Employment at Europe's airports during the last four years has remained stable, according to an Airports Council International-Europe survey of 14 airports accounting for a quarter of Europe's total air traffic. The Brussels-based group said 73% of airport employees work in operations, 17% in technical activities and the rest in support.
Frontier appointed Shari Buis city manager at Chicago Midway; Barbara Gessner city manager at New York LaGuardia; Pam Olsen city manager at Baltimore/Washington; Nancy White system manger of catering and support services and Jerry Schimetz manager of customer services, general offices.
Civil aircraft sales to economically troubled Asian nations may slow down and some Asian carriers may ask for delivery delays, Sally Bath, director of the Commerce Department's Office of Aerospace, said Friday as DOC and DRI/McGraw-Hill released U.S. Industry&Trade Outlook '98, formerly U.S. Industrial Outlook. Bath said, however, that her assessment does not apply to China, which has placed a large number of orders.
Internet technology is driving airlines to alter relations with the travel agent community, United Chairman Gerald Greenwald told the Economic Strategy Institute last week. The revolution is "pro-consumer" because it puts more choices at the traveler's fingertips.
Travel abroad still is safe, and the global travel and tourism industry cannot be held hostage by the threat of terrorism, the American Society of Travel Agents said. ASTA was rallying behind the Egyptian tourism industry and trying to counter the effects of last week's State Department advisory that Americans use "greater than usual caution" when traveling outside the U.S. State issued the warning because of the massacre of tourists at Luxor, the murders of four businessmen in Karachi and the general situation in the Middle East.
Fairlines, a business-class-only startup patterned after Midwest Express of the U.S., will be launched Dec. 8 in Paris. The carrier will operate two daily services to Milan Malpensa Airport, three to Nice and two between Nice and Milan using two customized, 72-seat MD-80 aircraft. Seats are leather, each with multimedia equipment, and a small lounge with a couch has been installed at the rear of each aircraft. Fares will be competitive with the business-class tariffs of established airlines. Investments total 80 million French francs (US$13.8 million).
New third-country code-share rights brokered by the U.S. and Canada set the stage for approval of pending code-share applications and rendered moot some U.S. majors' complaints that they could not conduct similar operations into Canada. The agreement was the result of bilateral consultations last week in Washington (DAILY, Nov. 21). A DOT spokesman said other liberalization was discussed and the parties will schedule another meeting.
Delta and Swissair ended their eight-year-old Global Excellence Alliance with Singapore Airlines Friday, setting the stage for Singapore to code share with Lufthansa and possibly United (see story to follow). Lufthansa confirmed that it and SIA will hold a joint press conference today in Singapore. Friday's disengagement ends a three-way link that included code sharing on routes such as Singapore-New York and cross- investments - each Global Excellence partner holds about 5% of each of the other two.
The International Civil Aviation Organization established a safety training center in Brussels at the location where a passenger boarded an aircraft with a time bomb for the first time in aviation history. Belgian Transport Minister Michel Daerden recalled the event last week in a ceremony inaugurating the training center, on the grounds of Brussels's former Haren Airport. The first hijacker in history intended to commit suicide after having gambled his fortune away at the Casino of Spa. He boarded an Imperial Airways flight to London Croydon.
- In Federal Register dated Nov. 17...Issued an AD on certain Boeing 777- 200 aircraft requiring replacement of certain overhead electronics units of the passenger address system...Superseded an AD on McDonnell Douglas MD900 helicopters concerning the collective drive link assembly.
Boeing Commercial President Ron Woodard took aim last week at what he called a "myth" in Europe that the post-merger Boeing is so large it threatens Europe's aerospace industry. "The combined revenues of Airbus partner companies are more than twice as large as we are," he said. "There is a giant all right, but it is not us. It is the combined partners of the Airbus consortium."
DOT made final its finding that Winair is fit to conduct interstate and domestic combination charter service and issued the carrier an interstate air transportation certificate. Its foreign certificate will be handled in a separate order. The carrier must notify DOT and demonstrate fitness if it wants to operate more than eight aircraft. (Dockets OST-97-2936, 2937)
DOT will take no action to prevent Continental Express from terminating its service at New Haven, Conn. The carrier told DOT it would end its Newark- New Haven flights Dec. 17 (DAILY, Sept. 30). The remaining carrier at New Haven, USAir Express, provides seven Philadelphia and three Washington National roundtrip nonstops per day, and DOT said this level of service "far exceeds" New Haven's essential air service requirement, redefined by the department as two nonstop or one-stop roundtrips a day to any medium or large hub.
Ananias Blocker, White House special assistant for legislative affairs and a former Senate Budget Committee analyst, will join American's Washington office to cover aviation bilaterals. He replaces Mary Kennedy, who died this year. American reportedly considered shifting the job to Texas but thought better of it.
After US Airways bought the US Airways Shuttle last week, bidder American told employees it is "unfortunate that there will be no new competition" in Shuttle markets New York LaGuardia, Washington National and Boston. In fact American, number three in all three, gained market share in Boston in the last year and remained flat at LaGuardia and National. During the same period, US Airways' share at LaGuardia and Boston declined.
Popular wisdom notwithstanding, airplanes and their air-handling systems don't make you sick, says a Stanford University Medical Center infectious disease expert. "There's nothing really special about an airplane in terms of infection except that you're in very close contact with people for a relatively long period of time," according to medical school professor Lucy Thompson. Colds and flu "are usually picked up from surfaces, such as an armrest or a washroom basin." Her advice? Pay close attention to personal hygiene.
American will break ground Dec. 1 at Dallas/Fort Worth Airport for its $2 million, 10,000-square-foot shelter and exhibit hall for the Flagship Knoxville, a pre-World War II DC-3 originally owned by American. American employees raised $700,000 for the project and the company pledged the rest. The Flagship was used as an Army cargo plane in 1942-43, returned to American and sold to Colonial Airlines in 1948. At one time it was used as a crop duster in South Carolina.
Delta and Aeropostal of Venezuela will explore cooperation in Latin America, including joint marketing, enhanced interlining, schedule coordination, computer reservations system links, shared passenger and facilities handling and reciprocal frequent flyer program participation.
