Mesa Air Group will take its 79-passenger Fokker 70 out of the Phoenix-Spokane market April 8 and begin operating it between Phoenix and Fresno, the company has confirmed. The Spokane route, initiated last June, has been less than vibrant while its three weekday 30-passenger Brasilia roundrips to Fresno are often fully booked. Both routes are operated as America West Express. The shift also may dampen Fresno-based, low-fare upstart Air 21's appetite to put its F28s in the Phoenix market. Mesa's other F70 operates between Phoenix and Des Moines.
British Airways will launch 737 service from London Gatwick to Kiev three times a week as of June 3. BA said traffic from Gatwick to the former Soviet bloc has been growing steadily - it started flying recently from Gatwick to Baku, Bucharest, Moscow and Sofia.
System One Amadeus has introduced two new productivity tools for travel agents - Speed Mode and Wizards. The company said Speed Mode, combined with Instant Entry, is the first true product consolidation milestone reached since System One and Amadeus combined operations last April. More announcements will be made this year, the company said, and technology teams are working to achieve complete consolidation by 1997. Speed Mode has been integrated into MAXSys APS on PRISM, upgraded version 3.2.
Australian Connection Airlines, a Sydney, Australia-based startup, has applied to Australia's International Air Services Commission for the right to carry passengers and freight nonstop from Sydney and Melbourne to either Madras or Bombay in India and then onward to Athens, Greece. ACA said it plans to operate a 747, building up service to three times per week. It said no Australian airlines are serving the markets it seeks, while Air India flies to Perth and Olympic Airways operates to Sydney and Melbourne via Bangkok.
Ages Group, Boca Raton, Fla., said it was contracted by British Airways to aid in the sale of surplus inventory that included rotables and expendable material used on BA's fleet of Boeing, McDonnell Douglas, Lockheed, Airbus and ATP aircraft. Ages staffed an office within BA's Tradeline operation at London Heathrow for the job.
Code-Sharing Regional Carrier Schedules Announced or Implemented - December 1995/January 1996 Domestic City-Pairs ----------------------------------------------------- Carriers Added Dropped New Shared From Major --------------------------------------------------------------------- America West Airlines Mesa Phoenix-Gun- nison, Colo.
The Office of Management and Budget has encouraged FAA to explore user fee financing to recover increased facilities and equipment and operations costs of the Oceanic Automation System. Separately, the Clinton administration - at the request of DOT - is proposing $150 million in new user fees for fiscal 1997 to offset a planned $224 million increase in the FAA operations budget (DAILY, Feb. 22).
ARINC said it will open an office March 1 in Beijing to support its current contracts, VHF data link and Harbin Airport modernization, and to pursue other market opportunities.
Air Transport Association has appointed David Kennedy director of federal affairs. Kennedy most recently was director-legislative affairs for the Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association, where he had worked since 1988. For AOPA, Kennedy served as lead representative on appropriations issues.
Northwest plans to process refunds of the expired federal ticket tax collected from its customers in 1995 for travel in 1996. The airline estimates 1 million tickets purchased in 1995 are eligible for a refund of the 10% ticket tax or the $6 international departure tax, totaling about $35 million so far. Rolf Andresen, controller and VP-finance, said, "Until recently, the status of these taxes was unclear because of the budget debate and because the IRS had not articulated its position.
SkyWest Airlines has implemented a new graphical crew scheduling system, Maestro, system manufacturer SBS International reported. SkyWest began training on the system last month, SBS said. Maestro "creates, monitors and maintains daily airline crew schedules, including trip rerouting and assignment," SBS said. The system "performs accurate trip and crew legality checks in real time as individual flights are posted, and enhances crew utilization by offering a wide range of alternatives for recovery whenever abnormal conditions arise," the company said.
TWA intends to increase and upgrade its international service this spring and make efficiency improvements at its St. Louis hub. On March 2, it will upgrade its New York Kennedy-Rome flights to daily 747 service, up from five 747 and two 767-300 flights. In the New York-Athens market, it will increase service from three weekly 767-300 flights to five. On March 17, it will upgrade daily New York-Madrid service from 767s to 747s, with continuing flights to Barcelona, currently served through Lisbon.
