Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association named Karl Kerscher regional representative for Illinois, Iowa, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri and Wisconsin. American Association of Airport Executives elected Peter Drahn, director of Dane County, Wis., Regional Airport, chairman for 1997-98.
American applied for an exemption permitting combination service between Dallas/Fort Worth and Caracas, Venezuela. It plans to start flying nonstop on the route beginning Sept. 3, using 188-seat 757s. The only current nonstop service between the U.S. and Caracas is flown from Miami and New York.
DOT Office of the Inspector General said Friday it has indicted three U.S. citizens and one Kuwaiti on mail and wire fraud charges for the sale of bogus aircraft parts. The 25-count indictment, filed by Assistant U.S. Attorney Brian Netols in Federal District Court in the Northern District of Ilinois, names Robert Mansfield, Dennis McCormick, David Dohm and Faleh Al- Rashidi, the last a Kuwaiti national living in Suffolk, U.K. Dohm is charged with one count of wire fraud, with most of the indictment focusing on the others.
A federal judge in Reno, Nev., rejected last week Great American Airways' challenge to the DOT Office of Inspector General's seizure in late April of the grounded airline's documents (DAILY, May 8). In a two-page order, U.S. District Judge Howard McKibben technically did not address the question of whether the OIG had authority to seize the documents.
New advertising campaigns mounted by TWA and United contrast sharply with current media images depicting travel as a glamorous, hassle-free and relaxed. While United's initiative (DAILY, May 16) promises to make up for past neglects of its customers, TWA's ads proclaim there are no "flights of fancy." Under the tag line - "We want to be your airline" - it will show employees touting the carrier's improvements. "We are presenting our own folks talking straight to our customers and asking for their business," said Rod Brandt, senior VP-marketing and planning.
America West and the Association of Flight Attendants, after negotiating a single contract without success since December 1994, asked the National Mediation Board for help Friday. Discussion of the critical issues of compensation and scheduling started only recently, the parties said, although they have reached tentative agreement on more than 20 other sections of the contract.
Although commercial aviation has only a minimal impact on the environment, its effect could be reduced even further, according to Al Garcia, senior VP-engineering for Airbus Industrie. He says aircraft burn 25% more fuel than is necessary "while we are working like hell to gain fuel economy improvements of 1% or 2%." A lot of fuel vapors go into the atmosphere while aircraft idle at airports waiting to take off, he says.
Delta has been earning more per available seat mile of capacity than any other U.S. carrier. In the first quarter, its profit per available seat mile was 1.18 cents, followed by US Airways at 1.03 cents, American at 0.62 cents and United at 0.47, according to Delta data. At 1.2 cents profit per ASM, Delta also was the leader for the 12 months that ended March 31.
Hillsborough County Aviation Authority filed against Laker Airways' request that Airline Management Limited's authority to fly for British Airways from Gatwick to U.S. points be revoked. The Tampa-area authority said that singling out Tampa and Puerto Rico to be "pawns" in Laker's dispute "would be plainly discriminatory." Laker said withdrawing authority would affect only flight crew, who would be paid more than under wet-lease through AML because BA would keep flying the route itself. (Docket OST-97-2143)
Asiana, LTU and other carriers filed court documents asking for a stay of the imposition of new overflight fees to be levied by FAA, which are to take effect today (DAILY, May 2). The motions were filed in U.S. District Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit.
Orally approved an exemption for Aerocomercial de Transporte y Rutas to operate charter cargo flights between Ecuador and the U.S., if flown by an authorized carrier; the charters cannot be flown without prior DOT approval...Renewed an exemption for Air Espana, trading as Air Europa, to operate combination service between Madrid and Miami, through May 9, 1998...Renewed an exemption for Northwest to operate combination service from Anchorage to Magadan, Khabarovsk, Vladivostok and Petropavlovsk- Kamchatski, Russia...Renewed an exemption for Orient Avia Airlines to fly sche
Hawaiian Airlines reported a 16% increase in revenue passenger miles in April to 376.4 million from 324.4 million in the comparable 1996 month. Capacity rose 13.6% to 468.2 million available seat miles from 412 million, and the load factor gained 1.7 percentage points to 70.4%. Hawaiian carried 441,765 passengers during the month, a 28.1% increase. For the first four months of the year, traffic grew 7.6% to 1.355 billion RPMs and capacity 11.6% to 1.848 billion ASMs, driving the load factor down 2.8 points to 73.3%.
John Spooner, deputy managing director of East Midlands Airport for the past two years, will succeed Terry Lovett as managing director. The airport completed passenger terminal renovations recently, and Spooner will oversee a runway extension, development of a business zone nearby, and surface transport improvements.
