Air France will be the first European carrier to fly Airbus A380s to Tokyo Narita Airport, beginning next year. It announced the plan as part of the commemoration of 150 years of Franco-Japanese relations.
Emirates claims to be the first airline in the world to permit passengers use of their own cell phones during a revenue service flight, and it aims to equip its entire fleet of 105 widebodies and all Airbus A380s on order to do the same. Emirates officials believe that several airlines will lead the transition into a new era of cabin connectivity for passengers but that the entire airline industry will move in that direction within a decade.
American canceled about 200 flights yesterday to enable it to reinspect wiring bundles on its MD-80 fleet, becoming the latest airline to admit problems in its maintenance records.
Air Berlin still expects to receive the first of 10 newly ordered Bombardier Q400 turboprops this year. Four of the aircraft are to be handed before yearend, with the remainder to be delivered next year. Air Berlin also took options for 10 more of the turboprops. The aircraft are to replace Fokker 100s, currently operated by Germania for Air Berlin. The Q400s will immediately go under a lease agreement to LGW Walter, which will operate them in the Air Berlin network. But by using LGW, Air Berlin is avoiding further complicating its own fleet.
Airbus is looking at a further round of upgrades to the A320 family and soon hopes to select an electronic flight bag provider for the narrowbodies. The aircraft maker is hoping to field a Class 2 system, with a supplier selection now in the final stages of being completed, says A320 family program manager Alain Flourens. Hardware tests would take place within a year, with customer deliveries likely late next year. The installation would involve a laptop mounted behind the pilot seat, and the information displayed on a side window screen.
Airbus plans to highlight the latest plans for its A350 cabin at the Aircraft Interiors Expo April 1-3 in Hamburg. The airframer will exhibit its newest A350 cabin mock-up for the first time at this show. Airbus also says it will roll out a new galley concept for the aircraft, which it developed in collaboration with airlines and caterers.
Lambert-St. Louis Airport has created two new deputy director positions and tapped two industry veterans to fill them. Cornell Mays has become deputy director-planning and development, where he will oversee the planning and engineering, planning development and environmental/safety departments. He previously worked at SDG Design Inc., a Detroit-based architecture, engineering and planning firm. He also was deputy director at Detroit Metro Airport, where he coordinated a $2 billion capital improvement plan.
Qantas has said it will introduce technology to allow customers on its domestic aircraft to send and receive email and SMS via mobile phones or PDAs but will not allow voice calls. The carrier tested the technology between April 2007 and January 2008 on one of its Boeing 767-300s. “An overwhelming majority of passengers involved in the evaluation indicated they wanted access to inflight connectivity on an ongoing basis,” said John Borghetti, Qantas’ executive general manager.
Avianca on March 25 received the U.S. Transportation Dept. nod for authority to launch Bogota-Washington services (DAILY, March 24). The carrier is targeting a June 12 start date for its daily Airbus A319 service. Washington will be the carrier’s fifth U.S. destination, as Avianca also serves Miami, Los Angeles, New York and Fort Lauderdale.
The future of Northrop Grumman’s Guardian anti-missile system for commercial airline use now rests with the Dept. of Homeland Security, which will review the findings of operational testing, report them to Congress and decide on program production startup. Under contract with DHS, Northrop on Jan. 15, 2007, initiated test flights using 11 FedEx MD-10s modified to carry the Guardian pod, which weighs about 500 pounds and measures 93x32x19 inches, according Jack Pledger, Northrop Grumman Corp. director of IRCM Infrared Countermeasures Business Development.
Japanese domestic passenger airline Starflyer and Fukuyama Transporting have signed a basic agreement to jointly provide overnight freight services, subject to approval by the Japanese transport ministry. For Starflyer, the contract marks the first attempt to enter the freight market. The companies hope to begin the service in July.
Austrian Airlines will launch flights to five new destinations and increase frequencies to 39 others in its summer schedule that takes effect March 30. In Russia, it is adding Sochi and Nizhny Novgorod to its permanent flight schedule. Also new are Riyadh and Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, and Baia Mare in Romania. Austrian says its new Russia flights are establishing it as the second-largest airline carrying traffic to Russia. The date for launch of flights to the new cities varies from April 1 to Sochi to Aug. 19 for Riyadh.
The European Union is launching a series of training classes as part of its Euromed Aviation Project, a program that aims to establish a European-Mediterranean Common Aviation Area. The classes focus on six themes: Air transport issues, aviation safety, aviation security, environment, ATM and management training. Registration is expected to open by June this year, and the courses will run through the end of next year.
Delta flight attendants will vote between April 23 and June 3 on whether to have union representation, the National Mediation Board says. Delta management is attempting to convince attendants they would be much better served by retaining a “direct relationship with management” instead of opting for representation by the Association of Flight Attendants.
Air New Zealand will boost capacity to Melbourne and Sydney this year with larger aircraft and more flights. Starting Oct. 26, ANZ will deploy a Boeing 767-300 on the Melbourne-Auckland route, replacing an Airbus A320. In December, the route will get third service, on Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday. The Auckland-Sydney route will also get three more weekly flights, using an A320.
United Parcel Service has completed arranging a management team aimed at leveraging its traditional role as an air freight integrator with global air freight forwarding. Named president of Freight Forwarding is Erick Kirchner, taking over a post vacant since December, when Dan Butto was promoted to become president of UPS International. Kirchner’s team includes Everett Riley as president of North American freight forwarding and Terry Gavin Sambrook as VP of global brokerage.
Mexican airlines, both legacy and low-cost operators, will likely face new competition from low-cost carriers from the U.S., Europe and South America now operating in Mexico.
International traffic among Asian carriers rose 4.8% to 11.6 million passengers in February, according to statistics from the Association of Asia Pacific Airlines. Passenger traffic in revenue passenger kilometers grew 5.9% on capacity growth of 5.7%, which gave the region a slim 0.1-percentage-point improvement in passenger load factor, to 76.3%. On the cargo side, international freight ton kilometers gained 2.4% in February, while the average cargo load factor rose one point to 66.1% as cargo capacity grew just 0.8%.
U.K.-based Digitus Biometrics is betting that its new Access Control System — which uses biometric fingerprinting to control access in secure areas — will become an option for airports.
FAA controllers had to contend with three serious ATC outages over the weekend of March 22 — including two on the same day at some of the agency’s largest ATC facilities. The outages affected the Miami en route center, the Northern California terminal radar approach control facility, and the tower at Augusta, Ga., according to the National Air Traffic Controllers Association.
