LAN Airlines finalized a previously announced order for 25 A318s and A319s with options on 15 A320 family aircraft ( ATWOnline, July 1). LAN is launch customer for the PW6000 on the A318, while the A319s will be powered by IAE V2500s.
North American Airlines, a wholly owned subsidiary of World Airways Holdings, reached an agreement valued at $15 million to furnish service for TravelSpan, a tour operator that provides vacation packages to the Dominican Republic, Tobago and other Caribbean destinations.
Virgin Blue is likely to launch an appeal after eight former Ansett flight attendants won an antidiscrimination case, claiming the airline had rejected their applications for jobs on the basis of age. The Queensland Anti-Discrimination Tribunal ruled in favor of the women, aged between 35 and 56, who unsuccessfully had sought jobs with Virgin Blue during the 12 months after Ansett's collapse in September 2001. None of the flight attendants made it past the first interview and they alleged the assessment process for cabin crew positions focused on young and attractive applicants.
Amadeus said Norwegian will be the launch customer for its scaleable Pioneer Customer Management Solution intended to address the requirements of low-cost carriers. According to Amadeus, Pioneer, which uses Unix and Linux technology, is based on a community IT platform; comprises reservations, inventory, revenue management and departure control solutions, and supports all sales channels. Separately, Norwegian said it flew 267 million RPKs in September, up 89% over the year-ago period, on a 49% rise in capacity to 334 million ASKs.
AirBridge Cargo took delivery of a third 747 freighter that will enable it to add four weekly flights between Europe and Shanghai via its hub in Krasnoyarsk. The 747-300SF, built in 1990, features a 30-pallet main deck and is one of three of its kind with GE engines to be converted to freighters, AirBridge said. The airline was awarded significant frequency increases to Shanghai and Beijing in recent negotiations as well the right to add Guangzhou, Nanjing, Hong Kong and Moscow on westbound flights.
Southwest Airlines' proposal to transfer its operations from Seattle-Tacoma International Airport to King County International Airport, better known as Boeing Field, was rejected yesterday by King County Executive Ron Sims, who cited noise and traffic concerns as well as the potential cost to taxpayers and unresolved legal issues ( ATWOnline, July 22).
SkyEurope transported 196,549 passengers in September, up 74% compared to the some month last year, resulting a load factor of 80.1%. In the past 12 months, SkyEurope transported 1.7 million passengers, up 132% from the 12-month period ended Sept. 30, 2004.
JetBlue Airways announced a significant expansion at its New York JFK and Boston Logan bases yesterday, highlighting the versatility of its new 100-seat Embraer 190s, eight of which will be in service by year end with a mix of short- and long-haul flying to big and small cities. The airline has ordered 101 of the CF34-powered RJs and will take delivery of 18 in each of the next two years.
GE Commercial Aviation Services will lease two ex-US Airways A320s to India's Air Deccan for delivery in January. Aircraft and Engine Support LLC took delivery on Sept. 30 of one MD-87 from Investors Asset Holding Corp. The sale of the aircraft, which formerly was leased to AeroMexico, was arranged by Sigma Aircraft Management.
SAS Technical Services AB named Michael Brag its chief commercial officer and acting MD of SAS Component A/S. Brag, 39, joined SAS Group in 2003 and is a member of the management board overseeing marketing, sales, partnerships and supplier agreements. SAS Technical Services holds full-service MRO contracts on more than 200 aircraft.
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."
