In the aftermath of United's decision not to pursue USAir, the outlook for the smaller carrier seems to be brightening. Gruntal Investment Research said yesterday it was "boosting the rating for USAir from Underperform to Neutral now that the big hit from failure of UAL talks is history." The investment firm added that the carrier "hit the top end of our down-side $8-$10 target last week."
Eastwind Airlines is extending a promotion under which full-fare customers buy a second seat on flights to Jacksonville and West Palm Beach for only $1 each way. The fares are good from Trenton, N.J., or Greensboro, N.C., between Nov. 29 and Dec. 14. Eastwind also has added special flights between Nov. 21 and Nov. 27 because of demand. The fares do not require advance purchase or a Saturday night stay.
Raytheon's Beech King Air 350 business aircraft has become the first western jetprop to win Russian certification, the company said. It also is the first to be certified to the new rules applicable under AP23, the Russian equivalent of FAR 23, Amendment 42, Raytheon said. Raytheon's Hawker midsize business jet received Russian certification two years ago.
Qantas plans to introduce additional service Friday between Melbourne and Saigon for 13 weeks. The supplementary service comes in response to demand for travel between Australia and Vietnam during the holiday season, including the Lunar New Year in February, said Geoff Dixon, the airline's group executive general manager-commercial. Qantas operates one flight per week between Melbourne and Saigon via Sydney with continuing service to Singapore.
FAA has told Oracle Telecomputing Inc. of Canada it will not allow Boeing Defense and Space Group to be the prime contractor in the agency's Standard Terminal Automation Replacement System (STARS) program. The FAA decision appears to be based on the selection of seven companies - one of them Oracle - allowed to submit proposals to FAA on the STARS program earlier this year. More recently, Boeing joined with Oracle, BDM, MCI and Formation to compete for the program. Boeing was listed as the prime contractor.
Delta said its proposed Atlanta-Rome flights would "inject new gateway service to an underserved region in order to maximize competition against Alitalia and provide optimum nationwide online service coverage." Also competing for the new service, slated to become available April 1, 1996, are Northwest for Detroit-Rome and USAir for Philadelphia-Rome services.
AlliedSignal Aerospace won FAA approval to market a solid-state cockpit voice recorder (CVR) that stores two hours of digitally recorded sound. Most current CVRs record only the last 30 minutes of sound. The European Joint Aviation Authorities soon will require a two-hour capability to increase the probability of having recorded sound from the onset of a problem until an accident occurs, AlliedSignal said. The National Transportation Safety Board has recommended that FAA adopt a similar rule.
UPS has reached agreement with the leadership of Teamsters Local 2727, which represents about 800 maintenance workers, on a six-year collective bargaining agreement. Union members will vote on the contract next week, and its terms would have a retroactive effective date of Aug. 1.
U.S. Customs Service has awarded a $92 million five-year contract to EG&G Dynatrend for national asset management for the Treasury Department. The company provides custody, management and disposal of seized property for Customs and other federal agencies.
Austrian Airlines is expecting a green light from DOT to set up "Atlantic Airlines" before the end of the year, according to the Austrian carrier's chairman, Mario Rehulka. Atlantic Airlines is the product of a partnership agreement among Austrian, Sabena, Swissair and Delta to offer "a homogeneous product" on transatlantic routes, which requires antitrust clearance from U.S. authorities, said Swissair sources. Rehulka said Austrian expects to post an operating profit of 50 million schillings in 1995, compared with a loss of ATS202 million last year.
Honeywell/Racal said they have shipped their 500th multi-channel aeronautical satellite communications system. The team has sold more than 800 systems in the air transport and corporate aviation markets since beginning the partnership in 1989. The 500th system went to Swissair. More than 70% of all multi-channel systems flying today come from the Honeywell/Racal team, they said.
Members of the American Bar Association's ABA Section of Labor and Employment Law Committee on Railway and Airline Labor Law have written a reference book on the Railway Labor Act. BNA Books, a division of the Bureau of National Affairs, is offering the book for $225 after a 30-day free trial review. To order, call 1-800-960-1220.
Frontier Airlines, after 16 months of service, has booked its one millionth passenger. The customer and her husband will fly free on their Denver-Las Vegas flight, and will receive a complimentary bottle of champagne.
