Fidelity Management&Research, its parent company and an affiliated company have acquired a 6.23% stake in Mesa Airlines Inc. and believes the airline company's stock is undervalued. In a filing at the Securities and Exchange Commission, Fidelity said it has no current proposals related to any type of "extraordinary" corporate transaction, such as a merger, liquidation or sale of assets, but Mesa should consider various ways of enhancing shareholder value, "including the sale of the company."
McDonnell Douglas Corp. believes the worldwide airline industry will need 13,272 new passenger aircraft valued at $1.024 trillion through 2013 to accommodate traffic growth and replace older aircraft. The long-term outlook, to be published this summer, sees fewer aircraft than Boeing's 15,462 through 2014, but it projects about the same dollar volume (DAILY, June 6). Summarizing the analysis, MDC said worldwide aircraft requirements are divided about evenly between widebodies and narrowbodies, but the latter account for only about one-quarter of the value.
Kenneth Mead, General Accounting Office director-transportation issues, is moving to the Office of Comptroller General within GAO. He will be replaced by John Anderson, who most recently has worked on natural resources issues for the agency.
Fuel Cost and Consumption, U.S. Majors Nationals and Large Regionals May 1994 - April 1995 Total Total Cost Gallons (Dollars) 1994 May Domestic 1,024,303,178 542,391,432 International 350,115,248 207,889,880 System Total 1,374,418,426 750,281,312
AirTran Corp. and subsidiary Mesaba Aviation have elected a new board member, bringing the number of directors at both companies to 10. Raymond Zehr, elected to AirTran's board, has served as VP of Pohlad Companies since 1987. Donald Benson has been named to Mesaba's board. Benson has been executive VP of Marquette Bancshares since 1993.
Pilots at Minneapolis-based Sun Country Airlines look like the newest members of the Air Line Pilots Association. The National Mediation Board yesterday counted 128 votes for ALPA out of 199 eligible. The board makes the vote count official after giving parties 48 hours to appeal.
The collapse of negotiations between SAS and its pilots union yesterday, and the resulting strike/lockout, forced the cancellation today of SAS's entire schedule of 800 flights affecting 56,000 passengers, the airline said yesterday. SAS expects negotiations and the majority of its flights to resume tomorrow. The walkout by the pilots and SAS's subsequent lockout began at midnight Thursday Stockholm time and was scheduled to last 24 hours. The pilots are demanding higher pay for the busy summer travel season.
KLM yesterday reported strong earnings improvement for fiscal 1994-95 and said that, for the first time in its history, two people from outside The Netherlands have been nominated to its Supervisory Board. For the year ended March 31, KLM reported pre-tax income of 563 million guilders (US$356.2 million) and net earnings of 470 million guilders (US$297.4 million), both significant improvements from fiscal 1993-94, when the airline had pre-tax income of 110 million guilders and net earnings of 103 million guilders.
House Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-Ga.), hosting a ceremony yesterday to mark a milestone U.S. airlines will reach this month - 10 billion passengers carried - took the opportunity to restate his commitment to fighting for continued exemption for airlines from the 4.3-cents-per-gallon fuel tax (DAILY, March 16). Commenting that the tax would kill jobs and "might well kill airlines," Gingrich said he is also "very committed to maintaining a healthy manufacturing industry," which would be hurt by whatever hurts airlines.
Continental Micronesia is asking DOT to reallocate to it for use through Sept. 30 three unused weekly roundtrip Route 2 U.S.-Philippines frequencies currently held by United. Continental Micronesia pointed out in a DOT filing that United is operating only seven of its 10 allocations for the route. The three frequencies have gone dormant for the past 12 months, Continental Micronesia said, adding that United has no plans to use them for the rest of 1995, according to flight schedules currently shown in computer reservations systems.
United flew 3.7% more systemwide revenue passenger miles last month than in May 1994 on 3.9% more capacity, depressing the load factor 0.1 percentage points. The number of passengers boarded rose 8.1%. United's North American traffic gained 4.2% on 2.6% more capacity, and its Pacific traffic rose 6.1% on 12.7% more capacity. Atlantic traffic declined 2% on 5.7% less capacity, and Latin American traffic fell 3% on 0.2% more capacity.
USAir's passenger traffic declined 2.4% in May on 4.3% less capacity, producing a load factor increase of 1.3 percentage points. The number of passengers enplaned declined 6.9%, but the length of the average passenger journey increased 4.8% to 649.1 miles. USAir said May was the first month that reflects the steps it has taken this year to match capacity and demand.
