Aloha appointed Joseph Hale senior VP-marketing. He was Delta's marketing director-Japan and previously worked 33 years for Pan Am. America West selected C.A. Howlett VP-public affairs. Lufthansa Cargo appointed Michael Vorwerk VP-cargo, USA.
America West said Friday it is putting its $18 million advertising account into review. The account is held by New York-based Rosenfeld, Sirowitz, Humphrey and Strauss (RSHS), which has been its agency since the airline was founded 11 years ago. The carrier has begun a comprehensive selection process from a "long list" of 10 potential agencies. It has invited RSHS to join in the review. "We need to ensure that America West is getting the best advertising and marketing support that money can buy," said Maurice Myers, president of the airline.
Crime bill (S.3) introduced last week by Senate Majority Leader Bob Dole (R-Kan.) includes criminal penalties for individuals violating FAA's Part 107 or 108 security regulations and a requirement that airline security screeners report to law enforcement authorities when they discover controlled substances or cash in excess of $10,000. Willful violations of the security regulations would bring a fine, imprisonment of up to one year, or both.
ARINC hopes to win FAA approval early this year for a Global Positioning System augmentation system it developed with E-Systems. American wants to use the equipment for Cat 1 operations, also early this year.
The Emirates Group will open a new training center in Dubai, part of a complex comprising the Dubai Aviation Club and the Dubai Aviation College, by the end of 1995, the company said. The training center, which will be designed to resemble an aircraft painted in the Emirates colors, will handle training for four Emirates divisions: flight operations, cabin crew, engineering and commercial. The "tail" section of the building will house flight simulators and an emergency evacuation simulator that Emirates helped CAE Electronics design.
Delta's systemwide traffic rose 3.4% last month on 0.2% less capacity, lifting the airline's load factor 2.2 percentage points (DAILY, Jan. 6). The number of passengers boarded increased 4.6% from December a year ago. International traffic was up 3.5% on 5.1% less capacity, while domestic traffic rose 3.4% on 1.3% more available seat miles. "December record boardings made 1994 the best year in terms of load factor and passengers," said Robert Coggin, senior VP-marketing. Delta boarded 89.05 million passengers during the year.
U.S. Trade and Development Agency is expected to issue a study today calling for a regional aviation board to oversee air traffic management in the Middle East. With representatives from Egypt, Jordan and Israel, the board would be patterned after air traffic management initiatives in Europe and operate under International Civil Aviation Organization standards.
The privatization of Trinidad&Tobago's BWIA International Airways through the acquisition of a 51% stake by investors led by the Acker Group has been put on hold, according to local press reports. The privatization was to have been completed by the end of 1994 (DAILY, Nov. 23). According to a report in the Barbados Advocate, opponents of the transaction allege that the government gave the U.S.-based Acker Group, led by former Pan Am Chairman Edward Acker, preferential treatment over local investors.
USAir will reduce its Newark operation to 18 flights a day March 5, eliminating service to Boston, Buffalo, Richmond, Raleigh/Durham and Indianapolis, in the second phase of its Newark downsizing. In a first step, the airline will cut back its current 51 daily flights to 35 on Feb. 15. All told, the adjustments will put 121 full- and part-time customer service agents and an undetermined number of maintenance personnel out of work.
Northwest Co-Chairman Gary Wilson's suspension from the board of directors, self-imposed after he was charged last August with possession of marijuana as he tried to board an aircraft, ended last Friday. Wilson has resumed his responsibilities for strategic direction of the company, particularly regarding finances. Company policy requires suspension of an employee in circumstances similar to Wilson's, followed by a legal process involving a company review and evaluation, but Northwest's bylaws have no provisions for suspending a member of the board.
United Express affiliate Atlantic Coast Airlines said its load factor increased 2.6 percentage points to 40% in December, from 37.4% in December 1993. While revenue passenger miles declined 18.4% to nearly 26 million from 31.9 million, capacity fell faster - 23.8% to just below 65 million available seat miles from 85.3 million ASMs.
Commercial aircraft manufacturers suffered their worst year for new orders in more than a decade in 1994, down by nearly 100 aircraft from 1993. "While full-year data are not yet available from all manufacturers, it appears that 260 to 270 new orders were announced in 1994," Boeing's Klaus Brauer told The DAILY. The 1993 total was 364, "previously the worst year in a decade," he said.
Alaska Air Group unit Horizon Air reported traffic increased 34% to 71 million revenue passenger miles in December compared with 53 million in the prior December. Capacity, meanwhile, was up 29% to 111 million available seat miles from 86 million in December 1993, allowing load factor to rise 2.4 percentage points to 64% from 61.6% in December 1993. Passenger enplanements were up 28% to 327,500 from 255,300 in December 1993.
