South African Airways next month plans to boost capacity to Washington Dulles with the start of daily flights on the route and end its service to Atlanta.
US Airways plans to launch service from Charlotte to New York Kennedy in the fall to compete with JetBlue, which previously said it would start service on the route.
Negotiations between Aerolineas Argentinas management and labor unions representing pilots and flight engineers are off again (DAILY, May 3), and one of AR's chief negotiators said in frustration he would not negotiate with them again.
GOL plans to broaden its international footprint by adding bases in all the capitals in continental South America during the next couple of years, says CFO Richard Lark. The Brazilian airline recently won approval to offer 21 weekly flights to Santiago, Chile, and also flies to Argentina, Bolivia, Uruguay and Paraguay. International flights should comprise about 5% of GOL's 45% available seat mile growth this year, Lark says.
A simple move to bid out the development of Bogota's Eldorado Airport has become extremely controversial, as Colombian engineering and construction groups expressed misgivings about "strange conditions" and legal and contractual factors unaddressed by the civil aviation department (Aerocivil) that could make it difficult to generate sound offers from interested parties. Bidding on the 17-year concession is scheduled to close on May 18. Six Colombian engineering firms have purchased the bidding specs.
Lufthansa Technik's Mobile Access Router (MAR) is now available as a standard option on the Airbus A380. MAR offers telephone, fax, video conferencing, web browsing, email, WLAN connectivity and moving maps. Lufthansa Technik originally built MAR for use in business jets, and the system is installed on about 30 of those planes.
Singapore Airlines this summer plans to launch weekly service to Milan and Barcelona. The carrier on July 19 will offer three weekly flights to the two cities with Boeing 777-200ERs. The flights will operate on Monday, Wednesday and Friday with next-day return flights. With the addition of the new destinations, Singapore Airlines will fly 81 times weekly to 12 cities in Europe, the carrier said, adding that the number of destinations in the airline's route network will also increase to 65 in 35 countries. -SL
Varig's preferred shares in the Sao Paulo stock market went up by a record-breaking 272.81% last week, spurred by rumors that Russian billionaire Boris Berezovsky made an unspecified offer to invest a substantial sum in Varig's restructuring. Other incentives were reports that Varig was following up with development bank BNDES (DAILY, May 1) for short-term financing.
Air France-KLM last week posted a record April load factor led by strong traffic across most regions in the airline's network, particularly in the premium cabins. Systemwide traffic increased 10% on 4.8% more capacity in the month. As a result, load factor grew 3.9 points to reach a record 83.1%. The airline carried 6.2 million passengers in April, up 7.3%. Load factor to the Americas gained 5.6 points to reach 89.6%, as traffic increased by 9.9% on 3.1% higher capacity. Asian routes also performed strongly, with load factor rising 2.9 points to 87.7%.
Lufthansa wants changes made both to the Airbus A350 and the competing Boeing 787, said Nico Buchholz, the airline's head of fleet planning. The executive said in an interview that his airline wants 1,000-2,000 kilometers more range out of the A350, while the proposed 787 is too small for its requirements. "The 787 so far is a little smaller than our Airbus A340-300s. We would like it to be the same size," Buchholz said.
Hawaiian Holdings yesterday reported a net loss of $12.3 million for the first quarter, although the company was lifted by the rising revenue tide that the rest of the industry is also experiencing. The carrier saw an operating loss of $4.6 million in the first quarter, a significant reversal from last year's $6.3 million operating profit. Operating revenue increased 10.8% to $209.7 million, with passenger yield up 1.1% and unit revenue increasing 5.7%.
Mexicana's plans to have subsidiary Click replace mainline service on the Cancun-Miami route (DAILY, May 3) went from likely to definite last week as the low-cost carrier filed for an exemption for the route. Click told the U.S. Transportation Dept. it intends to begin flying the three-times-daily service on June 1 with Fokker 100s. Mexicana currently operates the route twice daily with 120-seat Airbus A319s. [OST-2006-24749].
Qatar Airways won an exemption for scheduled and charter U.S.-Qatar service, which it will use for code sharing with Lufthansa (DAILY, March 1). The authority is limited to either code share or wet-lease operations, as Qatar holds a Category 2 rating in FAA's IASA program [OST-2006-24061].
ExpressJet plans to keep the 69 planes Continental is cutting from its contract with the regional carrier, taking a gamble on paying higher lease rates to fly the aircraft outside of Continental's network. Continental's former subsidiary had until September to notify its lone major partner if it would keep the Embraer regional jets.
Italian cargo startup Cargoitalia, which will launch operations this month, is mapping out a route network that would serve key U.S. cities, pending approval from the U.S. Transportation Dept. Cargoitalia is a joint venture between Italy's Air Logistic Holding and Tristar. The cargo carrier would operate scheduled and charter cargo flights from Italy to New York Kennedy Airport three times weekly, and to Atlanta, Houston Intercontinental and Chicago O'Hare twice weekly, using a leased DC-10-30 freighter.
Spanish low-cost carrier Air Madrid was fine $62,000 by Peru's anti-trust and consumer protection regulator Indecopi for infringement of consumer protection laws.From January 2004 to January 2006, Indecopi's consumer protection section received more than 320 complaints affecting 388 passengers inconvenienced by delays and overbooking at Madrid Barajas and Lima Jorge Chavez airports.
Russian national carrier Aeroflot is under pressure from the government to order Airbus A350s instead of Boeing 787s, say local reports. Daily newspaper Vedomosti reports the government allegedly favors Airbus because the U.S. is still opposing Russia's membership in the World Trade Organization.
JAL Group yesterday reported a slight increase in passengers, rising 2.2% during the traditional Japanese "Golden Week" vacation period, stretching this year from April 28 to May 7.
Virgin Atlantic this week will boost capacity to Las Vegas, giving the airline daily service on the route. The carrier first started service to Las Vegas in June 2000 and Virgin Atlantic has since carried over 700,000 passengers on the route as it slowly built toward a daily flight. Service from London Gatwick to Las Vegas is operated with a Boeing 747-400. Virgin Atlantic currently flies to 26 destinations worldwide and will start Montego Bay flights on July 3.
You can now register online for Aviation Week events. Go to www.AviationNow.com/conferences or contact Lydia Janow, 212-904-3225 or 800-240-7645 ext. 5 (U.S. and Canada only) MAY 17-18 -- MRO Military Europe, Berlin SEPT. 19-21 -- MRO Asia, Xiamen, China OCT. 24-26 -- MRO Europe, Amsterdam NOV. 13-15 -- Aerospace & Defense Programs, Phoenix
30 Years Ago May 10, 1976 - IATA Director General Knut Hammarskjold said deregulation in international markets would lead to "uncontrolled economic warfare, protectionism and retaliation by governments, bankrupts or subsidy for carriers, the death knell of planning in the industry and chaos for the consumer." 20 Years Ago
