Communities in Louisiana and Alabama applied for Chicago slots that will be available for reallocation by DOT as a result of the June 1 termination by American Eagle of nonstop O'Hare service to Shreveport, La., and Montgomery, Ala. American Eagle was awarded the slot exemptions solely for nonstop regional jet service from the communities to O'Hare (DAILY, April 21, Sept. 28, 1998). The Baton Rouge Greater Airport District and the Huntsville-Madison County Airport Authority each filed applications for four exemption slots.
United is asking its flight attendants to report cabin maintenance problems by picking up a GTE Airfone while in flight and calling the maintenance directorate. The new link enables cabin crew to dial "*FIX" and give details about the broken item directly to an aircraft maintenance technician (AMT). "With direct two-way telephone communication, we gather more information than we could get through the old maintenance reporting procedure, and it speeds up the repair process," said Mike Lapacek, staff analyst-maintenance planning, in an internal communique.
Bulgarian Transport Minister Wilhelm Kraus chose European Airbus equipment for national carrier Balkan Airlines despite the fact that Prime Minister Ivan Kostov criticized the European Union's attitude toward Bulgaria. On March 2, Kraus said a work group headed by him chose two A310s to replace Boeing 767s. One of the 767s was returned at the beginning of the year and the second departed last month as their leasing contracts expired.
DOT yesterday upheld its earlier decision that federal law takes precedence over a Texas court's ruling to bar Legend Airlines and Continental Express from flying out of Dallas Love Field. DOT told the City of Fort Worth and the Dallas/Fort Worth Airport Board that state law and a bond ordinance aimed at protecting DFW do not preclude rights set down by the Shelby and Wright amendments allowing certain carriers to operate interstate routes. Dee Kelly, attorney for Fort Worth and American, said the ruling was "no surprise at all.
American Trans Air will offer nonstop service to San Juan from New York Kennedy starting June 16 and from Fort Lauderdale June 9, operating six roundtrips per week in each market. Flights from JFK will use a Lockheed L-1011 and will operate every day but Tuesday. Service from Fort Lauderdale will be aboard a 727-200 and will operate every day except Tuesday to San Juan and every day except Wednesday on return to Fort Lauderdale. American Trans Air also offers nonstop service from Chicago Midway and Orlando to and from San Juan.
Express Airlines I, a Northwest Airlink carrier, posted a 5.3% increase in March traffic to 28,748 revenue passenger miles and a 0.6% rise in capacity to 46,273 available seat miles compared with the year-ago month, boosting the load factor 2.8 percentage points to 62.1%. Passengers flown declined 4.3% to 105,249. Year-to-date RPMs grew 0.2% on 4.5% fewer ASMs, growing the load factor 2.8 points. Passengers flown dropped 5.7%.
US Airways will temporarily suspend service between Philadelphia and Amsterdam on June 12 until it receives new aircraft for its international fleet. The airline said it will pull aircraft from another route to serve Charlotte-London.
China Southern Airlines has added an Airbus A320 flight training facility to its center in Zhuhai in southern China. At 100,000 square feet, the Zhuhai center is the largest flight training building in Asia, the airline said. China Southern has invested $100 million in the site, which meets FAA and other western standards. In addition to the A320s, the facility trains with two 737 simulators, one 757/767 and one 777, all made by Montreal-based CAE Electronics. The A320 simulator already is in use 20 hours per day.
Senate budget conferees, as expected, dropped a sense of the Senate resolution aimed at House Transportation Chairman Bud Shuster's AIR-21 aviation funding bill after House Republican leaders "had problems" with the Senate's restrictive language, congressional sources said yesterday (DAILY, April 14). The phrase apparently was a reference to the commitment of the House Republican leadership to give Shuster a vote in the House on AIR-21, a five-year FAA reauthorization that would expand funding by taking the aviation trust funds off budget.
American applied at DOT for an extrabilateral designation to operate San Jose, Calif.-London Gatwick service. The carrier, unsuccessful last year in its bid for a movable U.S. gateway for service to the U.K. - awarded to Continental for Cleveland-Gatwick service (DAILY, Oct. 21, 1998) - asked DOT to seek on its behalf a designation beyond the restrictions of the U.S.-U.K. Bermuda 2 agreement. "The U.S. and the U.K.
GE Capital is selling five aircraft to Airborne Express and is buying 13 from China Eastern. Airborne said it has entered an agreement with General Electric Capital Corp. to purchase five used 767-200s, with the right to buy a sixth, bringing to 28 the number of 767-200s it has committed to purchase. To date, seven have been acquired and five are in service. The latest aircraft will be delivered this year and in 2000, when the possible sixth also would arrive. The aircraft are now on lease to TWA.
