Asian Aerospace 2000 conference, Feb. 22-27 in Singapore, will center on a meeting of the ICAO Asia Pacific directors general. Hosted by the Civil Aviation Authority of Singapore, 36 directors general of civil aviation authorities from the region have been invited, together with various international and regional aviation organizations. CAAS Director General Wong Woon Liong said the region's fast growth into one of the world's biggest air markets, demands special attention.
FAA yesterday dropped a plan to require foreign carriers to test employees in the U.S. for drugs and alcohol as U.S. carriers are required to do. Instead, the agency will rely on ICAO to take action on substance abuse prevention. FAA said that "unilateral imposition of testing regulations on foreign air carriers is not warranted" now that ICAO has developed standards that can be applied by multilateral action.
The Taiwanese government has cleared its aviation officials to return to the negotiating table with their Korean counterparts for talks to resume on the Taipei-Seoul route. In Taipei, an official at the Civil Aeronautics Administration confirmed that that CAA has received the green light from its government, while in Seoul, Lee Han Tae, an executive at the Ministry of Construction and Transportation, said the Koreans also are ready.
The National Mediation Board has released Midwest Express and its Air Line Pilots Association unit into a 30-day cooling-off period after 18 months of contract talks that failed to yield a tentative agreement. Both Midwest Express and the pilots had asked for release. "It was obvious from the very first day of the January sessions that they [management] had no intention of meeting the pilots' expectations," said the airline's ALPA Master Executive Council Chairman Segundo Andrew.
U.S. Major Carriers Advertising Expense Third Quarter 1999 % Of Total Advertising Passenger Revenues Alaska 6,158,000 1.45 Domestic 5,874,000 1.45 Latin 284,000 1.41 America West N/A -- Domestic N/A --
The Indonesian National Air Carriers Association (INACA) has taken the government to task for issuing air operating permits to new carriers without considering the effect on national carrier Garuda Indonesia. INACA's outburst comes after the Ministry of Transport issued approved charter airline Pelita Air Services for domestic and regional flights. Last month, Mentari Airlines and Indonesia Airlines Aviapatria (IAA) also received permits.
With 12 countries in the region signing open-skies bilaterals with the U.S. and more in the offing, airline liberalization is spawning more competition, which is stimulating market growth from Mexico to Patagonia. Mexico claims that last year it generated $8 billion from tourist arrivals and is spending $80 million in tourism promotion. That is 1% of the gross income. If you take the multiplier effect of tourist arrival spending, a generally accepted rule, the dollar impact on Mexico's economy is more like $56 billion!
America West and United made organizational changes yesterday, creating separate divisions to oversee the airlines' e-commerce projects. America West's new division will manage the company's electronic business, Internet initiatives and online investments. Scott Kirby, currently the airline's VP of revenue management, was elected senior VP and will head the new division.
The FAA is filling safety-related vacancies but is leaving open non-safety-related jobs as it tries to live within a fiscal 2000 operations funding level, which was trimmed from its original budget request. FAA confirmed that it was not filling all its vacancies and cutting down on travel costs to stay within an operations budget, which was lowered $139 million from its request. The spokesman said Wednesday that a supplemental request of roughly $100 million has been under discussion between FAA and DOT.
U.S. National, Regional and Cargo Carriers Advertising Expense Third Quarter 1999 National Carriers % Of Total Advertising Operating Expenses AirTran Airlines 3,112,636 2.73 Aloha 1,512,462 2.54 American Trans Air 2,247,925 0.92 Frontier 1,320,489 1.83
Gulfstream International will increase service in the Eastern Caribbean by adding daily flights to Tortola and Virgin Gorda from San Juan, P.R., beginning Feb. 10. With the additions, Gulfstream will have five daily roundtrips in these markets.
Belgian Transport Minister Isabelle Durant withdrew a decree imposing a night flight ban at Brussels National Airport, due to pressure exerted by other members of Belgium's coalition government. Following a restricted meeting on Jan.
German regional carrier Augsburg Airways plans to double its fleet to about 24 units within four years. The airline, formerly known as Interot Airways, is a member on Lufthansa's franchise program, Team Lufthansa. Augsburg has grown considerably since 1997, when it started flying on behalf of Lufthansa. In 1998, the passenger number went up 86%, and the carrier expects additional rise of 30-40% in 1999. Final figures are not yet available. Despite the increased capacity, the load factor rose to 59% from 53.9%. The airline carried nearly 900,000 passengers last year.
