TUI Travel said it is holding "very constructive" negotiations with Boeing regarding the delivery schedule for the 23 787s it has on firm order. "We are not seeking damages from Boeing, although the delay in the program has heavily impacted our expansion plans," TUI Travel Aviation Director Christoph Mueller told ATWOnline.
Air New Zealand endorsed a government proposal to subsidize one work day over a two-week period to help national businesses through the economic downturn. CEO Rob Fyfe said ANZ would embrace the aid if it is forced to reduce capacity further and consider redundancies ( ATWOnline, Feb. 27).
Air Berlin CEO Joachim Hunold said during last week's ITB Berlin convention that the airline will operate 15 fewer aircraft during the upcoming summer schedule than it did last year. It currently has 125 in the fleet. He also confirmed AB's intention to investigate the possible sale of its LTU subsidiary ( ATWOnline, March 11) and said a dispute with LTU's pilots is a key factor.
Airline ticket sales through the Arlington, Va.-based Airlines Reporting Corp. plunged for a second month in February as total sales (fares plus taxes, fees and charges) dropped 26.1% year-over-year to $5.32 billion while total fares fell 28.3% to $4.44 billion. The decline followed slumps of 24.7% and 26.6% in sales and total fares respectively in January ( ATWOnline, Feb. 12). International fares were down 29.9% to $2.09 billion while domestic fares decreased 26.5% to $2.36 billion.
Shanghai Airlines Chairman Zhou Chi told a shareholders meeting last week that the 787 does not "fully meet the quality that Boeing touted earlier" and said the carrier is considering cancelling and/or postponing some or all of its nine Dreamliner orders, according to Bloomberg News.
Finnair said it will furlough about 700 pilots for at least one week each beginning in the middle of next month as part of a €30 million ($38.4 million) cost-savings program in the company's flight operations division. Length of leave will depend on aircraft type. Finnair Catering also will place employees on unpaid leave of two weeks to three months as part of a €3.9 million cost-cutting initiative ( ATWOnline, Feb. 6).
Boeing's first 787 moved from the final assembly hall back into the paint shop to be repainted and washed prior to handover to the flight test department. The aircraft must complete a series of "gauntlet tests" that include power, systems and engine tests, each of which must be completed before the next can be started. The tests are expected to take two months. While they are being conducted, ship ZA002 should complete ground vibration testing and the static test airframe should conclude load testing. Meanwhile, the forward fuselage for ship ZA006 was delivered to Everett last week.
MNG Technic won a tender issued by the Turkish airports authority for construction of a new MRO hangar at Istanbul Ataturk. The 64,000-sq.-m. facility will be built in four phases. Construction of the 16,000-sq.-m. first phase will begin "as soon as possible," MNG said. The company provides line and heavy maintenance at its IST base and line maintenance services at airports in Istanbul and Antalya.
China Southern Airlines expects to its 2008 net loss to be worse than previously expected owing largely to its decision to retire older aircraft whose value continues to decrease in the current economic downturn. It said in a filing to the Shanghai Stock Exchange that the impairment "will, to some extent, have a negative impact on the 2008 financial results of the company."
US Airways said it will test the Lumexis Fiber-To-The-Screen IFE system on certain flights. The FTTS fiberoptic technology reduces system weight by up to 50% and can offer high-definition content, the companies said. Inflight Canada designed and monitored the installation of an FTTS system on a US A320 that will serve Phoenix, Atlanta and Orange County.
ALTA member airlines carried 10.6 million passengers in January, up 5.8% from the year-ago month, fueled by strong domestic and Latin American traffic that offset weaker demand to the US and Europe. RPKs rose 3.2% to 15.79 billion against a 4% increase in capacity to 21.58 billion, lowering load factor 0.5 point to 73.1%. US Airways said February consolidated passenger RASM fell 9%-11% year-over-year, although total RASM dropped just 5%-7% thanks to a la carte revenue initiatives. It flew 4.19 billion consolidated RPMs, down 9.3%, against a 9% drop in ASMs to 5.48 billion.
