A US District Court judge put off a decision until June 7 on whether United Airlines' International Assn. of Machinists-represented employees have the right to strike if the US Bankruptcy Court grants the company's motion to reject the group's current contract and impose a new one. The union believes it has the right to strike, while United has said it thinks a strike would be illegal. It still is negotiating with IAM, which represents its ramp and customer contact employees, and has until May 31 to reach a new deal with the group.
Assn. of Asia Pacific Airlines reported a 9.9% hike in passengers on international flights to 10.6 million in March. Traffic in terms of RPKs rose 8.1% on a slightly slower capacity increase of 7.2%, resulting in a 0.6-point increase in load factor to 71.7%. International freight traffic in terms of FTKs climbed 6.5%. However, capacity was up 9% and as a result the average freight load factor fell 1.5 points to 64.9%. AAPA represents 17 airlines.
The battle over opening up Dallas Love Field heated up yesterday as Texas Republican Congressmen Sam Johnson and Jeb Hensarling introduced legislation called the Right to Fly Act, which immediately would repeal the Wright Amendment. The Wright Amendment, which became law in 1979, restricts nonstop flights from Love Field to cities in Texas and seven other states in close proximity. It was designed to protect Dallas/Ft. Worth International Airport from competition from Love Field.
Bmi selected SAS Component's Free2Fly program for its fleet of three A330s, 10 A321s, 11 A320s and four A319s on a long-term basis, the companies announced yesterday. Under the contract, SAS Component will buy and lease back bmi's stock of A330 rotables and set up branch stores at Manchester and Heathrow. The contract follows a decision by bmi to focus on core activities and a realization that SAS Component with its volume is in an ideal position to negotiate prices with OEMs.
Darwin Airline increased its capital from CHF4 million ($3.2 million) to CHF10 million earlier this month. The carrier currently operates three daily flights from its Lugano base to Geneva, as well as service to London, Berne and Rome.
Wizz Air said that in its first year of operation it transported 1.2 million passengers. The carrier recently said it has a 40% market share of the LCC business in Poland and 25% in Hungary. Wizz Air has bases in Katowice, Warsaw, Gdansk and Budapest and is planning to open a base in Poznan. Currently it operates a fleet of A320s to 17 destinations on 32 routes.
Air Transport Assn. member airlines flew 56.01 billion RPMs in April, up 3.1% over the year-ago period. Capacity climbed 2.8% to 72.14 billion ASMs and load factor gained 0.2 point to 77.6%. For the four months ended April 30, RPMs increased 6.3% to 215.45 billion, ASMs rose 2.6% to 283.14 billion and load factor jumped 2.7 points to 76.1%.
SR Technics Holdings reported that 2004 operating earnings soared to CHF34 million ($27.7 million) from CHF8 million in 2003 on a 24% rise in sales to CHF1.17 billion. The MRO services provider said that the improvement came in the face of "a difficult market environment and the impact of a weak US dollar." Net loss narrowed to CHF2 million from CHF4 million. Operating cash flow rose 18% to CHF99 million, which enabled SR Technics to partly fund the CHF218 million acquisition of FLS Aerospace while also retiring "a significant amount" of long-term debt.
Piedmont Aviation Component Services entered into an agreement to sell all of its ownership interest to Limco Airepair, a wholly owned subsidiary of TAT Technologies. According to Piedmont, Limco will continue to operate the company with the same name, facilities and people.
Onur Air regained rights to operate to the Netherlands, Germany, France and Switzerland after aviation authorities from the four countries jointly agreed to a gradual lifting of their ban against the carrier. "The decision is the result of intensive discussions with the Turkish authorities, which led to the engagement from the airline as well as from the authorities in question to put a corrective action plan in place to increase the safety of the flights," the French DGAC said in a statement.
Sigmar Aviation, an Ireland-based aviation recruitment and services company, is working with Boeing's Alteon training subsidiary to provide Alteon and Boeing customers with "a range of flexible personnel services to support airlines in startup, training, expansion and fleet transition."
Aircraft Management Technologies and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology's Lean Aerospace Initiative yesterday announced a collaborative effort to engage industry, airline and academic partners to establish the Lean Flight Initiative, the purpose of which is to develop and promote lean principles, practices and tools among aircraft operators and companies involved in facilitating airline operations.