Executives of Atlantic Excellence partners Delta, Sabena, Swissair and Austrian met Friday in Cincinnati to discuss promoting third-country sales and group bookings, ground-handling and alliance branding. The partners have $18.7 billion in annual revenue and 14% of capacity across the Atlantic. By contrast, the newly formed Star Alliance - United, Lufthansa, SAS, Thai and Air Canada - has $42.3 billion revenue. United and Lufthansa alone fly 15.2% of transatlantic capacity.
Senate Budget Committee is expected to approve today a five-year budget resolution that assumes FAA operations, facilities and equipment and research funding will grow 3% annually while airport grants remain at $1.46 billion per year. None of the assumptions would be binding on the appropriations committees. The House resolution, approved Friday, includes no explicit assumptions of FAA funding.
United has asked the U.S. government to arrange a deal with Paraguay to approve both United/Varig and American/LAPSA code shares. The filing responds to a code-share proposal by American and Paraguay's LAPSA for Miami-Asuncion service, filed last October. Investment in LAPSA from Brazil has led to reorganization of the carrier into a new company, TAM- Mercosur, which also wants the American code share.
Southwest has taken its "keep it simple" business strategy into the aircraft leasing arena, opting for plain packaged transactions that take little time to finalize and require negligible outside support, if any. "In everything we do, we try to eliminate extra steps, and in leasing, we've tried to make things simpler administratively to deal with," said John Owen, Southwest treasurer. The ability to keep leasing simple depends on how healthy the company is, however, and how much of a competitive appetite there is from banks to bid for financing.
Responding to concerns that rising traffic will mean increased accidents, Airbus Industrie consultant Gerald Davis, citing Airclaims data, says airlines could cut the current rate in half by retiring first- and second- generation aircraft and automating fleets. He acknowledges that this does not come close to the Gore commission's goal of a five-fold reduction.
Singapore Airlines retained its leading place in airline profitability in 1996, but earnings increased just 0.6% to S$1.03 billion (US$714 million) as fuel expenses rose and yields fell. Revenue grew 4.8% to S$7.2 billion ($5 billion) and group operating profit fell 14.3% to S$896 million ($620 million). The stronger Singapore dollar produced a saving of S$73 million, although higher fuel prices added S$153 million in expenses. Overall yield dropped 4.6% to 66 cents per load ton-kilometer, with passenger and cargo yields slipping 3.9% and 4.6%, respectively.
Air Action Group appointed Craig Skivington deputy managing director. Avitas appointed Douglas Kelly manager-asset valuation. Cadillac Plastic promoted Bill Marion to aerospace specialist. FlightSafety International selected Greg Wedding as assistant manager for the Gulfstream Learning Center in Savannah, Ga. Mercury Air Group subsidiary Maytag Aircraft Corporation hired Robert La Row as director-contract administration.
Brussels Airport Terminal Co. (BATC) posted a net profit of 644 million Belgian francs (about US$18 million) in 1995, up from BEF 248 million ($7 million) in 1995. Turnover increased 13% to BEF5.2 billion ($148 million), 56% from airport charges. The booming profits result from increased passenger volume, up 7.2% to 13.5 million, and decreasing financial costs. Despite its prosperity, the company plans to increase its charges 1% in 1997.
Sichuan Airlines and China Southern are acquiring Airbus aircraft as the carriers revealed they will take some of the 30 A320s/A321s ordered by China last week (DAILY, May 16). Sichuan, which operates three A320s on lease from ILFC, will buy two A320s directly from Airbus, becoming a new Airbus customer. China Southern will take three A320s, increasing its fleet of the type to 20, the largest in China.
Fifty members of the House - 47 Democrats, two Republicans and one Independent - asked President Clinton Friday "to quickly appoint a committed, experienced aviation safety advocate" as FAA administrator. Saying Congress eliminated FAA's dual charter last year, the legislators said, "It is disturbing to us that despite this clear mandate, the FAA's record is still inconsistent, at best." They cited FAA's slowness in implementing regulations on fire suppression and detection systems.
Alaska Airlines began serving Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk in the Russian Far East last week, its fifth destination in the region. Flights leave Anchorage at 2 p.m. on Thursdays and arrive the next day at 6:30 p.m. after a stop at Petropavlovsk. The return segment leaves at 12:10 p.m. Mondays and arrives the preceding day in Anchorage at 11:15 p.m. after stopping in Magadan. Direct flights are scheduled from Seattle. Alaska operates the service with MD-80s.
