National Tour Association Executive VP James Host has been inducted into the Travel Industry Association's Travel Industry Hall of Leaders. Host took over leadership of NTA in 1974 when it had 275 members and an annual budget of $100,000. Today it has 3,800 corporate members and a $7 million a year budget.
Fokker has authorized Honeywell to add Global Positioning System technology to the Honeywell Flight Management System (FMS) for the Fokker 100 and 70 aircraft.
Alaska Air Group has elected George Bagley as the new president and chief executive of Seattle-based subsidiary Horizon Air. He replaces Kathleen Iskra, who is resigning to pursue other career opportunities. Bagley joined Alaska Airlines in 1993 as VP-flight operations after a stint as senior VP of operations at Horizon. Mike Swanigan will replace Bagley.
China Airlines reports that its sales rose 194% in August from year-earlier levels to US$1 70.4 million. For the first eight months of 1995, CAL reported sales of US$1.15 billion, an increase of 2% from the same period in 1994.
A fleet of 500 supersonic transports could spew as large a volume of aerosol particles into the upper atmosphere as a small volcanic eruption, boosting the impact of SST traffic on stratospheric ozone levels, direct measurements of the exhaust trail of an Air France Concorde has revealed. A NASA ER-2 aircraft equipped with a special instrument suite made the first direct measurements of SST exhaust last October in experiments near New Zealand, flying S-shaped patterns along the route followed by the Concorde as it flew at Mach 2.
The Honeywell/Racal Satcom venture's multi-channel satellite communications system was certificated this month by Germany's Luftfahrt Bundesamt and the European Joint Airworthiness Authority on a Swissair Airbus A320. The partners said Swissair thus becomes the first airline in the world to begin equipping its medium/short-haul fleet for airborne satellite communications service. The type certification work was performed by Daimler-Benz Aerospace Airbus Hamburg. Swissair has ordered the systems for its fleet of 29 A319s, A320s and A321s.
Travel and Tourism Research Association (TTRA) will hold its annual awards competition for tourism professionals, educators and students June 16-19 in Las Vegas. Entries must be received by March 1. Five awards will be handed out, with prizes that include cash awards of up to $1,500. Awards will go to a travel and tourism research paper by a student enrolled in a university degree program and the best doctoral dissertation on a subject directly related to travel and tourism, among others.
SatoTravel has been awarded a corporate travel contract by the 3M manufacturing company worth $84 million, and a combined contract worth $16 million for travel services by Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory and the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory at the University of California. The Arlington, Va.-based company entered the commercial travel market in 1994.
United Parcel Service has reached an outsourcing agreement with TeleTech Inc. to staff and manage multiple new call center facilities nationwide. The Denver-based TeleTech will provide work force management services to UPS, which is restructuring its customer service operations. TeleTech initially will hire 2,400 people to staff and manage the centers. About 200 of those will be management employees. The first centers are scheduled to open in early spring.
Key West Hilton Resort and Marina will open Dec. 31. The 178-room resort will have 5,200 square feet of meeting space, accommodating up to 300 people for banquets and up to 500 for meetings. The resort brings to 24 the number of Hilton properties in Florida.
Organizers of the White House Conference on Travel and Tourism, to be held Oct. 30-31, want the event to be a springboard for more work on unifying the industry and intensifying efforts by the public and private sectors to build travel and tourism in the U.S. Regional delegates will participate in an interactive voting process to refine the National Tourism Strategy, issued this week, which will serve as a blueprint for economic growth, travel promotion and job creation (DAILY, Oct. 18).
Alaska Air Group (AAG) yesterday posted net earnings of $27.4 million, or $1.30 per share on a fully diluted basis, and an operating profit of $62.6 million in what the airline company said was the most profitable third quarter in its history. In the same quarter last year, AAG had an operating profit of $52.3 million and net earnings of $24.3 million, or $1.36 per share on fully diluted basis.
