Ryanair is launching its first Israel links, serving Eilat Ovda Airport from three European cities, Budapest in Hungary, Kaunas in Lithuania and Krakow in Poland.
The UK Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) said it is “open to pre-funding” as a means of contributing to the financing of the proposed third runway at Heathrow, attracting a considerable amount of resistance from the airline community.
The airline will operate three routes from Eilat Ovda Airport in the far south of the country, near the border with Jordan. Initially, flights will operate to and from Budapest in Hungary, Kaunas in Lithuania and Krakow in Poland.
With effect from the winter season (October 2015 to March 2016), Air France will offer its customers three weekly flights to Luanda on departure from Paris-Charles de Gaulle.
The airline plans to introduce new services to London Luton, Berlin Schönefeld, Manchester, Amsterdam and Bristol – the latter of which will be a brand new destination for Vienna Airport.
The twice-weekly service will operate on Wednesdays and Sundays from May next year to the German city which is located in the centre of the Rhine-Ruhr region – Germany’s largest metropolitan area.
The airline industry is opening its eyes to Moldova as an international market and meetings at this year’s Routes Silk Road forum in Tbilisi, Georgia have helped establish at least one new air service and confirmed an increased capacity offering on an existing route.
UK ACMI and airline sub-charter specialist, Titan Airways, is seeking to raise its profile among the world’s airlines and is using the Routes regional event calendar to interact with airlines in specific regions.
Transaero announced plans to debut the Airbus A320 Family variant into its fleet from July 2015 in March last year when it confirmed a deal with ICBC Leasing, part of the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China, to introduce six A321 aircraft on operating leases for delivery through March 2016. These are the first of up to 30 A321s that are due to enter the Russian carrier’s fleet within the next five years.
In protest against a Danish Labor Court ruling, Ryanair is moving its single Copenhagen-based aircraft to Kaunas in Lithuania, although it simultaneously announced plans to add three new routes from Copenhagen.
In recent years China has overtaken both USA and Germany to become the largest outbound market in the world with Chinese travellers now the top source of tourism cash, according to the UNWTO. In 2012 their annual spend was estimated at $102 billion, growing to a market of 97 million and spend of $124 billion in 2013 and 110 million and $165 billion last year.
The European Commission (EC) and the European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) have issued the first single air safety authorizations, which are valid throughout the European Union (EU), to 22 third-country operators (TCO).
United Arab Emirates (UAE) carrier, Emirates Airlines has announced that it will launch a service to Mashhad in Iran, its second service to the Western Asian country.
In his presentation highlighting aviation market trends in Russia, Ascend's Evgeny van der Geest provided an interesting insight into the current structure of the sector in the Russian Federation, including a growing lessor involvement - particularly from international businesses - which is fueling a fleet renewal process that is continuing to see the removal of older Soviet era airliners with western aircraft models.
Aeroflot Russian Airlines is reviewing its future long-haul fleet renewal after it was revealed just last month that the carrier had cancelled its order for 22 Boeing 787 Dreamliners. The flag carrier had been due to take delivery of the aircraft in 2014 but previous delays with the programme meant that the deliveries had been put back to 2016.
The resumption of direct flights between Georgia and the UK should be among the main route development targets for the United Airports of Georgia team, according to a senior executive at Adjara Group Hospitality, the fastest growing, privately held owner and management company in the Georgian hospitality industry. It has been over two years since there were direct flights between Georgia and the UK.
airBaltic has an order for 13 CS300s, the first of which is due to arrive in the third quarter of 2016 and is understood to be considering converting options for a further seven aircraft. It plans to use the aircraft for a mix of short- and medium-haul flying, including its Riga – Abu Dhabi route which it serves in partnership with Etihad Airways.
Following an expanded Air Service Agreement signed between the State of Qatar and the Republic of the Philippines, the Doha-based carrier will now operate a full twice-daily service to Manila, in addition to its daily flights between Clark and Doha.
In a presentation at this year’s Routes Silk Road Strategy Summit, Guy Brazeau, Director, IATA Consulting revealed that airlines flying within Europe and to and from Europe were witnessing a significant decline in average passenger yields during the first half of this year, but far short of the decline being seen in the Russian domestic market where yields are alarmingly more than a third less than last year.
Ukraine is a huge market opportunity, but for many carriers there have been notable restrictions on air access. Negotiations on a full EU-Ukraine open skies agreement had reached a critical stage over the past couple of years, but have fallen on a more regional structure. This has initially seen the Ukraine Infrastructure Ministry allow the western Ukrainian city of Lviv to be linked directly to European Union destinations without any restrictions as a trial run.
Dubbed the E175+, the variant KLM ordered has a different winglet to the baseline aircraft to increase fuel efficiency. Embraer revealed in March 2014 when the first aircraft was rolled out that the winglets and other streamlining for the mid-generation upgrade would help to keep the aircraft competitive until the next-generation ‘E2’ models enter service in 2018 and which will reduce fuel burn by 24 per cent versus the original aircraft.
Etihad Airways has announced a significant enhancement to its Abu Dhabi-Singapore route with the deployment of a Boeing 787-9 Dreamliner from 1 August 2015.