SkyTeam offered to make Malev an associate member of the alliance but did not proffer a full partnership because the Hungarian airline had not met its standards, Air France President and COO Pierre-Henri Gourgoun told ATWOnline recently. On Tuesday, oneworld announced an MOU with Malev that should lead to the carrier's entering that alliance next year subject to its meeting membership criteria ( ATWOnline, May 25).
SAS Scandinavian Airlines' credit rating was downgraded yesterday from B1 to B2 for the company's Senior Implied Rating by Moody's Investor's Service. The downgrade is mainly a result of the present overcapacity in the Scandinavian aviation market. Moody's acknowledged that SAS Group has reduced costs successfully through Turnaround 2005 and that yields have stabilized in recent months, but it expects continued yield pressure in the short term. It also has a positive view on SAS Group's continued strong liquidity position and the ongoing program for capital releases.
Air New Zealand officially opened its new pilot training facility, which houses a 777 simulator, classrooms and computerized training equipment. The design of the complex allows for additional simulator halls in the future, one of which is already under construction to house Air Nelson's Q300 simulator. ANZ currently operates four flight simulators within a nearby facility that are used for pilot training on 737-300s/400s/500s, 767-200s, 747-400s and A320s.
The European Regions Airline Assn. maintained its attack on the EU's new passenger rights rules, denying European Commission claims that passenger complaints have risen tenfold since the rules' implementation in late February. ERA DG Mike Ambrose said the association has asked the EC numerous times to provide information about the complaints it has received, but the Commission has yet to do so. "The EC's accusations of a massive increase in complaints must be in doubt until it produces the evidence," he stated.
Aerosim-Mechtronix in partnership with Clairis Technologies signed an MOU with Airbus covering a license agreement allowing Aerosim-Mechtronix to integrate Airbus simulation software from the A320, A330 and A340 families into elements of its Integrated Training Architecture. Clairis will provide local support and engineering skills.
Global Aircraft Solutions through its wholly owned subsidiary Hamilton Aerospace Technologies signed new heavy maintenance contracts with two existing customers, Q Aviation and Falcon Air Express. Under the deals, GACF will perform C checks and associated maintenance on a 737-500 owned by Q Aviation and a 727-200 operated by Falcon Air Express. Together the contracts represent more than $1 million in new maintenance work for Hamilton Aerospace.
SAS has begun offering wireless high-speed Internet access on all of its intercontinental flights. The airline has installed SAS Net Access service, provided by Connexion by Boeing, on all A340-300s and A330-300s it operates to the US and Asia. The service can be accessed from all 261 seats in business, Economy Flex and economy classes.
Northwest Airlines wants to lay off 2,840 of its 5,294 mechanics and related workers under a new contract proposal designed to achieve $176.2 million in annual savings, the Aircraft Mechanics Fraternal Assn. said in a message to members on its website. According to the union, the airline's latest proposal also calls for pay cuts ranging from 25.7% to 26.1% and reductions in benefits for the remaining 2,454 AMFA-represented employees.
Air China Ltd. and Cathay Pacific Airways signed an MOU to "promote sales and marketing initiatives" between the two airlines, including a new codesharing arrangement. Under the MOU, Air China will codeshare on two Cathay Pacific services from Beijing to Hong Kong, one of which operates daily and the other three times a week. Cathay Pacific in turn will add its code to three of the daily Air China services to and from Beijing. Codeshare flights should begin in the fourth quarter, the airlines said. The partnership will include reciprocal frequent- flier benefits.
Alitalia Express contracted Saab Aviocomp to provide component service for its ERJ-145s. The agreement includes the entire component repair and overhaul services covered by the capability of Saab Aviocomp and related engineering support. Alitalia Express operates a fleet of 14 ERJ-145s, 15 ATR 42s/72s and six Embraer 170s on a domestic and international network.
Arconics Aviation, a Dublin-based software developer, yesterday in Seattle announced the launch of its Manual Manager 1.0 graphical aviation document management package. The system automatically compares revisions in numerous manuals and operating procedure documents and either transmits the differences for automatic updating or presents them for a human editing process. The system is especially adept at simplifying the SGML updates issued by Airbus and Boeing, Arconics CEO Niall O'Sullivan told ATWOnline, and also will facilitate updating electronic flight bags.
