Four airlines - Air Mauritius, Air Madagascar, Air Seychelles and Reunion Island - are in the final stages of negotiations to pool their resources and create a new regional carrier. Negotiations started in August and are expected to end next month before a decision is made.
St. Louis-based regional carrier Trans States Airlines has exercised six options for the 50-seat regional jet ERJ-145, Embraer announced. The carrier signed last February the original contract for nine firm orders and 18 options, which now stands at 15 firm and 12 options. Trans States has taken delivery of four ERJ-145s and has begun regional jet service for United Airlines as United Express in Chicago and Delta Connection at New York Kennedy Airport.
Taiwan's Civil Aeronautics Administration (CAA) has penalized China Airlines (CAL) for a second time within three days by barring it from introducing new routes until its safety record improves. CAA has rejected an application from CAL to start flights from Taipei to Ho Chi Minh City and Hsinchu-Kaoshiung. Three days ago, three senior pilots were suspended for four months for violating flight navigation rules, which resulted in a 747-400 making an unauthorized stop in Abu Dhabi recently.
Go, British Airways' low-cost unit based at London Stansted Airport, will launch twice-daily service to Munich Nov. 25 and increase the frequency to three flights per day Dec. 8. The carrier will launch service to an eighth destination, Venice, and increase Bologna service by one flight per day on Dec. 8, and it will increase Edinburgh service from three flights per day to five on Nov. 25. Travel to Munich and Venice booked and flown by Feb. 11, 1999, will cost #80 (US$127) roundtrip. Go also serves Rome, Milan, Copenhagen and Lisbon.
Belgian regional VLM and Luxair will cooperate to offer daily services between London City Airport and Luxembourg. Starting Nov. 16, the partners will offer three daily roundtrip flights from Monday to Friday between the two cities, as well as a single roundtrip service on Saturday and Sunday. The flights will be operated by VLM with a Fokker 50 aircraft.
British Airways and Emirates have signed a code-share agreement on selected flights between the U.K. and the United Arab Emirates. Starting Dec. 1, BA flights between London Heathrow and Abu Dhabi also will carry Emirates' EK codes and Emirates services between Manchester and Dubai also will bear the BA flight prefix. This is a bilateral pact between BA and Emirates and does not extend to Emirates membership in the new oneworld alliance between BA, American, Canadian, Cathay Pacific and Qantas announced Sept. 21.
SAirGroup will acquire a 45% stake in Air Europe, the privately held Italian charter carrier, in an attempt to develop leisure travel on Air Europe's international routes and "establish a domestic scheduled network for the Italian market," the companies said yesterday. Air Europe, which had sales of 418 billion lire (US$258 million) in 1997, operates seven 767-300 aircraft on long-haul charters from Rome and Milan. Price of the SAirGroup stake was not disclosed. Majority ownership will remain with its senior management, headed by Chairman Lupo Rattazzi.
Comair nonstop regional jet service to begin Dec. 1 between Dayton and Boston is not seen as hub-bypass, but rather "cherry picking" its own nearby hub at Cincinnati, according to one analyst. There will be more such service from mid-size cities such as Dayton to major metropolitan areas such as Boston, New York, Philadelphia and Washington on the East Coast and Los Angeles, San Francisco and Seattle on the West Coast.
An analysis by accounting giant Ernst&Young concludes that Embraer's use of the ProEx export financing program "leads us to conclude that such financial support is an abuse of the program and a direct subsidy of roughly US$2.5 billion to regional-aircraft purchasers, which translates into an important cumulative negative effect on Brazil's budget and balance of payments." Described as a "comprehensive analysis" based on "an array of Brazilian and other public and government financial documents, financial reports of various airlines, interviews with air-carrier executi
Air Canada's 13-day pilots strike sank the carrier from record-setting operating income in the second quarter to red ink in the third, and President and Chief Executive Lamar Durrett said yesterday the company will spend the rest of the year developing "fundamental changes to our business plan for 1999." The airline reported a net loss of C$61 million (US$39.5 million) for the quarter ended Sept.
Members of the Association of European Airlines achieved a collective load factor of 78.1% in September, their highest ever. The previous record was 78%, produced in August 1997. AEA airlines' passenger traffic grew 8.8% in September, compared with the same month last year, while capacity increased 7.2%. Their North Atlantic passenger traffic expanded 9.6%, while passenger growth on intra-European services was 8.7%.
