Air France posted a 1.5% gain in April traffic, flying 4.9 billion revenue passenger kilometers on 6.5 billion available seat kilometers, up 2.6%. The load factor declined 0.8 percentage points to 74.9%. Freight ton kilometers increased 9.2% to 420 million.
SAS selected Arinc to provide VHF data link service, with needed ground stations, throughout Europe. Bob Jefferson, VP-marketing, said the deal is "an historic opportunity for Arinc to expand a critical service for our airline customers from North America into Europe." The service is a communications protocol that will link SAS's aircraft and its operational control centers.
Great Lakes Aviation President Douglas Voss was in Washington yesterday trying to find out why FAA is limiting the carrier's resumption of service. Great Lakes, which suspended operations voluntarily May 16 under pressure from FAA, resumed some service last week and built it up during the holiday weekend, but it has added nothing since then, a spokesman said yesterday. FAA said it is working with Great Lakes "with the goal of allowing additional expansion in the coming weeks in a controlled fashion." The agency said that "more flights could be added later this week."
Comair is on the verge of placing a major Canadair Regional Jet re-order, The DAILY is told. A spokeswoman confirmed that the company is in "final negotiations" and that the re-order likely would be announced "within the next few weeks." She could not confirm industry reports that the order would be in the range of 30 plus 45 options. The carrier, which intends to become an all-jet airline, also continues to talk to Embraer about its proposed 35- to 37-passenger EMB-135, a shortened version of the EMB-145. The fleet now comprises only CRJs (50) and Brasilias.
Carnival Air Lines flight attendants voted yesterday for representation by the Association of Flight Attendants. In a landslide, 286 out of 299 ballots were in favor of AFA. Carnival's 354 flight attendants were not organized. The merger of Carnival with Pan American continues on track; Pan Am's flight attendants are not represented by a union.
SkyWest Inc,. the holding company for Scenic Airlines and SkyWest Airlines, posted an $10.1 million profit for fiscal 1997, which ended March 31. The earnings were more than double the previous year's $4.4 million profit. Operating revenue increased 12.5% to $283.3 million. Expenses rose 11.7% to $267.9 million from $228.8 million. The company reported a net income of $1.1 million in its fiscal fourth quarter, up from a net loss of $2.2 million. It improved its cost structure as well, as unit costs dropped and unit revenues rose.
A SkyWest Brasilia suffered an engine fire following takeoff from San Diego last week, resulting in an emergency landing with no hydraulics, no flaps, no nose-wheel steering, no brakes - and no injuries. Flight 5724 was en route from Lindbergh Field to Los Angeles May 21 with three crew and 14 passengers. According to the preliminary National Transportation Safety Board report, the crew said the right engine lost power while climbing through 2,000 feet.
DOT granted startup carrier Skytrek economic authority to operate Wednesday, one day after FAA approved its Part 121 air carrier certificate. The charter airline is led by a team of Kiwi exiles, including Bob Iverson, Kiwi's founder and former chairman and chief executive. The Richmond, Va.- based charter carrier will start service with a single 727 configured for 169 seats.
Bombardier and Embraer are preparing their best and final regional-jet offers for presentation to AMR Eagle by June 2. Selection of the Canadair Regional Jet or the Embraer EMB-145 could be announced as early as the Paris Air Show in mid-June. The competition has been described as "a dogfight." Under American's new pilot-contract scope clause, Eagle is allowed to acquire and operate up to 67 of the 50-passenger jets during the pact's five-year life, after which the RJ fleet would be linked to the total number of big jets operated by the trunkline carrier.
A U.S. District Court judge in Delaware found that Chromalloy violated its license agreement with Pratt&Whitney by failing to pay license fees, the United Technologies unit reported. Chromalloy has agreed to pay several million dollars in royalties, with interest, and remaining issues of P&W's breach of contract suit against Chromalloy are expected to be tried later this year in the Delaware federal court, P&W said. According to the royalties claim, Chromalloy used P&W proprietary ceramic coatings for jet engine airfoils and other patented processes.
American Express, IBM and Hilton Hotels will begin testing smartcard technology for travelers this week at Chicago O'Hare Airport. The cards can be used for hotel check-in and airport check-in with electronic tickets. Special kiosks are being installed at O'Hare and seven more will be opened in Hilton hotels by mid-June. Several thousand frequent travelers have been given an American Express Corporate Card, a Hilton Optima Card or a Hilton HHonors Diamond VIP card with IBM computer chips.
