TWA is offering special Saturday-only fares to Kansas City from 17 cities in honor of the Smithsonian's 150th anniversary exhibition. Fares range from $79 to $99 roundtrip. Travel must begin before 1 p.m., and return flights cannot begin earlier than 3 p.m. but must be on the same day. The Saturday fares are good April 20 through May 18.
Boeing is ahead of Airbus Industrie in net new orders through the first quarter, but only by 10 aircraft, investment house Merrill Lynch says in its latest tabulation of orders minus cancellations. Boeing booked 100 net new orders, while Airbus had 90 and McDonnell Douglas seven.
Aerovias de Mexico has started twice-weekly service from Mexico City to Lima, Peru, with continuing service to Sao Paulo, Brazil, using 175-seat, two-class 757s. The service is part of a Wings of America marketing alliance, which includes Mexicana Airlines and Aeroperu. Aeroperu operates three weekly roundtrips in the market. The Wings program was started a month ago with the launch of Mexicana service between Mexico City and Buenos Aires, Argentina.
A Delta pilot representative probably will be appointed to the carrier's board this week if the Air Line Pilots Association unit approves its contract with the airline in today's vote. Even though final contract language will not have been completed, Delta management invited the new non-voting member to participate in a board meeting on Thursday.
Delta says the Justice Department is in the final stages of its review of the carrier's request for antitrust immunity for its alliance with Austrian, Sabena and Swissair. DOT has told the carrier it will issue an order soon, possibly in the next three weeks.
Sundstrand yesterday reported first quarter sales of $368 million and net earnings of $29 million, compared with sales of $346 million and net earnings of $26 million during the same quarter last year. Robert Jenkins, president, said that for 1996, commercial original equipment manufacturer sales had been expected to increase 10% to 20% "but now are projected to grow by about 5%, reflecting the loss of sales as a result of Fokker's bankruptcy."
The state of South Carolina supported Air South's application to DOT for an exemption from the high-density rule to obtain slots at New York Kennedy Airport for new low-fare services between South Carolina and New York. The carrier plans to use the slots to operate to Kennedy from Charleston, Columbia and Myrtle Beach, S.C. (DAILY, April 8).
Delta and All Nippon Airways detailed Friday their code-sharing/blocked space agreement. Pending approval by both governments, the two will operate 13 weekly flights between Tokyo Narita and Los Angeles. Delta will buy seats on ANA's daily 747-400 service between Los Angeles and Tokyo, and ANA will purchase seats on Delta's six weekly MD-11 flights between the two cities.
Air Transport Association said Phil Boughton, director-aircraft systems and engineering, was elected to the industry's Avionics Electronics Engineering Committee. National Aviation Hall Of Fame inducted Harry Combs, Combs Aircraft; retired Capt. David McCampbell, USN; Donald Slayton, Mercury Seven astronaut, and retired Brig. Gen. Paul Tibbets, USAF, pilot of the Enola Gay. Society of Automotive Engineers named Darlene Filler managing director of new affiliate Service Technician's Society.
Continental has signed a new agreement with the In-Flight Phone Corp. (IFPC) that will enable the carrier to resume installation of IFPC's inflight phone and entertainment systems. The installations were halted because of chronic hardware and software problems. USAir, which is embroiled in a lawsuit with IFPC, stopped installing the systems on its jets because of the problems. Under the new agreement with Continental, IFPC will install its FlightLink systems on 190 aircraft this year, and will have a total of 292 jets outfitted with the systems as of 1997.
Boeing said Friday it has formed a new unit - Aviation Systems - that will focus on domestic and international air traffic management markets. Nancy Price, who was president of Hughes Canada Systems Division where she was responsible for all Hughes air traffic control programs in Canada, was named VP of the new unit. Aviation Systems will be part of Boeing's Defense&Space Group, Kent, Wash. Defense&Space Group currently is pursuing several ATM programs, including FAA's Standard Terminal Automation Replacement System (STARS), worth potentially $1 billion.
Soaring Above Setbacks: The Autobiography of Janet Harmon Bragg, African American Aviator as told to Marjorie Kriz. Smithsonian Press; $19.95 hardcover. To order, call Brenda Tucker, 202-287-3738, ext. 343.
House Transportation Committee Chairman John Duncan (R-Tenn.) introduced last week legislation (H.R. 3267) to prohibit individuals who do not hold a valid private pilot certificate from manipulating the controls of aircraft in any aviation record-breaking attempt. The legislation was prompted by the death of seven-year-old Jessica Dubroff the week before. Under the bill, a flight instructor's airman certificate would be revoked if he or she knowingly is involved in a record-breaking attempt with a person who lacks a pilot license.
