in regional affiliate American Eagle Airlines, and while a lack of interest from buyers means the regional will still be owned by its current shareholders, American envisions an eventual sale of the division.
The European Union’s aviation blacklist is being used as a commercial tool to protect European airlines, particularly by France, the head of the African Airlines Association (Afraa) says. The goal, mainly from France, “is to destroy competition,” says Elijah Chingosho, Afraa’s Secretary General. Although he will not blame Air France specifically, he notes the airline has benefited from France’s policy.
House lawmakers are firing back at the European Union’s (EU) plan to regulate the greenhouse gas emissions of all aircraft—regardless of nationality—flying into and out of Europe. Aviation is to be included in the EU’s Emissions Trading System (ETS) as of Jan. 1, 2012, but the European Union Emissions Trading Scheme Prohibition Act of 2011, introduced yesterday by Rep. John Mica (R.Fla.), would block U.S. civil aircraft operators from obeying the European statute.
The White House on Wednesday appealed to House Republicans to pull new policy riders out of the extension for the FAA reauthorization bill, saying a stalemate could threaten jobs and funding for FAA’s projects, including the Next Generation air traffic control system.
Malaysia Airlines’ (MAS) turboprop operation Firefly plans to establish its own maintenance, repair and overhaul (MRO) organization, and it hopes also to serve other ATR operators in the region. Firefly has been outsourcing its maintenance on ATR aircraft to MAS Aerospace Engineering (MAE), but Managing Director Eddy Leong says it plans to bring line maintenance in-house starting January 2012 and heavy maintenance starting January 2013.
The pure size of American Airlines’ narrowbody order placed yesterday, and the carrier’s desire to turn its domestic fleet from the country’s oldest to youngest in just five years, ensured that Airbus and Boeing would share some of the spoils from the largest such deal in commercial aviation history.
Qantas will this week begin the fleetwide phase-in of a new MRO system that CEO Alan Joyce says will dramatically improve the carrier’s engineering process. The introduction of the new airworthiness control system is known as Project Marlin. The project “costs more than we wanted and took longer than we liked,” Joyce acknowledged during a speech at the Australia Pacific Aviation Outlook Summit in Sydney. “But this is the largest and most complex IT project Qantas Engineering has ever implemented, and we were always going to make sure we got it right.”