It was that kind of year for regional airline stocks - all down. Average price per share for nine issues declined 40 cents during December, from $8.24 to $7.83. Market value of the same stocks dropped by $63.5 million to $1.45 billion. It had been as high as $1.51 billion, reached on the 5th. Four of the nine stocks declined during the month, led by Delta Connection SkyWest, down $1.75 to $12.50 per share. Northwest Airlink AirTran/Mesaba was off $1.63 per share to $6.13.
Embraer's new owners will meet Monday to appoint a replacement for company founder and President Ozires Silva. Also expecting pink slips are the directors of finance and commercial, who control expenditures and income. The popular Ozires has told colleagues that he has done his job and taken the formerly state-owned company through privatization. He is likely to stay on in some capacity - perhaps as chairman - but also will run a private consultancy. The new owners, a consortium of banks and pension funds, are said to be highly profit-oriented.
African joint-venture startup carrier Alliance plans to begin flight operations early in March with a 747SP wet-leased from 40% owner South African Airways (DAILY, Sept. 20). The new airline will operate between East Africa and southern Africa, and to Europe, the Middle East and India, on a route network comprising Dar-es-Salaam, Entebbe, London, Bombay, Dubai and Johannesburg. The other partners in the company are Air Tanzania and Uganda Airlines, each with a 10% stake, and the governments of Tanzania and Uganda, 5% each.
Mesa Air Group, Farmington, N.M., flew 86.9 million revenue passenger miles in December, a 14.3% increase from December 1993's 76 million RPMs. Capacity rose 18.2% to 182.4 million available seat miles from 154.4 million, as load factor dipped 1.6 percentage points to 47.6% from 49.2%. Enplanements increased 19.2% to 468,513 from 393,203. For the year, Mesa's RPMs pushed just past 1 billion, up 9.5%; ASMs approached 2 billion, up 7.1%; enplanements rose 18.2% to 5.4 million, and the load factor increased 1.1 points to 51.4%.
DOT has issued a Commuter Air Carrier Authorization to ACT International Airlines of Irving, Texas. A subsidiary of the Airline Crew Train Corporation, the carrier will initially operate two flights per day, five days a week between Tulsa, Okla., and Branson, Mo. A few months after starting service, the carrier expects to increase service to Branson, a popular country and western music resort center.
Canadian Airlines International has upgraded to Direct Sell its participation in the Singapore-based Abacus computer reservations system. At the Direct Sell level, the Abacus system is interfaced automatically with the participating airline's host computer system during booking, to confirm bookings instantly, and the airline's inventory is decremented automatically.
United's systemwide passenger traffic rose 7% in 1994 on 1% more capacity, causing its average load factor to increase 4 percentage points to 71.1%. Traffic increased throughout United's system in 1994 despite declines in capacity in the North American and Latin American markets. North American traffic rose 6.5% on 0.6% less capacity, and Latin traffic rose 8.3% on 3.1% fewer available seat miles. Pacific traffic increased 9.2% on 6.4% more ASMs, and Atlantic traffic increased 4.3% on 2.1% more capacity.
AECTRA Refining and Marketing, a distributor of aviation fuel based in Houston, Texas, is urging DOT to deny TNT Sava any future authority to operate cargo flights between Brazil and the U.S. AECTRA said in repeated letters to DOT that Sava and its principal officer, Juvenal D'Oliveira, "are demonstrably unfit to enjoy any rights or privileges from the DOT." AECTRA said D'Oliveira also owns most of Coex Air Inc., for which he ordered and received $1.3 million worth of fuel, using Sava's permit.
Although the Republicans are now in charge, the membership of the Senate Commerce Committee, which oversees aviation, has changed little. There are only two new members of the panel, new Sens. Olympia Snow (R-Maine) and John Ashcroft (R-Mo.). Three committee members from the 103rd Congress are gone - Sens. John Danforth (R-Mo.) and Harlan Mathews (D-Tenn.) are no longer in Congress, and Sen. Charles Robb (D-Va.), apparently left the committee because of the reduction in the Democratic membership.
FAA has awarded an $800,000 technology development grant to American Science and Engineering Inc., of Atlantic City, N.J., to apply its patented X-Ray forwardscatter technology to the problem of automated explosives detection in baggage. The grant will fund the integration of forwardscatter and backscatter technologies into "a new-generation automatic detection system for airport deployment," said AS&E President Ralph Sheridan. "Forwardscatter measures the scattering of X-rays from organic materials, such as plastic explosives, in the forward direction," he said.
