Like their U.S. counterparts, British travel agents put commission caps and Internet bookings high on their threat lists, according to a PricewaterhouseCoopers travel agents' benchmarking survey. The survey, which queried 237 travel agents, found that only tour operators' direct sales to travelers ranked ahead of commission caps and Internet bookings as major threats facing travel agents. Commission caps, the No. 7 threat in a 1996 survey, was No. 2 this year. Internet bookings rose from No. 4 two years ago to No. 3.
American wants an exemption to operate scheduled combination service between Los Angeles and Nadi, Fiji, under code share with Air Pacific. (Docket OST-98-4915)
FAA - In Federal Register dated Dec. 14...Issued an airworthiness directive on certain Boeing 757 aircraft requiring inspection of the acoustic panels in the engine inlet...Issued an AD on Douglas MD-11 aircraft requiring inspection of the attachments on the No. 4 banjo cap...Issued an AD on Rolls-Royce Viper engines requiring inspection of the barometric flow control unit augmenter...Proposed an AD on AlliedSignal 502R engines to require an improved fan core inlet anti-ice system.
DOT - Approved an initial one-year exemption and indefinite-duration code-share authority for Northwest to conduct scheduled mail service between Honolulu/Los Angeles/Chicago/Seattle/New York/Washington, D.C./Baltimore/Dallas/Fort Worth/Miami and Sydney/Melbourne via Japan under code share with Ansett Australia, and for Ansett to display Northwest's designator code to transport mail on Ansett's scheduled flights between Japan and Sydney/Melbourne...Approved, subject to FAA-approved routings, an American Red Cross charter using a HeavyLift Volga-Dnepr An-124-100 aircraft fo
House Appropriations transportation subcommittee chairman Frank Wolf (R-Va.) scolded Air Transport Association President Carol Hallett Friday for announcing "before the debate has even begun" that one of the three core elements in ATA's 1999 legislative agenda would be to push for taking the aviation trust fund off budget. In a letter sent Friday to Hallett, Wolf noted her comment to that effect quoted Dec.
Malaysia Airlines posted a pre-tax loss of 432 million ringgit (US$114 million) for the six months ended Sept. 30, compared with a profit of RM47.3 million ($12.5 million) for the same period last year. Group revenue rose 1% to RM3.4 billion ($900 million). MAS attributed the loss to a decline in traffic on domestic and regional routes and the weak ringgit, which led to higher costs and foreign currency exchange losses. The carrier said demand in the second half of the year remains soft and price competition continues to pressure yields. On Jan.
Asia/Pacific airlines got rid of at least 96 jet aircraft with more than 100 seats during the first 10 months of 1998, according to data from carriers in the region analyzed by The DAILY. Thirteen DC-10s have been divested and more are up for sale, and 12 767s and 12 737s have left fleets in the region as well. The data do not include Boeing and Airbus orders that have been deferred or canceled. Garuda Indonesia and Philippine Airlines, which shrank their international service and returned aircraft to lessors, accounted for many of the widebody aircraft reductions.
Fedex Pilots Association leaders said Friday they believe the union's rank and file will approve the contract agreement negotiated late last week without the need for a sales campaign. Two previous tentative agreements on a first-ever FedEx contract were defeated in ratification votes, and FPA members will get a look at the new one next week. Pilots will begin receiving copies of the proposed contract Dec. 29, FPA said Friday, and a ratification vote should take place about Feb. 4. FPA's board will meet tomorrow to draw up majority and minority opinions.
Northwest's Pacific passenger revenues were cut nearly in half in the third quarter, down $310 million to $360.5 million, as capacity fell 28.6%. With pilots' strike effects, yield plunged 18.7% in the Pacific and 16.8% over the Atlantic.
AAR named Vincent Corso VP-airline sales at AAR Cooper Aviation and Robert Botticelli VP sales and marketing at AAR Aircraft Component Services-New York.
Recent briefings to FAA, the Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association and the Air Transport Association indicate that the much-anticipated Johns Hopkins Global Positioning System risk assessment will be delivered on schedule Jan. 19.
Iberia, which experienced double-digit traffic growth in November, began adding 80 holiday-season flights over the weekend to take advantage of a surge of Spanish travelers. The carrier is adding frequencies to New York, Buenos Aires, Puerto Rico, the Dominican Republic and the Spanish cities of Las Palmas, Tenerife, Fuerteventura, Lanzarote, Ibiza, Menorca and Mallorca. Its November traffic was 2.6 billion revenue passenger kilometers, up 14.3% year-over-year for its biggest gain this year but down 12.1% from 2.9 billion RPMs in October.
Professional Aviation Maintenance Association is alarmed that FAA plans to quit publishing its Alerts this month in favor of an Internet-only version. PAMA says Alerts' monthly reports on maintenance incidents from voluntarily submitted data are read by more than 29,000 mechanics and pilots. PAMA called FAA's decision a "major safety error." The data are part of Service Difficulty Report procedures.
United and its Air Line Pilots Association unit began negotiations on a new contract Friday, 16 months before the current agreement becomes amendable. United ALPA said it hopes to revise the 400-page agreement without the kind of bitter confrontations that have been part of labor talks at other airlines.
Pigs in Peru have been eating airline food smuggled out of Lima Airport garbage. Despite the popularity of the food among swine, police stopped the practice because the waste needs to be incinerated to prevent the spread of disease.
Aeropostal filed at DOT for an exemption to operate scheduled combination service under reciprocal code share with American from points in Venezuela to Dallas/Fort Worth and Houston, and to 31 points beyond Miami, New York, DFW and San Juan, its U.S. gateways. The Venezuelan carrier holds authority to serve the gateways and Caracas-Orlando/Atlanta via Aruba. It wants to place its code on American flights to the gateway cities and on American/American Eagle flights to the beyond points.
Flight attendants at Midway have voted for representation by the Association of Flight Attendants, AFA said Friday. Of 107 eligible voters, 82 cast ballots for AFA after what the union called a "fierce battle" for representation. An earlier representation election was overturned after the National Mediation Board found that Midway had violated workers' rights.
New Jet Aircraft Deliveries September 1998 Last 12 Months Carrier # Type Engines Delivery Air China 1 747-400/CO PW4056 1 Air Pacific 1 737-700 CFM56-7B24 -
FAA and Chile's Director General of Civil Aeronautics (DGAC) completed the first test flights in Chile demonstrating the capabilities and benefits of the Wide Area Augmentation System in what FAA described as "the latest step toward achieving a seamless, worldwide satellite-based air navigation system." The test flights were conducted at Santiago International Airport.
Delta Chief Executive Leo Mullin believes the airline's buildup in Latin America will stimulate the region's economies by almost $600 million during the next three years.But the level could be higher if it weren't for restrictions "that thwart the development of a sound transportation network," he said this week in New Orleans.
Florida-based Gulfstream International flew 12.8 million revenue passenger miles last month, a 38.17% increase compared with November 1997. Gulfstream's parent, G-Air Holdings Corp., acquired Paradise Island Airways in August (DAILY, Aug. 13). Capacity climbed 36.5% to 23.4 million available seat miles, while the load factor edged up less than one percentage point to 54.7%. Boardings rose by nearly 51% to 74,555.
Frank Swoboda, Washington Post transportation writer, discusses DOT's proposed airline competition policy, airline alliances, airport economics and FAA reauthorization on this week's Aviation News Today, to be broadcast Sunday at 12:30 a.m. and 1:30 p.m. on Washington's NewsChannel 8.