Air Canada yesterday named Lamar Durrett president and chief executive. Durrett, executive VP-corporate services and chief administrative officer, is a longtime protege of Hollis Harris, current Air Canada chairman, president and chief executive officer. The appointment positions Durrett eventually to replace Harris, who will retain the chairman's title. Harris's contract expires in February 1997, but Air Canada's board has asked him to stay on after that time, a spokeswoman said. The appointment takes effect May 14, the date of the carrier's annual general meeting.
Air Jamaica has started twice-weekly freighter service to Miami from Kingston and Montego Bay, using a DC-8 with 13 pallets and four compartments for bulk freight. With the new service, the carrier is offering 190,000 pounds of lift each way between Jamaica and Miami two days a week. Currently it offers 100,000 pounds a day.
With the expiration this week of the court-ordered "cooling-off period" shielding ailing Dutch aircraft manufacturer Fokker from its creditors, the company said the next step probably is formal bankruptcy protection, regardless of whether and how soon a rescue takeover can be staged.
Boeing 757 and 777 Systemwide Aircraft Utilization Per Day Third Quarter 1995 B757-200 America West American Continental Number of Aircraft Operated 14 87 15 Total Fleet Operations Departures 60 261 41 Block Hours 178 913 187
Pearson Development Corp. (PDC) attorneys last week began their case in a Toronto court seeking C$523 million to C$662 million in damages from the Canadian government for cancellation of a Toronto Pearson terminal redevelopment/privatization contract. The consortium filed a claim in March 1994 after Prime Minister Jean Chretien killed a deal approved by the previous government for redevelopment of Terminals 1 and 2.
Hainan Airlines of China has signed a letter of intent to purchase 10 Metro 23s from Fairchild Aircraft, boosting its Metro fleet to 12. Hainan joins Asia Pacific Airlines of Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, which has ordered four Metro 23s, as recent Fairchild customers (DAILY, Feb. 16). Hainan, which launched commercial service in May 1993 and took delivery of its first Metro 23 in September 1994, offers scheduled flights to 18 cities and is developing feeder traffic to and from secondary cities within China.
United will expand its service between Los Angeles and Kona and Maui June 6. The carrier said the new flights, coupled with its new second daily nonstop to Tokyo, show its commitment to Los Angeles. United left the Los Angeles-Kona market in 1989. Flights to Maui will increase from one a day to two. Both will be operated with 757-200 aircraft.
Delta may be within two months of a ratification vote on its tentative contract agreement with the Air Line Pilots Association - including reduced pay in some 737 markets facing low-fare competition - but a similar proposal at American has not gone far. A National Mediation Board mediator, who met last week with American's Allied Pilots Association and this week with the company, will determine when to schedule joint meetings.
Northwest and KLM are distributing travel booking software to "Gold" and "Preferred" WorldPerks members, providing them with information about products and services offered by the carriers. The software, WorldNetwork, uses CompuServe's online service and taps into the Worldspan reservations system.
American Society of Travel Agents officials have met with Hawaii Gov. Benjamin Cayetano to discuss their concerns about commission caps and the state's excise tax on agents' airline commissions. Hawaiian agents have been severely affected by the caps, given they usually profit from relatively higher-priced flights from the mainland. Hawaii also is the only state that taxes agents' commissions at 4%.
Florida is becoming the epicenter of a shakeout among Southwest, ValuJet and Delta. Southwest will overfly 11% of ValuJet's system, directly or indirectly, by yearend, calculates Steve Lewins of Gruntal Investment Research. Lewins thinks Delta will deploy its 25 lower-cost 737-200s "as a shield" to defend its Orlando operation but keep them out of Atlanta, where more capacity could damage yields.
FAA said it has earmarked "four to five programs" as tests of the new acquisition system it plans to present to Congress April 1, George Donohue, FAA associate administrator for research and acquisition, said yesterday (DAILY, Feb. 22). Donohue said he could not name the programs until he has met with Monte Belger, associate administrator for air traffic services. The programs "will test all aspects of this new acquisition system," Donohue said. "We are asking for a complete review of this new acquisition system within three years.
Western Pacific has issued a request for proposals on a fleet of new 30-passenger-class regional aircraft and is toying with the idea of operating its new regional network as a separate entity. It initially said it would contract the service out. Among the aircraft in the chase are the ATR 42-500, Dornier 328, Embraer Brasilia and the Saab 340BPlus.
