US National Mediation Board terminated the Aircraft Mechanics Fraternal Assn.'s representation of former Northwest Airlines technical employees, Delta TechOps President Tony Charaf announced yesterday. TechOps will continue to integrate former NWA employees and will bring them up to DL pay scales and premiums at the next pay period. They will be eligible for profit-sharing and rewards programs this year and will shift to DL's benefits programs in January 2010.
United Airlines will begin accepting credit and debit cards for onboard purchases on all flights on March 23 and said it will move to a cashless cabin on domestic and North/Central American flights "after a brief transition period."
Sabre Travel Network added United Airlines "economy plus" tickets to its MySabre and Turbo Sabre travel agency tools, allowing the purchase of such seats through its standard GDS desktop application.
Ryanair said Ireland's minister of finance repealed the €10 "tourist tax" at "small and peripheral airports" like Donegal and Sligo but left it in place at Dublin and Shannon. The LCC this month announced cuts in its service at both airports ( ATWOnline, Feb. 13).
Global Aero Logistics, parent of North American Airlines and World Airways, changed its name to Global Aviation Holdings. "We are focused on growing our commercial cargo and passenger business, and the new name and identity will better represent the leading role we play in the charter aviation transport industry," CEO Rob Binns said. NAA operates passenger charters aboard 757-200ER and 767-300ER aircraft while World flies both passenger and cargo charters aboard 747-400s, DC10-30s and MD-11s.
Frontier Airlines Holdings, which is operating under bankruptcy protection, said it posted a $27.9 million net loss in January and a $2.8 million operating profit. Net result would have been a $2.8 million loss excluding reorganization items and mark-to-market fuel hedge transactions. January reorganization costs reached $28.3 million. Mainline unit revenue rose 4.4% year-over-year while unit cost fell 20.1%. President and CEO Sean Menke said the company is "now focused on securing the necessary financing to facilitate our emergence from bankruptcy later this year."
United Airlines parent UAL Corp. named General Motors VP-Global Strategy and Operations Tony Cervone as senior VP-corporate communications and chief communications officer.
Air New Zealand is concerned that France's Bureau d'Enquetes et d'Analyses released its 53-page interim report on the November A320 crash to the media before it was provided to the airline, in addition to the fact that ANZ has not been given access to either the CVR or the FDR. BEA said the A320's pilots, who worked for XL Airways, were conducting a low-speed test on approach to Perpignan when they lost control and crashed into the Mediterranean Sea, killing seven ( ATWOnline, Feb. 25).
AirTran Airways launched a buy-on-board food service called Sky Bites on 60 flights, with plans to expand it to the entire network starting next month. Individual items will cost $1-$4 and packages will be $4-$6. It is partnering with Kraft Foodservice on the program. Separately, it launched a daily Atlanta-Cancun service yesterday.
CAE reached deals with West Air Sweden, MyAir and Kuwait Airways to provide e-Learning training services. West Air will receive online recurrent training for pilots operating its CRJ200s, MyAir will employ CAE CRJ700 training courseware as part of its initial type rating under a three-year deal and KU pilots will gain access to CAE General Operating Subjects courseware including Cold Weather Operations, Dangerous Goods, ETOPS and TCAS II.
Atlas Air and Polar Air Cargo dispatchers voted unanimously to join the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, the union announced. Atlas and Polar pilots elected to join IBT in December ( ATWOnline, Dec. 23, 2008).
Australia's SkyAirWorld suspended all operations, according to a statement cited by ABC News in which CEO David Charlton said the Brisbane-based carrier is committed to restructuring in the coming weeks and still plans to launch E-190 flights from Perth to Christmas Island and Cocos-Keeling Islands in April. SkyAirWorld also operates ERJ-145s and E-170s.
Austrian Airlines flew 1.16 billion RPKs in January, down 12.2% from the year-ago month. Capacity dropped 6.5% to 1.78 billion ASKs, lowering load factor 4.3 points to 65.4%.
Dragon Aviation Leasing took delivery of the first of 13 A320s on order. The aircraft, leased to Air France, is the Beijing-based lessor's first directly purchased Airbus type. Dragon is a joint venture of China Aviation Supplies Holding Co., AerCap and Calyon Airfinance.
Canada and Costa Rica signed an expanded air services agreement allowing carriers to operate their own aircraft or codeshare flights between any city-pairs.
European Union and Pakistan signed an aviation agreement that removes nationality restrictions contained in previous bilateral air services agreements between 18 EU member states and Pakistan and thus brings them in line with EU law.
AVIC last week completed the merger of its aircraft manufacturing subsidiaries and launched a new company in Xi'an that will be "mainly responsible for big [military] transport aircraft production and spare parts production for Chinese big commercial aircraft," AVIC President Lin Zuoming said ( ATWOnline, Sept. 29, 2008). The venture has registered capital of CNY12 billion ($1.75 billion), with AVIC the only shareholder. Other investors will be added next year.
A J Walter Aviation was awarded a seven-year power-by-the-hour contract to provide rotable component support for Czech Airlines' fleet of 33 Airbus aircraft from March 1. Agreement initially covers two A321s, eight A320s and seven A319s. The remaining 16 aircraft will join the program over the next seven years.
Air Berlin said its executive directors and "top managers" will forego 50% of their bonus entitlements for 2008, or a combined €2 million ($2.6 million). AB will announce its full-year results on March 30 and said it expects to report an operating profit. It also announced the launch of flights from Berlin Tegel to Krakow (four-times-weekly beginning April 29) and Oslo Gardermoen (five-times-weekly on April 24).
The Air New Zealand A320 that crashed into the Mediterranean Sea during a Nov. 27 test flight conducted by XL Airways pilots was in the midst of a low-speed test conducted on approach to Perpignan when the cockpit crew lost control, according to a preliminary report issued yesterday by French investigators that raised questions about the test's timing and recommended that EASA develop regulations for "acceptance" flights.
Air Astana transported 2.8 million passengers in 2008, up 8% from the prior year, on a 16% increase in capacity to 7.5 billion ASKs. Load factor was 64%. It took delivery of three A320s last year, raising its fleet to 21 (two 767s, four 757s, two A321s, seven A320s, one A319 and five F50s). It plans to operate 34 aircraft in 2014 and 63 by 2022. Air New Zealand said January yield was up 8.1% year-over-year. It flew 2.35 billion RPKs during the month, down 8.5%, against a 6.6% fall in capacity to 2.82 billion ASKs. Load factor dropped 1.7 points to 83.4%.
