After a survey of airline chief executives, IATA has revised its outlook of world aviation markets and predicts that the economic downturn affecting most of the Asia/Pacific region will lower operating profits by as much as $2 billion this year. Instead of its previous global forecast of a 6.6% average annual growth rate, IATA said aviation will expand 5.4% each year through 2001. As a subcomponent of that total, it has revised its forecast Asia/Pacific passenger growth rate to 4.4%, below the global average and a massive drop from the 7.7% previous growth forecast.
..The situation raises another scenario for "Air Whiskey." The company could acquire financially troubled, publicly held United Express Great Lakes and use that as a means of taking itself - Air Wis - public. Such a move would support the later acquisition of 50-seat regional jets, which would split the capacity difference between the 328s and Air Wis's 80-seat BAe 146s. The United pilots' scope clause limits Air Wis to 18 146s - all of which will be on hand by April - thereby halting the carrier's growth.
SkyWest Wednesday announced a public offering of 1,400,000 shares of common stock at $40.50 per share. The carrier, which is expanding its activities as a United Express affiliate on the West Coast, said it would use the proceeds of the offering "for expansion of operations, including the acquisition of additional aircraft and related spare parts, support equipment and ground and maintenance facilities, and for general corporate purposes." The Robinson Humphrey Co. and SBC Warburg Dillon Read are underwriting the offering.
Tyrolean Airways launched a five-times weekly Canadair Regional Jet service between Vienna and Strasbourg this week. The Austrian airline is expecting tourist traffic to be boosted by this years' celebration of the centenary of the death of Sissi, the spouse of Austrian emperor Franz- Josef, which the Austrian national tourist board is currently promoting extensively. Furthermore, Austria is taking over the revolving presidency of the European Union on July 1.
Qantas pre-tax profits for the six months ended Dec. 31 jumped 20.5% to A$298.9 million (US$200 million), despite a softening of travel conditions to and from Asia. Net earnings increased 9.6% to A$166 million ($111 million) and revenues rose 5.6%. Expenses grew 4.5%. "We are now experiencing the adverse impact of economic conditions in Asia and expect the rate of performance improvement to slow over the next 12 to 18 months," said Chairman Gary Pemberton.
Cincinnati- and Orlando-based Comair has reached a new code-share agreement with Sabena to provide expanded service to Brussels, Belgium, from seven U.S. points, effective April 5. Covered in the pact is service from Dayton and Akron, Ohio; Detroit and Kalamazoo, Mich.; Des Moines, Iowa ; and Lexington and Louisville, Ky. Sabena VP-North America John Lindekens said, "With the increase of Sabena A340 flights between Cincinnati and Brussels to daily on May 15, we will be able to provide more regional passengers with a direct connection to Europe.
Express Airlines I, Northwest Airlines' wholly owned Airlink affiliate, flew slightly more than 23 million revenue passenger miles last month, a drop of 8.9% from January 1997. Capacity fell more slowly - 5.5% to 47.3 million available seat miles from 50.1 million. The resulting load factor - 48.6% - was 1.8 percentage point below January 1997's 50.4%. January 1998 January 1997 Rev. Passenger Miles 23,016,000 25,273,000 Available Seat Miles 47,346,000 50,122,000
Mesa filed 90-day notices of suspension of air service at DOT for its United Express service to Durango, Gunnison, Hayden/Steamboat Springs and Montrose, Colo.; Dodge City, Garden City, Great Bend, Hays and Liberal, Kan.; Farmington and Santa Fe, N.M., and Cheyenne, Gillette and Jackson Hole, Wyo. The carrier said that "as a result of the loss of code sharing with United Air Lines," it intends to terminate service May 18. No other carrier serves Farmington - Mesa's headquarters - or Montrose, Cheyenne, Gillette and the Kansas communities.
Taesa has applied at DOT to operate 108 Miami-Santiago-Buenos Aires and 30 Miami-Montevideo-Santiago-Buenos Aires roundtrips through September, using DC-10-30F aircraft carrying general cargo.
American seeks DOT renewal, "for an indefinite duration," of its code share with South African Airways, under which it displays SAA's code on New York- Los Angeles, New York-Miami and Miami-Los Angeles flights in conjunction with SAA's transatlantic service between South Africa and the U.S. American proposed indefinite-duration renewals last month (DAILY, Jan. 28).
Air New Zealand, smarting from a slackened Asian travel market and the effects of a stronger U.S. dollar, posted a net income of NZ$82 million (US$47.4 million) for the six months ended Dec. 31. Earnings were up 6.9% over the year-earlier period but were lower than the company had expected. ANZ felt traffic fall off on routes to Korea and other Asian nations and also was hurt by the weakening of the New Zealand dollar against U.S. currency. The airline buys aircraft and fuel in U.S. dollars, so both were more expensive.
Sen. Jay Rockefeller (D-W.Va.) discusses rural air service, fiscal 1999 budget proposals and the Airport Improvement Program on this week's Aviation News Today, to be broadcast Sunday on Washington's NewsChannel 8 at 12:30 a.m. and 1:30 p.m.