A United official took his carrier's argument for hanging onto beyond rights in U.S.-Japan aviation talks to an industry luncheon yesterday, encouraging U.S. negotiators to stay focused on long-term benefits and shun American's position on loosening rights for other U.S. carriers. Stuart Oran, executive VP-corporate affairs and general counsel, told the International Aviation Club in Washington that there are a number of ways Japanese and U.S. carriers can participate in the growing Pacific market without forcing United and Northwest to surrender their beyond rights.
Harris Corp. was awarded an FAA contract valued at more than $10 million to develop an advanced system that will enhance communications and permit air traffic controllers to increase the number of flights over the Gulf of Mexico. The Buoy Communications Systems contract will use a network of satellites and water buoy-based radio links to provide controllers with direct voice communications to pilots. The new system will "seamlessly" transition into the Voice Switch and Control System that Harris is installing at 21 en route control centers in the U.S.
Mexico President Ernesto Zedillo has sent to the Mexican Congress proposed legislation to authorize long-awaited private investment in the country's airports. The government plans to issue 50-year renewable concessions for airport operation. Foreign investors will be limited to a 49% stake in consortia operating the airports, although there are provisions for the government to allow a larger investment on a case-by-case basis.
Total Revenue Departures Total Revenue Departures America West 436 American 23,181 Continental 6,687 Delta 2,900 United 4,133 USAir 1,828 Total 39,165 Average Number of Seats Per Departures Average Number of Seats Per Departures
American has allowed Hawaiian Airlines to defer its lease payment of approximately $7.1 million for a DC-10 further, until Dec. 9, while Hawaiian negotiates agreements with a private investor group, creditors and labor groups. Hawaiian is seeking new equity capital from the private investors and has signed a letter of intent which would terminate automatically if definitive agreements have not been reached by Dec. 8 with the investors, creditors and labor groups. The payment due American is for the lease of the DC-10 in late 1994 and early 1995.
Total Revenue Departures Total Revenue Departures American 6,213 Continental 1,122 Delta 8,663 Northwest 1,749 TWA 2,409 United 3,882 USAir 589 Total 24,627 Average Number of Seats Per Departures Average Number of
General Aviation Manufacturers Association board elected Horst Bergmann, chairman of Jeppesen, chairman for 1996. Fred Breidenbach, president of Gulfstream Aerospace, was elected vice chairman. Newly elected to the GAMA board were Bing Lantis, president of Mooney, to succeed Jacques Esculier, Greg Summe, president of Allied Signal Aerospace Co. Engines, to replace James Robinson, and C.W. Miller, president, AlliedSignal Aerospace Co. Avionics, to replace Greg Summe, who had been president of AlliedSignal Avionics.
In its first police action on the information superhighway, DOT assessed civil penalties of $14,000 against Virgin Atlantic Airways for failing to disclose the full price of flights advertised on the Internet's World Wide Web. The department said fares advertised about June or July on the carrier's home page included a "21-day APEX" fare of $499 for weekday roundtrip flights between Newark and London during certain travel periods.
TWA intends to offer only daily nonstops to Tel Aviv from New York in January, knocking out a stop in Paris now operated two days a week. The 747 flights will be increased to 12 a week next summer, and the stop in Paris will end Jan. 8. TWA said this type of change normally is made in the summer, but there is a heavy demand for the nonstops now. Other schedule changes for January include increasing aircraft capacity from New York to San Francisco, Los Angeles-St. Louis and St. Louis-Denver/Boston.
Thomson Training&Simulation said it won a contract to update Air New Zealand's fleet of Boeing flight simulators. It will install simulated TCAS 2 (traffic alert and collision avoidance system) on 747-200, 747-400 and 767-200 simulators. The 747-400 simulator also will be fitted with simulated FANS (future air navigation system). All three simulators were built by Rediffusion.
Illinois State Sen. Aldo DeAngelis introduced legislation last week to create a regional airport authority that would run Chicago's airports as well as develop, own and operate a proposed South Suburban airport near Peotone. The bill also calls for the formation of the O'Hare Noise Compatibility Commission "to ensure suburban input into, and, in some cases, control over" noise mitigation and funding issues at O'Hare Airport.
Air Line Pilots Association members at Federal Express have voted overwhelmingly to implement self-help actions if the union and management cannot agree to a contract during the current 30-day cooling off period, which expires Saturday at 12:01 a.m. As of late yesterday, there was no word that a contract agreement had been reached in mediated talks, which resumed Monday. In a vote counted by a neutral committee of pilots not affiliated with FedEx, the carrier's ALPA members voted 90% in favor of self-help.