Shareholders of Virgin Express yesterday approved a plan to repurchase up to $15 million of the carrier's outstanding shares. Under the plan, adopted at a shareholders meeting in London, the company initially would purchase up to $7 million in stock. If earnings for 1999 reach $8 million, the company would be permitted to buy the entire $15 million amount. Shares will be purchased on the open market.
Bombardier yesterday reported revenues for the year ended Jan. 31 of C$11.5 billion (US$7.7 billion), up 35% from the previous year. Net income was C$554 million ($371 million), an increase of 32%.
The government of Indonesia has named Merpati Nusantara the backup airline to national carrier Garuda Indonesia. According to Muljadi Kartono, secretary general of the Ministry of Transport, Merpati is the only airline of the four local private carriers that operates domestic and international flights. The other three - Bouraq Airways, Mandala Air and Peliti - offer only scheduled domestic and chartered flights.
As the German capital moves from Bonn to Berlin shortly, Lufthansa is contemplating the reintroduction of transatlantic service from Berlin to the U.S. for the first time in seven years. When Delta pulled out of Berlin-New York Kennedy service last year, it left the new German capital with no Atlantic nonstops. "Maybe there will be a chance of installing a code-share flight between Washington and Berlin by 2000 or 2001," said Wolfgang Weber, director of Berlin operations for Lufthansa.
The House on Monday approved a five-year extension of the War Risk Insurance Plan by a vote of 392-1 and sent it to the Senate for final congressional approval. The program provides insurance for commercial airliners flying into war zones. Rep. Thomas Petri (R-Wis.), a senior member of the House aviation subcommittee and floor manager of the bill, said the act is not currently being used in Kosovo, but it "could be needed at any time and, therefore, we cannot afford to allow the program to lapse."
Northwest, which last month named three new VPs, yesterday revamped its finance department with four new appointments. Jeff McClelland was named senior VP-controller and Neal Cohen was appointed senior VP-treasurer. Both will report to Chief Financial Officer Mickey Foret. Doug Podolak was named VP-fuel and corporate service, and Dan Mathews was chosen VP-assistant treasurer. Both report in Cohen. Tim Rainey was named VP-systems operations control, replacing McClelland and reporting to Richard Anderson, chief operating officer.
FAA Year 2000 Program Director Ray Long said yesterday that the agency will issue its Business Contingency Plan tomorrow. Administrator Jane Garvey cautioned that the plan is not set in concrete and will evolve as progress is made toward meeting year 2000 objectives. The contingency plan will be used only if there are Y2K failures. But both Garvey and Long said again that last weekend's test of air traffic control communications systems in Denver proved the agency has been successful in removing Y2K computer bugs.
United, with strongly positioned East-West Coast markets from Washington Dulles Airport, said yesterday it is filling in the holes in its route system by concentrating on north-south expansion with the help of regional partner Atlantic Coast Airlines. United will grow just under 3% systemwide but about 60% at Dulles, said VP-North America East Region Daniel Walsh. United in January announced it would increase its total departures from Dulles to 117 by May.
American's Allied Pilots Association is headed back to court tomorrow after the union on Monday failed to convince U.S. District Court Judge Joe Kendall to lower the fine he imposed when pilots failed to obey a temporary restraining order to end a 10-day sickout in February. Kendall will continue the hearing tomorrow to assess damages from the sickout, which American estimates at more than $50 million.
U.K.-based low-fare airline Debonair has purchased its first aircraft - a British Aerospace 146-200 - with financing from Finova Capital Ltd. The airline's current fleet comprises 12 BAe 146s and one Boeing 737-300, wet-leased from AB Airlines. The BAe 146 originally was delivered to Debonair in 1996 under an operating lease from US Airways and since then has been operated on Debonair's scheduled services.
Air Transport Association Cargo Traffic February 1999 Revenue Ton Miles (000) February February % 1999 1998 Change Domestic Freight 751,881 752,365 (0.1) Mail 158,028 168,222 (6.1) Total 909,909 920,587 (1.2) International
SkyWest Airlines reported a 42.4% jump in traffic on 38.8% more capacity for March 1999 compared with the same 1998 month, which grew the load factor 1.4 percentage points to 56%. SkyWest flew 95.6 million revenue passenger miles and 170.6 million available seat miles. Passengers flown leapt 58.8% to 459,331. Year-to-date RPMs jumped 43.7% and ASMs 37.6%, boosting the load factor 2.2 points. Passengers flown climbed 62.9%.
