Northwest Airlines flew 7.31 billion consolidated RPMs in July, a 9.4% decrease from the year-ago month. Capacity fell 11.1% to 8.3 billion ASMs and load factor rose 1.6 points to 88.1%. Domestic traffic declined 9.4% to 4.05 billion RPMs against an 11.8% decrease in capacity to 4.62 billion ASMs, raising load factor 2.3 points to 87.6%. International RPMs dropped 7.7% to 2.78 billion as ASMs fell 8% to 3.04 billion, lifting load factor 0.3 point to 91.3%. Lufthansa Group flew 10.46 billion RPKs in July, up 1.4% over the year-ago month.
Virgin Atlantic Airways is introducing a new inflight texting service allowing passengers to send a question via their seatback IFE and receive an answer within minutes. The new feature, dubbed AQA (Any Question Answered), will be offered in cooperation with IssueBits of London.
AirTran Airways named former La Quinta Corp. Chief Accounting Officer Mark Osterberg as VP and chief accounting officer. JetBlue Airways named Martin St. George VP-planning, replacing the retiring David Ulmer. St. George was previously MD-marketing planning for United Airlines.
Lufthansa Systems announced that Augsburg Airways, Contact Air, Eurowings, Lufthansa CityLine, Germanwings and Cirrus Airlines will equip their cockpits with the Lido Route Manual electronic charting system. LHS signed with Atlas Blue for provision of the ProfitLine/Yield Rembrandt revenue management solution.
Amadeus signed three-year agreements with China Eastern Airlines and China Airlines to power their international websites with its e-Retail Solution. Both airlines also plan to implement the Amadeus e-Merchandise solution within a few months.
Alteon Training opened a new pilot and maintenance training facility at ANA's Flight Training Center near Tokyo Haneda. ANA will make its simulators available to Alteon for third-party use when the carrier is not using them. Alteon will install a 787 training suite at the facility by the first quarter of 2008.
TAM flew 1.87 billion RPKs in July, a 21.6% increase over the year-ago month. Capacity rose 18.8% to 2.3 billion ASKs and load factor climbed 1.8 points to 81.2%.
Jordanian government sold an 80% stake in Royal Jordanian's former training and simulation division to Oriental Investment Group for Tourism and Development. According to the Arab Air Carriers Organization, the deal is worth approximately $14.8 million. Jordan Airline Training and Simulation is one of several noncore businesses separated from the flag carrier and sold under the government's privatization. As with previous privatizations, the remaining 20% will be retained by RJ.
Northwest Airlines announced successful completion of the IATA Operational Safety Audit and the US Dept. of Defense Commercial Air Carrier Quality and Safety Survey.
Air France and KLM are hiking their fuel surcharges. KLM will increase its surcharge by €5 ($6.40) per segment to €65 on all intercontinental flights and by €1 per segment to €24 on all European flights on tickets issued as of Aug. 10. AF will impose further fuel surcharges of €7 to each long-haul flight, €1 on domestic flights and €2 on medium-haul flights. Separately, Jet Airways yesterday added INR150 ($3.20) to its INR500 surcharge on all domestic fares.
Southwest Airlines named Executive VP-Aircraft Operations Mike Van de Ven chief of operations effective Sept. 1. Van de Ven joined the carrier in 1993. Also, Southwest promoted VP-Inflight Daryl Krause to senior VP-inflight and provisioning and Senior Director-Provisioning Scott Halfmann to VP-provisioning. National Air Traffic Controllers Assn. elected Pat Forrey president and Paul Rinaldi executive VP.
US Dept. of Transportation reached a $50,000 settlement with British Airways, which denied boarding to four mobility-impaired passengers on flights leaving the US. BA was sanctioned for not attempting to determine if the passengers were able to assist in their own evacuation if necessary and will be allowed to credit $45,000 of the penalty toward new training programs for US-based employees.
TAP Portugal suspended acceptance of Varig tickets. "Responsibility of the new company [Volo do Brasil] for tickets issued in advance has not yet been clearly defined or declared," TAP noted in a statement. "This is reflected in increased financial risk to TAP that is worsening by the day." TAP added it will continue to pursue negotiations with Varig on the potential resumption of commercial agreements between the carriers.
UPS pilots began casting ballots last week on ratification of a tentative labor contract agreed to June 30. The five-year deal reportedly provides increased pay and improved work rules for the 2,700 pilots, including a 20% raise in a captain's average annual salary to $300,000. Voting will continue until Aug. 31.
Centre for Asia Pacific Aviation said LCC market share in India is expected to reach 70% by 2010 as full-service airlines lose 1.5 points every month. "We do not expect this rate to slow in the short term, given the profile of current fleet orders. LCCs could therefore control over 35% of the domestic market by the end of 2006 and pass 50% some time in [the second half of 2007]," CAPA CEO Indian Subcontinent and Middle East Kapil Kaul said, adding that 60 million passengers are expected to fly on Indian carriers in 2010.
Spirit Airlines will launch daily Fort Lauderdale-Las Vegas flights on Nov. 15, supplementing its current service via Detroit Metro. Separately, Spirit flew 423.6 million RPMs in July, a 5.6% drop from the year-ago month. Capacity fell 4.3% to 511 million ASMs and laod factor declined 1.2 points to 82.9%.
UK Parliament's Environmental Audit Committee yesterday called for heavier taxation on airline tickets to slow the growth of air travel and therefore its impact on the environment. "The government has no excuses for not raising air passenger duty," the committee stated, while also calling for a slew of other charges including differential landing fees based on aircraft fuel efficiency.
News from Travel Technology Update: Airlines have been insisting for more than a decade that something has to give in the ever increasing costs of GDS distribution. In the last few weeks, two of the largest U.S. carriers have made it clear that if they can't wring more out of the GDS companies, travel agencies that use uncooperative GDSs will have to do the giving.
Air France-KLM flew 18.49 billion RPKs in July, up 4.9% over the year-ago month. Capacity increased 5% to 21.7 billion ASKs and load factor slipped 0.1 point to 85.2%. Delta Air Lines flew 11.76 billion system RPMs in July, a drop of 0.6% from the year-ago month. Capacity fell 2.1% to 13.77 billion ASMs and load factor rose 1.3 points to 85.4%. Domestic RPMs declined 10.6% to 8.03 billion against a 12.6% decrease in ASMs to 9.38 billion. Load factor rose 2 points to 85.7%.
Assn. of European Airlines said yesterday that competition issues in Italy and Austria have highlighted the need for European regulators to take a closer look at fuel companies' relationships with airlines. AEA said Italian authorities fined fuel suppliers €315 million ($405.4 million) in June for anticompetitive practices and that Austrian Airlines has asked national authorities to investigate OMV, the state-owned company that supplies both the airline and fuel companies operating in the country.
Worldspan signed a five-year global distribution and airline hosting partnership with MAXjet Airways and a five-year Worldspan Meridian hosting and distribution agreement with Daallo Airlines of Djibouti.
Aviareto named GECAS MD and Senior VP-Business Development Niall Greene as MD and Rob Cowan, formerly of the Irish Aviation Authority, as its new head of operations.
Fomento de Construcciones y Contratas of Spain agreed to acquire Aeroporti di Roma Handling through its Flightcare subsidiary for €72.5 million ($93.3 million) subject to the approval of competition authorities. FCC said Flightcare will become the leading independent handling company at Fiumicino and Ciampino and "will be well placed to expand to the rest of Italy."
