Aeropostal renewed its regular flight schedule out of Maiquetia after a month of schedule adjustments forced by the Jan. 5 collapse of a bridge on the Caracas/Maiquetia Expressway (DAILY, Feb. 28). The carrier operates 48 daily domestic flights to and from Barcelona, Puerto Ordaz, Maracaibo, Maturin, Barquisimeto, Porlamar and Valencia. No updated information was released on international flights.
And the American society for Public Administration named Joan Bauerlein, FAA director of aviation research and development, the recipient of this year's National Public Service Award.
Southwest and the Albuquerque police are getting a lesson in the law of unintended consequences from a federal appeals court, which ruled last week that a full jury should decide whether a Southwest employee who was the victim of a workplace prank gone bad should prevail. Customer-service representative Marcie Fuerschbach claims her supervisors and colleagues staged her arrest, with the help of two willing Albuquerque police officers, as a way to celebrate the end of her probationary status with the airline.
Delta last week reported a deep $300 million net loss for January, including one-time reorganization costs, a large deficit for 31 days but less than the $314 million loss posted last year.
JetBlue's Manager-Route Planning Adam Greene says that currently none of the airline's routes overlap with AirTran's and Southwest's on an airport-to-airport basis. But he cautions that the picture could change since all three airlines have ambitious growth plans.
AirTran's yields continue to be "quite favorable," analysts at Raymond James say, since the airline "appears to be benefiting from a reconfigured revenue management system that better balances fares and load factors to produce maximum revenue."
Nav Canada may be able to begin installing a more complete surveillance system for the Hudson Bay basin within a year, using automatic dependent surveillance-broadcast (ADS-B) technology instead of radar.
Columbus-based Skybus Airlines tentatively won from the U.S. Transportation Dept. certificates enabling it to launch low-fare operations from Columbus to points in both the U.S. and Canada (DAILY, Jan. 30). The certificate award should be finalized before monthend, barring any challenges to the tentative order [OST-2005-20072].
To list an event, send information in calendar format to Ingrid Lee at [email protected] (Bold type indicates new calendar listing in PDF format.) MARCH 18 -- Airline Pilot Job Fair hosted by AIR, Inc., Sheraton Gateway Hotel, LAX Airport, Los Angeles, 800-538-5627, www.jet-jobs.com MARCH 20-21 -- ACI-NA Spring Washington Conference, co-sponsored by AAAAE & ACI-NA, L'Enfant Plaze Hotel, Washington, www.aci-na.aero, 202-293-3035, email [email protected]
British Airways last week reported an almost flat load factor for February and said "significant promotional activity" is needed to maintain load factor strength. Passenger load factor increased by just 0.4 percentage points to 71.2%, with capacity growing 3% and traffic 3.6%. The airline said the traffic increase comprised a 7.1% rise in premium traffic and 2.9% growth in the non-premium category.
United and Star Alliance partner Swiss will expand their code share to include Swiss's flights from Zurich to Boston, Miami and New York Kennedy and Swiss flights between Geneva and New York Kennedy. The airlines will launch the code share on March 27 [OST-2005-22464].
Promoted Robert Gray to VP-regulatory compliance and government affairs; most recently he was senior director-regulatory compliance and government affairs.
American's February load factor was up 2.8 percentage points to 75%, due partly to a significant cut in domestic capacity, the airline reported last week. Consolidated traffic increased 2.7%, and capacity was down 1.2%. The 3.5% cut in domestic capacity was partly outweighed by a 3.4% rise in international capacity, following the airline's long-term capacity trend. Domestic traffic was up 2.2% and international traffic 3.7%.
Frontier executives believe the holding company they're proposing to create could lay the foundation for several business ventures, such as setting up international subsidiaries. The airline won board approval earlier this month to set up Frontier Airlines Holdings, and a special shareholders meeting is tentatively scheduled March 27 to vote on the plan.
Appointed John Grisik executive VP-operational excellence and technology, named Jerry Witowski to succeed Grisik as segment president-electronic systems and named Brian Gorato to succeed Witowski as president-sensor systems division, effective March 15.
The Jackson-Madison County Airport Authority is urging the U.S. Transportation Dept. to rescind a tentative order ending Essential Air Service subsidies for McKellar-Sipes Regional Airport, disputing DOT findings that the $200-per-passenger subsidy cap continued to be exceeded after several DOT warnings.
US Airways loses the most bags of the major airlines, according to the latest U.S. Transportation Dept. data, with 8.45 reports per 1,000 passengers in January. The average for the 19 carriers was 6.92, better than in January 2005, with Hawaiian and AirTran losing the fewest bags. The six regional carriers were all the bottom of the ranking, led by Atlantic Southeast, which had 19.47 reports.
Aerolineas Argentinas is expected to win nine new routes from Argentina's department of transportation (ST), sources in Buenos Aires said, while AR subsidiary Austral will not fare as well.