U.S.-New Zealand open skies talks continued in Washington on a cordial basis through Thursday, a State Department spokesman said. Carriers authorized to fly between the two nations under the current bilateral are United, Air New Zealand, Qantas and American on a code share, Qantas and Evergreen on a code share, FedEx, Polar Air Cargo, UPS, Emery, Amerijet, World and American International.
Evans&Sutherland said will supply the visual system for United's new A320 full-flight simulator under a contract from Airbus Industrie. The simulator will be installed at United's facilities in Denver, and the carrier plans to begin training pilots with it as early as December.
Aero Club of Washington debate on airport needs between Paul Gaines, aviation director for the City of Houston, and Ed Merlis, senior VP- government affairs for the Air Transport Association, will be broadcast Sunday by Aviation News Today on Washington NewsChannel 8 from 12:30 a.m. to 1 a.m. and 1:30 p.m. and 2 p.m.
Phoenix Information Systems, St. Petersburg, Fla., has created a Phoenix Transaction Services subsidiary to offer call center transaction services to airlines. Bob Harlan, a former VP-reservations at American and consultant with Unisys, EDS, Hilton Hotels and MCI, will lead the unit. Phoenix has provided the service to smaller airlines, such as Laker Airways and Eastwind Airlines, but intends to expand to larger international and domestic airlines and other travel firms, such as cargo companies and hotel reservation services.
Atlanta-based Northwest subsidiary and Airlink operator Express Airlines I flew 40.1 million revenue passenger miles last month, a 12.1% increase from April 1996, on capacity that rose just 0.2% to 68.5 million available seat miles. Apr 1997 Apr 1996 4 Mths 1997 4 Mths 1996 RPMs 40,098,000 35,774,000 148,776,000 133,653,000 ASMs 68,527,000 68,372,000 269,232,000 264,383,000 LF (%) 58.5 52.3 55.3 50.6
UPS Worldwide Logistics opened its first distribution center in Mexico as part of a strategy to invest $5 million in Latin America by 1998. The center is located in Naucalpan, 20 minutes from Mexico City.
Atlantic Coast Airlines promoted Jennifer Schep to director of inflight. Schep, an ACA employee since December 1989, most recently was chief flight attendant.
Southwest's new service into Jackson, Miss., beginning Aug. 7, will hammer the fare structure in the market.With Southwest's entry, savings on walkup fares will be as high as 67% and will average 55%, according to an analysis by Bankers Trust. Advance purchase prices could drop as much as 47%. Five major carriers, mainly American and Delta, serve Jackson.
American Airlines yesterday signed a binding agreement to acquire the assets, aircraft, airport slots and employees of Shuttle Inc., a group of banks that has farmed out management of the Northeast U.S. shuttle to US Airways for the past five years. US Airways, which manages the shuttle but has never owned it, has a clause in its contract giving it the exclusive right to match any offer by another party seeking to acquire the company.
El Al, North American Airlines and the state of Maryland argued against terminating El Al authority to fly to certain U.S. points as proposed in a show-cause order (DAILY, May 23). DOT made the tentative decision based on the Israeli government's refusal to grant Tower authority for the Athens- Tel Aviv leg of proposed New York-Athens-Tel Aviv service, formerly flown by TWA. The parties questioned whether DOT has taken into account a May 20 explanation by the Israelis, compared U.S. action unfavorably with how it has handled Japanese disputes, and said U.S.
Northwest Aerospace Training Corp. (NATCO) said it is the first large jet training center certified under the new Part 142 to provide a "complete package of pilot training services" to airlines and jet operators. Part 142 updates federal aviation regulations and standardizes the use of simulation in the pilot training industry. It encompasses all exemptions under a single rule to ensure that all contract pilot training centers operate under similar standards. NATCO also reported a contract from Aeromexico to provide MD-82 simulator training.
Air France posted a net profit of 211 million francs (US$35.9 million) in the fiscal year ending March 1997, emerging from the red for the first time since 1989. The Air France Group, excluding regional unit Air France Europe, registered a net consolidated profit of FRF394 million ($67 million). But the positive results were offset by the FRF671 million ($114 million) net loss of Air France Europe, whose merger with the parent airline began April 1 and will conclude in the fall.
Vivid Technologies received a $3.5 million continuing research grant from FAA to develop a high-speed explosives detection system. It said the grant shows that FAA "has acknowledged the importance of the operational performance of explosives detection systems, in addition to their detection capabilities." Vivid said its technology supports inspection of 1,500 bags an hour at "low cost of ownership." It said it has sold about 200 systems, and they "have proven to integrate seamlessly into real-world airline and airport operations."
