A new airline privilege fee being charged by the city of Tinicum, Pa. - location of Philadelphia International Airport - is being challenged by the Air Transport Association (ATA) and the Air Carrier Association of America (ACAA).
U.S. travelers planning an international trip purchase travel insurance eight times more often that those traveling domestically, according to new data on insurance purchasing habits. Squaremouth, an online insurance comparison site, studied four years' worth of data and found that international travel accounts for 88% of travel insurance sales, and the average premium paid on a policy is $166.82. Domestic travel accounts for 11.9%.
As part of its ambitious route expansion plans, Aerolineas Argentinas intends to resume service to Paraguay Oct. 22 after a six- year absence, operating twice-daily service from Argentina to Asuncion. One of the daily flights will operate nonstop from Ezeiza International in Buenos Aires to Luque International in Asuncion, while other daily flights departing from urban Aeroparque in Buenos Aires will stop over in Corrientes or Resistencia in Northern Argentina on their way to Asuncion.
FAA was forced to clear the airspace controlled by the Memphis en-route center around midday Tuesday after a major communications failure at the center disrupted radio frequencies and radar feeds. Traffic was re-routed, and several ground-stops were initiated. When the outage first occurred, controllers were forced to contact other facilities regarding flights using personal cell phones. Memphis center began accepting flights again at about 2.30p.m. local time. FAA said it is still investigating the cause.
Polar Air Cargo Worldwide, a subsidiary of Atlas Air, confirmed it will be adding six new freighter frequencies to Japan before the end of the year, following the recent conclusion of a new aviation accord between the U.S and Japan.
Alitalia "is in a comatose state, it is in the intensive care unit," the airline's chairman, Maurizio Prato, told a commission of the Italian Senate yesterday in Rome. The carrier will not have enough funds to repay its loans of EUR320 million (US$450 million) due in the next two years or the EUR714 million worth of bonds due in 2010. The losses of Italy's ailing flag carrier will be "a little bit" under EUR400 million, net of extraordinary items in 2007, Prato forecasts.
Airbus has fixed the global, 150 hour route-proving schedule which its MSN009 A380 aircraft will undertake as part of the certification program for the Engine Alliance GP7200 turbofan.
The Air Line Pilots Association and the International Association of Machinists applauded legislation introduced yesterday that would limit airline managements' ability to alter employees' contracts when they are in bankruptcy, and put the claims of workers and retirees on par with businesses and banks.
The former chairman of Air Lib was sentenced yesterday in Paris to a four-year prison sentence, of which 30 months were suspended, for embezzlement and causing the bankruptcy of the airline in 2003 (DAILY, March 6, 2003). Jean-Charles Corbet was also fined EUR300,000 (US$424,000) and ordered to pay damages to the liquidators of France's former second-largest carrier, which employed 3,200 people at the time of its demise. Corbet said he would appeal the decision.
The U.S. Transportation Dept. yesterday took a something-for-everyone approach to awarding coveted China frequencies for the next three years, with Delta slated as the first to begin using the new rights by April. Airlines have been deluging DOT with conflicting submissions and arguments for the past three months, but in the end DOT awarded the flights exactly as industry observers expected before the process began (DAILY, May 24). Incumbent airlines got a weekly flight each, and Delta and US Airways were named as new entrants.
Cheapflights.com, the U.S. version of the 11-year-old Cheapflights.co.uk, is finally seeing its business take off in North America after four years of building traffic.
The base labor union at Lloyd Aereo Boliviano (LAB), at an emergency membership meeting Friday, voted to muster congressional and other political support to renew direct negotiations with the nation's president Evo Morales to help rescue the airline from the deep financial and institutional crisis that has plagued LAB for over a year.
Southwest expects its unit costs to rise 4%-5% year-over-year in the current quarter while unit revenues should grow at the slower rate of 2%. The changes in unit cost projections for the third quarter occured after Southwest saw its profits slide in the second quarter. Previously, the carrier's management pledged to improve at meeting financial targets in 2008 if the carrier falls short of its 2007 goals (DAILY, July 19). The minimum goal for 2008, executives said, is 15% earnings-per-share growth.
Amtrak is expanding food cart service on its Acela Express trains between New York and Washington, D.C., hoping to entice more premier passengers to ride the train in this lucrative air shuttle market. Amtrak employees are now taking food to passengers in their seats on 10 trains Monday through Wednesday and 12 Thursday and Friday. Menus were recently enhanced for Acela first class passengers. For the 10 months ended July 31, 2.6 million passengers rode Acela Express trains, an increase of more than 20% from the same period a year earlier.
Air Madrid faces more legal problems, only a week after a judge dismissed charges against the former airline's president and three directors for alleged fraudulent sale of tickets after knowing they were about to close the airline last December (DAILY, Sept. 20). Spain's social security authority is demanding payment of $5.82 million for delinquent assessments to the social security system. The social security agency is now going to court to seek payment.
SR Technics won new work from Scandinavian Airlines System (SAS) to perform C checks and modifications on four Airbus A330s and seven A340s. The MRO plans to start work on the SAS aircraft in October and complete the checks and mods in March 2008.
In a bid to help operators of older single-aisle Airbus aircraft enhance their in-service A320s, the aircraft-maker has rolled out an upgrade package to bring the legacy models closer to the latest production standard. The so called In-Service Enhancement Package (ISEP) is an amalgamation of service bulletins aimed at reducing fuel burn by allowing pilots to determine the best routes to a destination.
The trial regarding Hawaiian's lawsuit against Mesa is set to get underway today as Mesa's CFO is being put on administrative leave after Hawaiian alleged he destroyed evidence pertaining to the suit. Hawaiian initially filed the suit in February 2006, claiming Mesa did not follow requirements to destroy evaluation materials after Mesa was not selected as an investor in Hawaiian when that carrier was in Chapter. 11.
The House yesterday approved a temporary legislative extension yesterday to keep FAA running through the end of calendar 2007. FAA's current authorization expires Sept. 30. While the House has approved a new, four-year authorization bill, legislation remains pending in the Senate. The extension, approved by a voice vote, gives lawmakers more time to finish work on a four-year reauthorization bill.
Colombia's civil aviation department (Aerocivil) authorized 21 additional weekly passenger and cargo frequencies between Colombia and the U.S. within the framework of a tentative agreement to renew the existing bilateral air agreement between the two nations. The adjustment favors AeroRepublica and Avianca, which requested frequencies to the U.S. from Bogota. Medellin is not included because no carrier requested that route besides American, which had already been authorized for 10 weekly frequencies beginning Dec. 13.
ExpressJet and Frontier are negotiating a short-term deal that would see ExpressJet flying some 50-seat aircraft for Denver-based Frontier while that carrier continues to work toward FAA approval for its new Lynx subsidiary. Frontier wanted to launch Lynx in October but hasn't received authorization from FAA to start flights. A spokesman for Frontier said the two airlines are looking at an agreement that would start sometime around Nov. 15 and run through the end of January. He explained the potential deal entails three-to-four aircraft.
Modern parked jet totals rose slightly to 393 aircraft in mid-September, up from the 383 reported in mid-August, according to a report by Merrill Lynch analyst Ronald Epstein. "We expect some additional creep as the summer season ends," Epstein said. "We continue to hold our view that demand is still greater than the supply of aircraft and twin aisle aircraft appear to be in the highest scarcity."
