The raising of passenger facility charges (PFC) is one of the big-ticket items airports will be eyeing in the 2007 FAA reauthorization bill, according to industry leaders speaking at Aviation Daily/Engineering News-Record's first Aviation Industry Roundtable. Representatives from airports, government, construction, concessions, architects and vendors covered key issues of interest to the airport community, including inline baggage screening systems, generating non-airline revenue and balancing airport needs versus city and state government interests.
Etihad yesterday tapped former Gulf Air leader James Hogan to serve as its third chief executive this year, and Hogan will likely pursue a strategy similar to one he followed in the past, calling for worldwide network expansion and aircraft acquisitions in the near term.
The Hungarian government will have to repay Canada's Airport Development Corp. (ADC) $83.2 million for its takeover of Budapest's Ferihegy Airport in 2001.
The long-awaited privatization of Saudi Arabian Airlines has finally taken off with French Bank BNP Paribas given the task of carrying out the plan. The carrier will outsource the catering, ground handling and aircraft engineering maintenance business units and the Prince Sultan Flight Academy in Jeddah. The catering arm, which recorded revenue of $172 million last year, includes inflight duty-free sales. It will be the first to be privatized. Proposals to acquire between 31-49% were submitted by the Sept. 27 deadline. Cargo will be sold separately.
Southwest CEO Gary Kelly called the summer test of assigned seats on some of his airline's flights a success, but he is not ready to release the results and it will be well into next year before a decision is made about using assigned seats throughout the system.
Many large shipping customers are hesitant to shift all their business to the major cargo integrators, although integrators win high marks for shipment information and price, a recent Unisys study finds.
Airbus last month sold only four single-aisle aircraft, all to new, private customers, effectively putting the company further behind Boeing in order intake for the year. Although Airbus has long conceded the orders race, the 226 orders taken through September compared to Boeing's 723 (though Oct. 3), leave the European manufacturer with less than 25% market share going into the last quarter. Airbus executives were hoping orders and deliveries would be about equal by yearend, but they still have to book about 200 aircraft to make that commitment.
Low-fare airline Air Arabia has received the green light from the Nepal government to operate flights to the Kathmandu. Sharjah-based Air Arabia will offer eight services a week, increasing to twice daily with the winter schedule in 2008. The air services agreement between Nepal and the United Arab Emirates allows the airline to operate from any point in the latter to Kathmandu. Flights will commence as soon Air Arabia receives the slots from the Civil Aviation Authority of Nepal. Kathmandu will be the carrier's 26th destination.
After months of negotiations to get back a 50% equity stake in possession of U.K.-based TAA, workers at Lloyd Aereo Boliviano (LAB), represented by its labor union federation (Fstlab), last week finally reached their goal and started paperwork for the company's new corporate structure to be managed by the workers.
September load factors at Mesa's Hawaiian subsidiary Go inched up to 66.1% from 64.5% in August. Go flew 8.7 million revenue passenger miles on 13.2 million available seat miles. Last week, a bankruptcy judge allowed Go to keep selling tickets, denying a request by Hawaiian Airlines that stemmed from a larger lawsuit Hawaiian filed against Go parent Mesa, claiming Mesa violated confidentiality agreements when Mesa considered investing in Hawaiian during its bankruptcy.
Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport's efficiency in screening luggage is being hurt because of a federal requirement forcing the airport to rescreen bags being transferred from Canada, said airport Director Steve Wareham. "That's 15% of our bags in Minneapolis, and since the liquids ban, our baggage areas are being choked" by the requirement, he said at an industry meeting hosted by The DAILY and Engineering News-Record in New York. "We need that capacity and we need it now. Why can't we get TSA to screen the bags in preclearance facilities?" Wareham asked.
Northwest yesterday reached a tentative agreement with the Aircraft Mechanics Fraternal Association, more than a year after the union members went on strike. A membership ratification vote will be held during the next 30 days. Even though the striking AMFA mechanics have been replaced since they walked off the job Aug. 20, 2005, the agreement gives members the option of accepting layoff status and receiving one week of layoff pay per year of service, up to a maximum of five weeks.
About half of the tens of thousands of names sent to the FBI-run Terrorist Screening Center (TSC) for verification between December 2003 and January 2006 were misidentifications, says a congressional report. The Government Accountability Office (GAO) interim report, released last week, said that number, though large, "likely represents a fraction of all people screened" by government agencies.
The final report on the investigation of the August 2005 crash of a Helios Air Boeing 737-300 is expected to be made public today. The report was reviewed by Greek Transport Minister Michalis Liapis, the Court of First Instance in Athens and Cypriot President Tassos Papadopoulos, says the Cyprus News Agency. The plane crashed on a flight from Larnaca to Athens, killing all 121 passengers and crew.
Comair plans to use power it was granted by the bankruptcy court overseeing parent Delta's Chapter 11 case to impose concessions on its flight attendants starting Nov. 15.
American saw its mainline traffic and load factor drop slightly in September, with international growth failing to offset a domestic reduction. Mainline traffic declined 1.4% on a 0.5% capacity drop, leading to a load factor decrease of 0.7 points to 75.5%. The drop was even steeper for mainline domestic, with traffic down 3.8% on 2.4% less capacity. International traffic was up 3.1%, and capacity climbed 3%.
EADS Co-CEO Louis Gallois is taking over the running of Airbus after irreconcilable differences emerged between Christian Streiff, who ran the aircraft maker the past three months, and EADS executives.
Two top British Airways' executives yesterday resigned about four months after they took a leave of absence over questions they were involved with alleged cartel actions related to ticket pricing and fuel surcharges.
Wizz Air plans to add six new routes from Katowice next summer, boosting its capacity 50% year-over-year at the Polish airport. The carrier is adding an Airbus A320 at Katowice in May 2007. New service includes flights to Belfast three times per week, three weekly flights to Eindhoven, to Bourgas two times per week, two weekly flights to Crete, three flights per week to Bournemouth and service three times per week to Birmingham/Coventry.
The European Union's Aviation Safety Committee of Member State experts decided to place Cypriot carrier Ajet under "strict monitoring," after considering adding it to the blacklist of carriers banned from operating in the EU, said an EU source. Ajet, which operates charter services with Boeing 737-800s, would have been the first EU-based carrier to be added to the blacklist.
Volvo Aero plans to spend $1.3 million to expand its fan case production plant in the U.S., which supports the GE90 powerplant offered on the Boeing 777. The new 27,000-square-foot plant and office building at Volvo's Aero-Craft subsidiary in Newington, Conn. will join an existing 40,000-square-foot facility. Volvo Aero said the existing machine park and workshop cannot handle current demand. Connecticut's State Bond Commission approved a $1.5 million loan for the site's construction earlier this month.