Delta's June quarter earnings will be better than the current $2.32-per- share consensus among Wall Street analysts, Delta Chief Financial Officer Thomas Roeck said yesterday. Roeck reported improved revenue trends and continued progress in cutting costs, but he did not go into detail on his expectations for the quarter, which is the fourth of Delta's financial year. Delta lost money in the June quarter last year. Its systemwide traffic in May declined 3.2% on 0.6% more capacity, causing its load factor to drop 2.5 percentage points to 63.9%.
The Senate Tuesday night adopted an amendment that would require foreign airlines to provide passengers the identical level of security they would receive from U.S. airlines at the same airport. The measure, approved by voice vote as an amendment to the anti-terrorism bill (S.735), would strengthen the requirements of Section 105 of the 1990 aviation security act, which required the FAA administrator to develop a system of protection for U.S. carriers and a similar system for foreign carriers. The amendment was sponsored by Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah).
For the second month in a row, Continental registered the best on-time record of the majors as DOT issued its Air Travel Consumer Report for April yesterday. The report comes a week after the department resumed publication of the data and issued reports for the first three months of the year. As in those three, the on-time data for April include mechanical delays and cancellations (DAILY, June 2). The overall on-time performance for April was 81.3%, up from the 79.3% in March. Continental ranked first with 83.9%, followed by USAir, 83.8%, and United, 83.2%.
Nicholas Garaufis, a New York attorney, has been appointed FAA chief counsel. Since 1986, Garaufis has been counsel for Claire Shulman, president of the Borough of Queens in New York City, serving as a legal adviser, director of intergovernmental relations and aviation adviser. He has been a member since 1992 of the New York Area Aircraft Noise Mitigation Committee, which advises FAA and Congress on measures to alleviate aircraft noise pollution in the New York area.
Washington Air Route Traffic Control Center, Leesburg, Va., avoided a system failure that could have delayed aircraft throughout much of the East Coast yesterday by shutting down a computer system and switching to the only backup before it failed. The problem was in equipment the center uses to link new state-of-the-art computers with planned view displays (PVDs) that are "1960s vintage stuff," said National Air Traffic Controllers Association representative Chris Sutherland.
Qantas and partner Air Pacific will reorganize their transpacific code- sharing operation to increase their reach into the U.S. market and improve operational efficiency across the Pacific, Qantas said yesterday. Under an agreement that takes effect in January, subject to government approvals, Air Pacific will add a second weekly 747 service between Nadi, Fiji, and Los Angeles as part of a planned expansion that eventually may add a third weekly flight. This will enable Qantas to convert its two weekly Sydney- Nadi-Los Angeles flights into Sydney-U.S.
Sabre Travel Information Network has been named "World's Leading Computer Reservation System" for the second year in a row by the readers of travel trade magazines published by the Miller-Freeman Group.
Air traffic controllers will "fight as hard as we can" against a 5% pay cut assumed in the House budget bill, but a union spokesman this week refused to confirm industry rumors that controllers, starting in Chicago, will "work to rule," slowing air traffic across the nation if the measure survives.
U.K. publication Decanter Magazine has judged American's Business Class wines as the best in the air for the second straight year. American has won Business Traveller International's Best Cellar in the Sky award for three of the past five years. Decanter's judges commended the airline for offering virtually identical wine lists in Business Class and First Class.
World Airways has asked DOT for a temporary allocation of five weekly frequencies, held by USAfrica, to conduct scheduled combination service between the U.S. and South Africa. World cited the failure of the U.S. and South Africa to sign an air pact and USAfrica to restart operations. "There can be no longer be any illusions about the fate of USAfrica: it is highly unlikely that it will ever operate again," said World, adding that USAfrica, reorganizing in Chapter 11, "has missed every one of its milestones" for a return to service. "Valuable U.S.
The Air Line Pilots Association (ALPA), which has been negotiating for more than a year toward its first collective bargaining agreement with FedEx, claims the carrier faces a pilot shortage late in the summer and likely will not be able to make package deliveries on time. The union said its members at FedEx often fly overtime to make up for the shortage of pilots.
American's systemwide passenger traffic increased 5.2% last month on 1.7% more capacity, boosting its load factor 2.1 percentage points. The number of passengers boarded rose 1.3 points. Domestic traffic was up 3% on 2.1% less capacity, and international traffic grew 10.6% on 11.8% more capacity. For the first five months, its systemwide passenger traffic rose 6.4% on 1.8% more capacity, producing a passenger load factor gain of 2.8 percentage points, to 64.6%. The number of passengers boarded increased 2.4%.
United begins serving local Chicago food specialties on 500 daily flights to O'Hare this week as part of the city's Taste of Chicago extravaganza. Until July 15, United's menus will feature entrees and snacks from nine Chicago restaurants.
