Gallery: This Week in Aviation-Dec. 4-8, 2017

Qatar Airways has decided to equip its incoming fleet of Airbus A321neos with CFM International Leap-1A engines, dropping an earlier commitment for the competing Pratt & Whitney PW1100G engine. The order for 50 units of the largest A320neo-family member replaces an earlier order for the same number of A320neo family jets.

Kirstjen Nielsen is sworn in as US homeland security secretary Dec. 6 by White House chief of staff John Kelly and White House executive clerk David Kalbaugh.

Japan Airlines (JAL) has entered into a strategic partnership with Boom Technology, taking purchase options on 20 Boom supersonic passenger aircraft.

China’s ICBC Leasing has ordered 55 Commercial Aircraft Corp. of China (COMAC) C919s, becoming the biggest customer for the aircraft.  

Aerolíneas Argentina took delivery of its first Boeing 737 MAX 8 Nov. 29 and flew the aircraft’s first commercial flight from Buenos Aires’ Ezeiza International Airport (EZE) to Mendoza in western Argentina Dec. 4. Aerolíneas is the first Latin American carrier to fly a MAX aircraft.

Taiwan’s China Airlines has taken delivery of an Airbus A350 XWB powered with a biofuel mix, joining the sustainable fuel initiative for Airbus delivery flights.

Las Vegas-based LCC Allegiant Air will focus on adding 30 Airbus aircraft between the end of 2017 and 2018 as it works under an accelerated schedule to retire its MD-80s.

Alliance Airlines MD Scott McMillan in front of an Austrian Airlines Fokker aircraft being transferred to the Australian carrier, which is the world's largest operator of Fokker aircraft.

Malaysia Airlines took delivery of its first of six Airbus A350-900s leased from Air Lease Corp.

SkyTeam is teaming up with high-tech startup SkyLights to transform its Dubai International Airport lounge into a virtual movie theater. For a limited time, customers can watch multimedia content on immersive Bravo headsets and enjoy the latest cinematic VR technology before they fly. The two-month Dubai ‘Virtual Cinema’ pilot is part of SkyTeam’s strategy to deliver an innovative and memorable experience each time customers visit one of the alliance’s seven branded lounges around the world.

EasyJet launched Immfly’s digital platform, “Air Time” on the first of five easyJet aircraft equipped with the service. The high-performance digital platform, available in five languages (English, Spanish, French, Italian and German), enables high-speed IFE streaming on passengers’ own smart devices.

Hong Kong-based lessor China Aircraft Leasing Group Holdings (CALC) has accepted its first Airbus A320neo, and handed it over to Denver-based Ultra LCC Frontier Airlines.

Express freight specialist DHL Express has become the first operator to accept an Airbus A330-300 Passenger-to-Freighter (P2F) converted aircraft from Elbe Flugzeugwerke (EFW), the joint venture between Singapore-based ST Aerospace and Airbus.

American Airlines is planning to add extra-large storage bins on the bulk of its in-service Airbus A321s, 202 aircraft in all, and has chosen Airbus’s aftermarket services unit Services by Airbus to perform the retrofit.

The European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) has certified the ATR 72-600 full-flight simulator (FFS), which was manufactured by TRU Simulation + Training and is based at ATR’s Paris Training Center.