Boeing said Japan Airlines has become the first licensed user of its Maintenance Performance Toolbox, a secure online service offering electronic assistance and integration for aircraft maintenance and troubleshooting. JAL partnered with Boeing in developing the product. The Toolbox features visual navigation methods and databases intended to facilitate prevention, repair and recordkeeping and is available on any device with an Internet connection.
Denim Air passed an IATA Operational Safety Audit. Denim is an ACMI operator with clients that include KLM, Olympic Airways, Air Nostrum, Loganair, VLM, Air Mauritania and Air Senegal.
St. George, Utah-based SkyWest Airlines agreed to purchase 22 70-seat CRJ700s for its Delta Connection operation. The deal involves the conversion of existing orders for 18 smaller CRJ200s placed by Delta Air Lines on behalf of Atlantic Southeast Airlines, which subsequently was acquired by SkyWest, plus four incremental aircraft. The order includes conversion rights for other CRJ versions and reaffirms options for 80 CRJ700s.
Jet Airways proposed allowing foreign pilots to stay three years instead of one to solve India's chronic pilot shortage. According to Hindu Business Line, Jet CEO Wolfgang Prock-Schauer has proposed the initiative to the government. At the same time, insiders at Jet have confirmed to ATWOnline that the airline is talking with Air Sahara about taking a stake. Air Sahara approached Ernst and Young to assist it with capital raising options to meet its expansion plans.
EasyJet carried 2.74 million passengers in September, up 16.5% compared to September 2004. Load factor dipped half a point to 86.4%. For the rolling 12 months ended Sept 30, the airline carried 29.56 million passengers, up 21.4% over the year-ago period, and load factor improved a slight 0.7% to 85.2%. Revenue increased 23% to £1.34 billion ($2.38 billion). The company reiterated its August guidance that it expects its profit for the just-ended fiscal year "to be broadly in line with last year."
Air China reported robust growth figures for September, with passenger numbers up 11% to 2.5 million and cargo up 5.5% to 67,000 tonnes. Passenger load factor climbed 1.4% to 78.5%.
Finnair is adding a seventh MD-11 in December and aims to acquire an eighth next year as it builds its Asian network. "Within a couple of years, we will have some 10 widebody aircraft. We will add between one and two new destinations in Asia per year and increase frequencies to current destinations," President and CEO Keijo Suila declared in a statement. The carrier opened Guangzhou last month and adds Nagoya in June.
Swiss International Air Lines is to spin off its Regional operations into a standalone subsidiary called Swiss European Air Lines with its own management team and operating certificate before year end.
MTU Aero Engines and Lufthansa Technik intend to grow their Kuala Lumpur engine MRO joint venture Airfoil Services to a $20 million business by 2010 compared to $5 million in annual sales today by expanding into HPC blades as well at the current LPT blades and adding the GE CF34 to the present V2500, CFM56 and CF6 portfolio. Employment will rise to 500 from 130.
Continental Airlines announced yesterday that it added another $84 million to its defined benefit pension plans, bringing its year-to-date contributions to $304 million. That total meets its minimum required contribution for 2005.
Vietnam Airlines reported a 28.9% jump in revenue to 15.6 trillion tong for the nine months to Sept. 30 as tourist numbers surged to the country. Passengers were up 21% to 4.5 million and load factor was 69%.
Air France-KLM Group posted "an excellent performance" in terms of both traffic and unit revenue in September. Traffic increased 9.6% to 16.07 billion RPKs on 4.9% higher capacity of 19.35 billion ASKs and load factor gained 3.6 points to 83.1%. The number of passengers rose 7.3% to 6.2 million. Traffic on the European network, including France, increased 7.6% on a 1.3% rise in capacity and load factor was up 4.4 points to 74.4%. Cargo activity saw a slight improvement, with traffic ahead 2.3%. Capacity grew 6.6%, causing cargo load factor to slip 2.7 points to 65.2%.
SAS is set to unveil a new efficiency program next month in response to continuing losses, particularly among its Swedish and Danish Scandinavian Airlines units, Group President and CEO Jorgen Lindegaard told media Friday. The company already has reaped SEK12.8 billion ($1.7 billion) in savings out of a goal of SEK14 billion from its Turnaround 2005 program, but that is not enough, Lindegaard said. "SEK14 billion is fine, but we have to go [beyond] that. We have loss-making companies in Sweden and Denmark, which we won't allow [to make losses] next year."
Delta Air Lines said it is resuming its full flight schedule after canceling "select flights" as part of emergency fuel conservation efforts adopted "to address critical fuel shortages" in the southeastern US that were created by Hurricanes Katrina and Rita. The carrier did not provide a figure for the number of cancellations during the two weeks that the "short-term emergency fuel conservation initiative" was in effect.
Iberia, as expected, unveiled its three-year Director Plan aimed at increasing productivity and revenues while reducing costs, largely through a combination of layoffs, outsourcing and automation. The plan also calls for a three-year wage freeze, "linking payroll increases to results." A profit improvement target was not presented, but a target of €600 million ($726 million) has been reported previously ( ATWOnline, Oct. 3).
Independence Air announced the departure of CFO Richard Surrat, who "resigned in order to pursue other opportunities." His replacement is David Asai, a seven-year veteran of the company who served most recently as VP, controller and assistant secretary.
MAIR Inc., parent of Mesaba Airlines, warned Friday that it may have to file for bankruptcy protection in light of actions taken by its bankrupt partner Northwest Airlines. Northwest has defaulted on $28 million owed to the Airlink carrier and is removing nine of 35 Avro RJ85s it subleases to Mesaba by the end of this month in order to return them to the lessor. It has said it intends to repossess the remaining 26 by year end.
TNT Express signed a contract with GECAS for two additional 737-300SFs, bringing the total number of 737s in its fleet to nine. The new aircraft will be converted from passenger to freighter configuration by IAI's Bedek Aviation Services and modified to comply with Chapter IV noise emission standards. TNT will introduce the aircraft to its European Air Network in August and December 2006.
United Airlines parent UAL Corp. will exit bankruptcy via a $3 billion, six-year, all-debt financing package, the company said yesterday. JP Morgan and Citigroup will be lead managers for the offering, which UAL said has "very competitive terms." The interest rate is LIBOR plus 450 basis points. Exit financing will be used to repay the debtor-in-possession facility, make other payments required to exit bankruptcy and insure a strong cash balance when the company leaves bankruptcy.
Prisma Aviation Services remarketed an ATR 42-300 together with a package of spare parts to aircraft inventory and parts specialist Dart Aviation in France. The aircraft, which had been stored at Rome Fiumicino since March 2005 following the voluntary liquidation of Air Industria in 2003, will be parted out.
RASSA Holdings said Aeropostal Alas de Centroamerica signed an agreement to use its R@N Web-based passenger service system. The proposed startup airline is based in Costa Rica and plans to begin operations this month using DC-9s and MD-80s.
Italian government, as expected ( ATWOnline Oct. 6), approved a financial assistance package for Italian airlines amounting to €200 million ($239 million). Deputy Transport Minister Mario Tassone stressed that the aid package is directed to the Italian airline industry as a whole to "help them overcome moments of crisis owing to the rising fuel price," La Republica reported. It added that Alitalia will receive approximately €80 million.
American Airlines Cargo raised its fuel surcharge from $0.50/kg. to $0.55/kg. for most international shipments of US origin and from $0.20/lb. to $0.22/lb. for US domestic shipments. New rates take effect Oct. 19. The fuel surcharge also will be adjusted in local currency for most shipments not of US origin unless the adjustment is not allowed for regulatory reasons.