Northwest and its flight attendants, represented by the Teamsters, will attend a National Mediation Board mediated status conference Jan. 25 in hopes of returning to the bargaining table. U.S. District Court Judge Donovan Frank meanwhile placed a stay on his order that the parties begin negotiations pending the conference (DAILY, Jan. 13). Northwest and the union will reassess the status of talks prior to a preliminary injunction hearing, said Michael Bloom, an attorney for the Teamsters Local 2000.
Terminal Fly has inaugurated schedules passenger service between its home base in Resistencia, in Northern Argentina, and Buenos Aires, and non-scheduled cargo flights, with Fokker F28 and F27 aircraft.
Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) praised the DOT Inspector General's office for establishing a web site and hotline for airline consumers to register their complaints about flight overbooking and access to the lowest available air fares (DAILY, Jan. 11). "This is the first time the airlines will actually be held accountable to consumers," Wyden said.
DOT granted TWA a two-year initial exemption for New York-Providenciales, Turks&Caicos, service, the first weekly nonstop service in the market, using MD-83 aircraft. (Docket OST-99-6667)
Gaining momentum to build a powerful Internet travel portal, a combination of 23 domestic and foreign carriers signed letters of intent to become charter associates in the new web-based travel business being developed by United, Delta, Northwest and Continental. The carriers claim the site will provide published and Internet-only fares as well as travel features, such as hotel and car rental services. Officials said the big boost came from the American's decision to join the group. "They are the 900-pound gorilla," said a spokeswoman for the initiative.
Bellview Airlines, a privately owned Nigerian carrier, filed at DOT for permit and exemption authority. The carrier wants to start scheduled service in February to New York Kennedy from Lagos, where DOT last month lifted the ban on direct flights to the U.S., in place since August 1993. It proposes twice-weekly nonstops with Boeing 747-300 aircraft configured for three classes with a total of 304 seats, stressing the affordability of its proposed nonstops, compared with service via Europe, and the fact that three million people of Nigerian descent live in the U.S.
US Airways Express will add nonstop regional jet flights each business day between New York LaGuardia and Charleston, S.C., beginning Feb. 10. US Airways Express will add two flights between LaGuardia and Columbia and one between LaGuardia and Charleston. In total, the airline will operate three nonstop LaGuardia-Columbia and two nonstop LaGuardia-Charleston flights. The service will be operated with 50-seat Embraer 145 regional jet aircraft.
Note To Reader: Because of the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday, Aviation DAILY will not publish an issue dated Jan. 17. The next issue will be dated Jan. 18.
Swiss accident investigation board is sending an investigator to a crash yesterday in Libya of a twin-engine Shorts 360 turboprop aircraft operated by Swiss charter carrier Avisto. An undetermined number of those aboard were reported killed. The plane, ferrying oil workers, crashed into the sea after the pilot radioed that both engines had died and that he was making a sea landing in the Mediterranean. The aircraft had taken off from Tripoli with 41 aboard, including crew for an oil refinery at Marsa el-Brega.
Following negotiations led by its central purchasing department, Lufthansa inked an agreement with SAP that more than doubles its current investment in SAP mainframe software. Representatives of the Lufthansa group and SAP met in Frankfurt yesterday to sign the agreement, which outlines Lufthansa's further deployment of SAP software. Lufthansa has been using SAP software since 1981, when it deployed the SAP R/2 mainframe system.
Continental plans to launch daily nonstop service between its Newark hub and Puerto Plata, Dominican Republic, beginning in June, subject to government approval. The new route will be operated with Boeing 737-300 equipment and comes after the U.S. and the Dominican Republic reached an open-skies agreement last month (DAILY, Dec. 16). Continental has been serving the Dominican Republic for more than 10 years with flights to its capital, Santo Domingo.
JetBlue Airways signed a licensing deal this week with Mercury Scheduling Systems to use its Nova and Nova Online software. The airline will begin using the Nova System for crew planning immediately. The online software allows flight and cabin crews to enter preferred work schedules from anywhere in the world over the Internet. Under the terms of the contract, Mercury will receive a recurring monthly license and support fee.
