EU and Azerbaijan signed an aviation agreement yesterday granting all EU carriers the right to fly between any member state and Azerbaijan. More than 210,000 passengers flew between the markets in 2007, the EU said.
United Airlines flew 10.57 billion consolidated RPMs in June, down 7.5% from the year-ago month, while capacity fell 8% to 12.31 billion ASMs. Load factor rose 0.5 point to 85.9%. Southwest Airlines said June passenger RASM decreased an estimated 9%-10% year-over-year. It flew 6.73 billion RPMs in June, down 2.1%, against a 3.8% fall in capacity to 8.46 billion ASMs. Load factor rose 1.3 points to 79.5%.
European Court of Justice imposed a €2 million ($2.8 million) fine on the Greek government for failing to recover state aid illegally granted to Olympic Airways, the predecessor of Olympic Airlines, which was privatized in March ( ATWOnline, March 11). The penalty will be increased by €16,000 each day if Greece fails to recover the money within one month. The ruling relates to a longstanding dispute between the European Commission and Greece over state aid to its loss-making flag carrier.
British Airways plans to cut summer and winter capacity by an additional 1%, ground six additional aircraft next year and defer its A380 deliveries, while some 2,000 employees represented by Unite have "overwhelmingly rejected" the airline's proposed job cuts ahead of Wednesday's talks mediated by the UK Advisory, Conciliation and Arbitration Service.
American Airlines flew 10.89 billion system RPMs in June, an 8.1% decrease from the year-ago month. Capacity dropped 7.8% to 12.79 billion ASMs and load factor slipped 0.3 point to 85.1%. Continental Airlines said June consolidated and mainline RASM fell an estimated 19.5%-20.5%. It flew 8.07 billion consolidated RPMs last month, down 6.5% year-over-year. Capacity dropped 7.8% to 9.51 billion ASMs and load factor rose 1.1 points to 84.8%.
Mesa Air Group announced that the US Court of Appeals upheld an injunction against Delta Air Lines preventing it from canceling Mesa subsidiary Freedom Airlines' contract to fly 22 ERJ-145s for Delta Connection ( ATWOnline, Oct. 22, 2008). Delta cited operational problems, but the court ruled, "The evidence showed that Delta induced Mesa to agree to Delta's coordinated cancellations by promising not to count such cancellations against it," Reuters reported.
Air Jamaica's rumored sale to Spirit Airlines owners Indigo Partners and Oaktree Capital has not been finalized, airline and government officials told The Jamaica Observer. "We are still talking to interested parties and the matter has not yet gone to Cabinet," a JM board member told the paper, while a government official said, "There has been no sale as yet. The recommendation still has to go to the Cabinet and the board of Air Jamaica before a decision is taken."
Cargo B Airlines halted operations last week as it ran out of cash. The Belgian carrier launched in October 2007 and flew to Africa and South America with two new 747-400Fs. "Volumes held up well, but we could not secure sufficient financing to support the introduction of the second 747 which was delivered half May," President and CEO Robert Kuijpers said. Lessor Nippon Cargo Airlines repossessed the aircraft. The company will be liquidated.
Aon Corp. released a report warning that the commercial aviation industry "is likely to see insurance premiums rise significantly for the rest of the year and potentially into the next" as insurers suffer heavy losses related to the recent accidents near Brazil, Comoros and Buffalo. "If the rest of 2009 follows the 13-year average pattern for losses, and discounting 2001, the year will be the most expensive ever seen in the airline insurance market," it said, with claims potentially surpassing $2.2 billion.
SkyEurope Holding last week announced the departure of SkyEurope Airlines Chairman and CEO Jason Bitter by "mutual agreement." He was replaced by former Vice Chairman and CFO Nick Manoudakis. The LCC is operating under creditor protection ( ATWOnline, June 24).
Gulf Air named former Royal Jordanian President and CEO Samer Majali as its new chief executive, replacing Bjorn Naf. Majali announced his unexpected resignation from RJ last week, telling ATWOnline that, "after 30 years at the airline and eight years as chief executive, I decided it was time for me to move on" ( ATWOnline, June 30).
British Airways said it has asked the UK Advisory, Conciliation and Arbitration Service to mediate talks with its labor unions to help it reach agreement on pay reductions and job cuts ( ATWOnline, June 19).
US military personnel from the Combined Joint Task Force-Horn of Africa have been deployed to assist with search-and-rescue operations for the Yemenia Yemen Airways A310-300 that crashed Monday in the Indian Ocean with 153 aboard ( ATWOnline, July 2).
SITA said its "2009 Airline IT Trends Survey," released this week, revealed that carrier investment in information technology "is set to reach a new low this year as aircraft operators cope with unprecedented financial losses." According to the survey, IT and telecommunications spending as a percentage of airline revenue is forecast to be just 1.7% in 2009, the lowest level since 2002.
Arab Air Carriers Org. Secretary General Abdul Wahab Teffaha estimated that inclusion of aviation in the EU's Emissions Trading Scheme will cost his member airlines around €200 million ($281.6 million) in 2012, the first year that carriers are scheduled to be included. "This is a conservative estimate and covers only the cost of offsetting the emissions. It does not include the expenditure needed to implement the systems to comply with the rules," Teffaha told ATWOnline during the SITA Air Transport IT Summit in Cannes this week.
The 11 member airlines of the Arab Air Carriers Organisation (AACO) will become the first users of SITA's new Aircraft Emissions Manager when the system becomes available in October. Four global airlines - one from the Middle East - is currently testing the solution.
French military aircraft and boats are continuing to search the Indian Ocean near Comoros for debris and survivors from the Yemenia Yemen Airways A310-300 that crashed late Monday, while the European Commission demanded that the airline "urgently provide" information on its maintenance program to avoid being placed on the EU's list of banned carriers.
GECAS and flydubai reached a sale-and-leaseback agreement covering four 737-800s scheduled for delivery in the second half of this year (two this month, one in October and one in December). Aircraft are worth $320 million. Flydubai CEO Ghaith Al Ghaith said the financing is the first secured by the startup from outside the UAE. The airline expects to operate six aircraft to "around" 14 destinations by year end. Flydubai ordered 50 -800s at last year's Farnborough Airshow ( ATWOnline, July 15, 2008).
Lufthansa CEO-Group Airlines and Corporate Human Resources Stefan Lauer was appointed chairman of the six-member board of directors at bmi effective yesterday. He succeeds founder Michael Bishop, who is leaving the board. LH Manager-Hub Development and Capacity Management-Frankfurt also was named to the board, joining Lauer, CEO Nigel Turner and Deputy CEO Tim Bye as executive directors. Lufthansa's takeover of bmi was approved last week ( ATWOnline, June 23).
The European Commission extended the deadline of its investigation into the takeover of Austrian Airlines Group by Lufthansa by at least 14 days, or up to a maximum 90 days although a decision is expected to come in about two weeks. Sources close to both AAG and the Austrian government told ATWOnline that a 20% reduction in Austrian's capacity may be a condition for approval and would be acceptable. The airline is considered to be too large for its home market, with or without Lufthansa.
GE Aviation said it "successfully completed a customer trial of its ClearCore engine wash effluent collection system" on a Virgin Atlantic Airways CF6-80C2-powered 747-400 at London Heathrow. According to GE, ClearCore will be offered as either an effluent collection system working with "existing front-end wash equipment" or as a complete wash and collection system.