Alpine Air and Scenic Airlines applied at DOT to provide Essential Air Service to Ely, Nev., and Redtail Aviation and Alpine proposed EAS for Moab, Utah. Alpine is the incumbent carrier. For Ely, Scenic proposed three options, each totaling three daily roundtrips operated six days a week: two Ely-Reno and one Ely-Las Vegas, $1,280,708 per year; two Ely-Las Vegas and one Ely-Reno, $1,231,341, and one Ely-Reno and one Ely-Las Vegas, $987,674.
Florida-based Gulfstream International Airlines posted a load factor of 53.8% last month, three and one-half percentage points higher than January 1997's 50.3%, despite the fact that capacity fell 7.2% to 18.3 million available seat miles from nearly 19.7 million. Revenue passenger miles held most of their ground at 9.8 million compared with the prior January's 9.9 million. January 1998 January 1997 Rev. Passenger Miles 9,839,488 9,903,000
Great Lakes calculates it costs $300 in airport charges just to launch a 19-passenger Beech 1900 at Denver International Airport. At an average 50% load factor, those costs equate to $31.59 per passenger for each departure. At that rate, it is not surprising that Mesa failed to turn a profit in a number of Denver markets and served notice it was dropping those points. United continued to deny Mesa a higher pro-rate, and the regional posted its first four consecutive losing quarters - its December quarter has not been reported - since going public in 1986.
Load factors for 15 of the nation's largest regional airlines increased 2.01 percentage points in January, compared with the same month a year ago. Their average was 48.67%, compared with 46.65% in January 1997. Overall, the load factors reflected the normal January downturn after averaging 54.3% in December. Horizon Air topped the stack at 56.92%, up 0.62 points from a year ago but down from December's 65.9%. Only Horizon and five others - Comair, Gulfstream International, AMR Eagle, Air Wisconsin and CCAIR - exceeded 50%.
Veteran Saab Aircraft of America public relations executive Ron Sherman has established his own marketing and public relations firm, Sherman Communications. Sherman retired from Saab in December after 12 years with the firm, during which the Saab 340 became a successful regional aircraft in the North American market.
Aerospatiale of France will split into nine subsidiaries during the second half of 1998 to prepare for the integration of Europe's aerospace sector, the company said yesterday in Paris. Last December, the French, German and U.K. governments asked Aerospatiale, Daimler-Benz Aerospace and British Aerospace to reorganize their operations, aiming at "balanced partnership" integration. With its new structure, Aerospatiale intends to "fully play its role as the French architect of the construction of the European...industry," the company said.
Flagship Airlines posted a 9.6% increase in revenue passenger miles to 45.2 million last month, the fastest traffic growth among the four Eagle carriers by a considerable margin (DAILY, Feb. 6). Executive Air, Eagle's Caribbean unit, enjoyed an 8.6% traffic increase to nearly 26 million RPMs, but the other two units - Simmons and Wings West - lost traffic compared with January 1997. Simmons, by far the largest of the Eagle units, flew 94.6 million RPMs, down 2.6%; Wings West recorded 30.6 million RPMs, down 2%.
FAA said yesterday it is adding 13 routes to the Caribbean and South America based on Global Positioning System navigation. "This is the first 100% use of GPS as primary means of navigation using domestic route separation standards," said Dennis Koehler, FAA Southern Region air traffic division manager. The FAA's Miami Air Route Traffic Control Center is in charge of what FAA described as an "innovative route structure that promises to markedly improve air access" to the regions.
Association of Flight Attendants filed a motion Wednesday charging Midway Airlines with unlawful interference in the Feb. 13 flight attendants election. AFA wants the National Mediation Board to overturn the election and certify AFA as the bargaining representative for Midway cabin crew.
French Air Transport Director Michel Guyard has informed Continental Micronesia that he will not examine the U.S. carrier's proposal for Guam- Noumea, New Caledonia service until a new U.S.-French bilateral is negotiated, Continental Micronesia told DOT. As a result, Continental Micronesia opposes Airbus Transport International's application for French- U.S. charter authority (DAILY, Feb. 11) instead of questioning it and asking that DOT at least evaluate each charter flight individually. Guyard's stance, described in a Feb.
IATA asked the U.K. High Court for permission to seek judicial review of the consultation process conducted by the U.K. Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions on noise limits for aircraft departing from London Heathrow, Gatwick and Stansted airports. The High Court last April voided noise limits imposed by the government at the three airports and ordered reconsultation on the limits and on the locations of noise monitors around the airports.
TWA, US Airways and Hawaiian faulted each other's bids for fourth and fifth U.S-Japan designations in comments filed at DOT, with the first two promoting the benefits of their respective hubs and TWA cautioning DOT not to "waste" a designation on Hawaiian.
Union problems grounded some Virgin Express flights for the second time this month when cabin crew and pilots staged a half-day strike Tuesday at Virgin's operating base at Brussels Airport. According to the unions, the issue again was work schedules and a refusal by management to negotiate or set up a formal structure for talks. Similar to the cabin crew members' first demonstration Feb.