Ryanair CEO Michael O'Leary told a Dublin tourism conference this week that charging for lavatory use "is not likely to happen, but it makes for interesting and very cheap PR." He made worldwide headlines two weeks ago with his proposal to charge passengers £1 ($1.38) per use and continued last week, saying he was "serious" about the move and had discussed implementation with Boeing ( ATWOnline, March 9).
American Airlines announced a new 17-year lease at Dallas Love Field but will suspend American Eagle flights at the airport from June 11 until terminal renovations are complete in 2013. Eagle serves Chicago O'Hare from DAL."We have every intention of returning service to Love Field when the new terminal is completed," AA VP-State and Community Affairs Kevin Cox said. AA does not operate mainline flights at the airport, which is dominated by Southwest Airlines. Separately, Eagle will launch a daily Dallas/Fort Worth-Santa Fe flight on June 11.
Claiming that some airlines are "overreacting" to the current downturn with hasty reductions of their networks, Qatar Airways CEO Akbar Al Baker confirmed that the carrier's winter expansion will include its first services to Australia.
Bmi Group yesterday confirmed a £99.7 million ($137.2 million) loss in 2008, reversed from a £7 million profit the prior year, and said it plans to reduce costs by an additional £45 million this year and is negotiating a pay freeze with employees.
Aegean Airlines' ambitions were checked last week when it was denied the right to purchase rival Olympic Airlines, but the carrier said it has continued on a "healthy and dynamic growth path" and finished 2008 with a €29.5 million ($37.5 million) profit, down only 18% from the €35.8 million earned the previous year.
The US National Transportation Safety Board late Wednesday issued an "urgent safety recommendation" calling for Rolls-Royce to "redesign" the Trent 800's fuel/oil heat exchanger to prevent the fuel feed system icing that is believed to have caused both the uncommanded loss of thrust on a Delta Air Lines 777-200ER last November and the dual rollback that led to the January 2008 British Airways -200ER crash landing at London Heathrow.
Malaysian government finally agreed to fund the construction of a new low-cost terminal at Kuala Lumpur International costing MYR2 billion ($541 million). The promise to build the facility, scheduled to be completed in the second half of 2011, ends an impasse between the government and AirAsia, which had threatened to build its own exclusive airport just east of the capital in order to ease congestion at the current terminal that can handle only 15 million passengers per year ( ATWOnline, Feb. 3).
American Airlines yesterday said that "early speculation" regarding Wednesday's MD-80 JT8D-200 engine failure that led to debris falling on a New York City neighborhood and an emergency landing at New York JFK is that an object was sucked into the engine and damaged fan blades, according to the Associated Press ( ATWOnline, March 12).
Air France KLM confirmed it intends to proceed with an order for approximately 100 long-haul aircraft, although the timeline has been changed slightly owing to the present economic environment. "Air France KLM's plan to launch a call for tenders for around 100 Airbus or Boeing medium-capacity long-haul aircraft, initially scheduled for 2008, is being maintained. The order could be placed by the end of the year, or maybe a little later," a spokesperson told ATWOnline. The group has both Airbus and Boeing aircraft in its long-haul fleet.
CSA Czech Airlines posted a 2008 pre-tax profit of CZK500 million ($23.6 million), compared to a CZK111 million profit in 2007. It said pre-tax earnings under IFRS came to $550,000, reversed from an $8.8 million loss on a similar basis the prior year. It said fuel and currency hedges were the difference and that absent those its fuel expense would have increased by CZK1.2 billion. However, falling demand in the second half of last year cost approximately CZK400 million in lost revenue.
Alaska Airlines and the Assn. of Flight Attendants-CWA announced the ratification of a two-year contract extension (to April 2012) covering 2,830 employees. The amended deal offers a 1.5% pay increase in 2010 and 2011 and participation in a performance-based incentive plan already offered to AS's dispatch and management employees.