Working groups involved in the industry-labor-government Aviation Safety Initiative will make midyear progress reports on June 17 to the steering committee. "The purpose of the midyear review is to hold ourselves accountable," a steering committee member says. Full-year accomplishments are scheduled to be reported Dec. 5.
Boeing, after raising a fuss about the Export-Import Bank bankrolling Russia's Il-96M program, is the second largest supplier on the project behind engine supplier Pratt&Whitney. Boeing supplies the nacelles for the engines at $8 million per shipset for the 20-airplane project. Collins is third largest, supplying avionics at $4 million per aircraft.
- In Federal Register dated April 15...Issued special conditions on Turbomeca Arriel 2S1 turboshaft engines....Superseded an airworthiness directive on McDonnell Douglas DC-9 and MD-80 series aircraft concerning inspection for chafing to the wire bundle in the overhead switch panel of the cockpit...Superseded an AD on Lockheed L-1011-300 series aircraft concerning cracking of certain areas of the rear spar caps...Issued an AD on CASA C-212 aircraft requiring structural inspections...Issued an AD on Flight Trails Helicopters hardpoint assemblies installed on McDonnell
America West named Ron Cole VP-sales. He will be responsible for passenger sales, national sales, travel agent relations, air cargo and territory development. He previously was VP-sales at Reno Air and worked at American.
CIT Group/Capital Equipment Financing appointed Terrence McNamara VP- district manager for northern Ohio; Julie Rogers district manager-state of Michigan; Thomas Boegel district manager in CIT's Eastern Business Center in New York, and Michael Salatino district manager, also in New York. Lockheed Martin named Ray Crockett director-communications for Lockheed Martin Aeronautical Systems. Parson elected James McNulty chief executive.
Canadian Airlines International carried 17.1% more traffic last month than in March 1995, in what Canadian called "by far its strongest traffic growth in recent years," according to Don Casey, VP-planning. The increase came on a 5.9% increase in capacity. The carrier logged 1.38 billion revenue passenger miles. The load factor shot up seven percentage points to 73.3%, from 66.3%. For the first three months of the year, the carrier's traffic increased 12.4% on 6.5% more capacity, lifting the load factor 3.5 points to 66.8%.
FAA will host an international conference on aircraft inflight icing May 6- 8 at the Hilton Hotel, Spring, Va., that will explore a "wide range of technical issues involving operating aircraft in icing conditions." These include current certification requirements, operating regulations and weather forecasting capabilities for aircraft icing under varying environmental conditions. Icing and aviation experts from the U.S., Russia, Canada and Europe and expected to attend.
DOT's proposal to reduce the confidentiality period to six months, from the current three years, for all airlines' international nonstop segment and on-flight market, or T-100, data and collect capacity data from foreign airlines has received generally favorable reviews. American, TWA, USAir, the Air Line Pilots Association and Airports Council International-North America (ACI-NA) voiced support for the changes. American said it believes "prompt discosure of T-100 data will be procompetitive and in the public interest.
Twenty-three members of the United States Airports for Better International Air Service (USA-BIAS) are urging the Clinton administration to open passenger talks with Japan as soon as possible with the strategic goal of creating a true "open skies" air service agreement between the two nations.
The U.S. airline industry will fragment in the next few years, shrinking to four major network carriers plus Southwest and a few niche carriers, predicts Ray Neidl, VP of Furman, Selz. Speaking at the fifth annual Phoenix International Aviation Symposium last week in Phoenix, Neidl predicted a 90% failure rate for startup carriers. The industry will shake out to American, United, Delta, "maybe Northwest" and Southwest, he said. At USAir, Chairman Stephen Wolf will "turn that carrier around" and probably sell it to another airline, mostly likely United.
TWA, Delta, United and Continental are urging DOT to reject Air Liberte's bid to operate combination service between Bordeaux, France, and Newark. "In view of the current state of aviation relations between the U.S. and France, the new application can only be called astounding," said TWA. "There is no indication that reciprocity exists for the grant of new access to the U.S. by the applicant," Delta said, noting that U.S.-France relations are governed by principles of reciprocity and comity. "The U.S.
Queen Bess: Daredevil Aviator by Doris Rich. Biography of the life of Bessie Coleman, America's first African-American female aviator. Smithsonian Press; $13.95 paper. To order, call Brenda Tucker, 202-287- 3738, ext. 343.