Danish Air Transport, Vamdrup, Denmark, has purchased a Beech 1900D and placed options for two more aircraft. DAT will take delivery next month and place the aircraft in service throughout Scandinavia and Northern Europe. DAT also operates two King Air 90s, One King Air 200 and one Beech 1900C. DAT Managing Director Jesper Rungholm described the 1900D, which has a stand-up cabin, as "the most comfortable 19-seat regional airliner in the world."
Airborne Express pilots, angry over the firing of a popular pilot who refused to fly what he considered an unsafe test flight, are mounting a public campaign to have him reinstated. Airborne's 800 pilots, represented by the Airline Professionals Association Teamsters Local 1224, will stage informational picketing in coming weeks at "strategic" locations around the country and refuse overtime flying. Pilots also say they will honor picket lines of Airborne's Teamsters drivers in big cities if they strike.
Angel Airlines has beaten out Bangkok Airways in the battle for designation as Thailand's second international carrier. The Department of Transport granted AAL eight routes initially, including Bangkok-Singapore, Phuket-Singapore and Chiang Mai-Singapore, all lucrative, and an AAL official said it will apply next month to expand service to Vietnam, China, Laos, Myanmar and Cambodia. After postponing its startup in August and again in September due to leasing problems, AAL launched operations Oct. 24 with two leased 737-400s.
United yesterday told DOT that American "offered nothing new" in its objection to DOT's tentative allocation of 32 additional Chicago-London winter-season frequencies to American and 97 to United. Under the terms of the show cause order, each carrier would hold roughly an equal number of frequencies - American 422 and United 421. The DAILY on Oct. 27 incorrectly reported that American would have 433.
Rep. Bud Shuster's (R-Pa.) plan to resume attempts to unlock the Aviation Trust Fund for use directly on aviation capital improvement projects will be "the big initiative" for the House Transportation aviation subcommittee when the new Congress takes office in January, subcommittee counsel David Schaffer said yesterday at the Regional Airline Association fall membership meeting in Alexandria, Va.
Air Transport Association reported a 1.8% decline in members' traffic on 4.6% less capacity in September compared with the same month last year, increasing the load factor 2.1 percentage points to 70.7%. ATA reported 45.7 billion revenue passenger miles on 64.7 billion available seat miles. Year-to-date RPMs grew 2% on 1.1% more ASMs, boosting the load factor 0.5 points.
DOT yesterday renewed for one year Haiti National Airlines' (HNA) exemption to conduct sched-uled foreign combination service between Port-au-Prince and the terminal points Miami, Fort Lauder-dale, New York and San Juan, Puerto Rico, and charters.
China Airlines has opened its new three-bay maintenance hangar, which was designed and built by Burns&McDonnell over a five-year period. The facility is divided into areas for aircraft repair, automatic warehousing, aircraft components maintenance, air and water treatment and offices. It can accommodate three 747-400s plus an MD-11 or an A300. The air pollutant and wastewater treatment area is equipped with advanced environment protection equipment and a stored-ice air conditioning system that reduces peak electricity consumption. CAL Chairman H.I.
DOT granted Mexicana an exemption from high-density slot restrictions at Chicago O'Hare, providing two temporary slots to operate a daily Chicago-Mexico City nonstop roundtrip during the winter season. The carrier told DOT it has served the market for more than 30 years "without interruption" (DAILY, Sept.
AeroMexico posted a 5.5% traffic increase for September on 10.9% more capacity. The airline carried 600,000 passengers, up 1.8%. So far in 1998, traffic has risen 8.5% and capacity 6.3%.
In a bid to increase flight safety awareness, Taiwan's Civil Aeronautics Administration (CAA) warned Taiwan airlines that it will come down hard on safety rule violations. As an indication that it means business, CAA suspended three China Airlines pilots for four months and grounded five Dornier 228s of private carrier UNI Air for two months.
United is encouraging its Chicago-area employees to join the Midwest Aviation Coalition and help "protect and promote Chicago's aviation interests." The organization, also supported by American, Southwest and Delta, will back O'Hare and Midway issues and counter efforts to cap local traffic to justify construction of a third area airport in Peotone.
Air New Zealand said yesterday it will begin replacing its Boeing 737-200s next year, two years earlier than the planned 2001 start of the changeover. The first Boeing 737-300 will enter service in October 1999 and the seventh is due for introduction in April 2000. The airline will sell its -200s as new aircraft enter the fleet. "Current aircraft pricing brought about by the general state of the market has allowed us to bring forward the delivery as well as purchase an additional aircraft," said Chairman Selwyn Cushing.