Nations Air has terminated a proposed merger with Frank Lorenzo and his company, ATX. DOT got wind of Lorenzo's involvement with the carrier last month and considered releasing the information to the public (DAILY, Sept. 15). In a short letter to an FAA regional office, Nations Air President Mark McDonald said the carrier has terminated the merger and is discussing a new round of financing with current stockholders and new investors. It hopes to complete these talks by the end of November.
The U.S. Travel and Tourism Administration has plans to refine data available on the World Wide Web to help users analyze the international market. USTTA also will seek partners to provide state and city data as well.
America West will take part in the field trial of an Airline Maintenance and Operations Support System (AMOSS) being developed by Honeywell and Computing Devices International (CDII). A ground-based software system, AMOSS is designed to provide a state-of-the-art fault isolation and diagnostic capability that integrates aircraft and ground support service.
KLM plans to terminate service between Amsterdam and the Canadian cities Ottawa and Halifax, effective March 29, because of unfavorable exchange rates and low ticket prices. The Dutch carrier decided to suspend the markets, which are served in combination, despite what it described as "very high" load factors. KLM began serving the cities in June 1989 with one of its own 747s, incurring substantial losses.
A temporary power outage in the Host computer at Fort Worth Air Route Traffic Control Center delayed more than 500 flights in the area Tuesday. A problem with a component of the power conditioning system of the Host computer caused it to lose power at 12:08 p.m. Power was restored in three seconds, but it took 12 minutes more to restore the backup system to full capacity. Controllers lost radio contact with aircraft for about three seconds, while power was switched to emergency generators.
McDonnell Douglas turned in 19% better third quarter net earnings of $192 million yesterday, helped by military work as sales edged downward to $3.35 billion and jetliner sales turned soft. Operating profits through the first nine months of the year stood at record levels, and the company continued to generate cash, using some of it to buy back stock. Douglas Aircraft sales fell $304 million, although stronger performances earlier this year kept the nine-month sales total at $3 billion, $600 million ahead of last year's pace.
National Air Transportation Association is expanding its safety seminar to include deicing instruction. Scheduled Nov. 16-17 in Pittsburgh, the intensive session will focus on aircraft fueling safety, quality control and fire prevention, as well as deicing techniques and procedures. For more information or to register for the seminar, contact Cindy Aloise at 800-808-6282.
Uncertain status of USAir apparently is having an adverse effect on this week's U.S.-U.K. aviation talks.British Airways is not about to let anything happen as long as USAir is in play, an industry official said, referring to the prospect of USAir collaboration or a merger with United or American.Although a U.S.-U.K. deal was expected from this week's talks, DOT was unwilling late yesterday to say whether they would continue.
DOT has approved Air Micronesia's bid for authority to operate between Guam and Manila and beyond Manila to and from Taipei, Taiwan/Seoul, Korea/Singapore/Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia/Jakarta, Indonesia. In a late filing, Federal Express had urged DOT to defer action on the application until that carrier provides additional information about its service plans (DAILY, Oct. 16). Noting that it already acted on the application with the consent of all parties, including Federal Express, the department said it will address the matter in a separate order.
E-mail is becoming the preferred way of customers to communicate with travel agents, according to a survey conducted by Air Travel Card. The survey found that 52% of respondents use E-mail to exchange information and travel itineraries with agents. Most corporate travel decisionmakers also rated the form of communication as excellent or very good.
Atlas Air has successfully concluded negotiations for the continuation of its 747 freighter wet-lease with Varig. Atlas Air operates a fleet of eight 747-200 freighters and one 747-100 freighter for six carriers - British Airways, China Airlines, Emirates, KLM, Lufthansa and Varig.
Suzanne Cook, senior VP-research for the Travel Industry Association, gives this snapshot of the travel industry in 1995: All growth so far this year has been on the leisure side, up 3.5%, with more people traveling by air than automobile. Real travel sales are 4% higher than last year. The number of travel agencies is growing, but not their incomes. Cruise line business is flat but has great potential, and the motorcoach industry is bullish in 1995. The hotel boom is slowing, but food service can expect sales 4.8% higher than in 1994.
