December 2009 Archives

One of the most interesting by-products of the failed attempt on Christmas Day to destroy a Delta Air Lines Airbus A330 is learning about rules issued and reneged by TSA through Twitter.

On 27 December TSA published vague guidance on its website, cautioning passengers that additional security measures were in place, but never specified the exact nature of the changes.

Thanks to carriers like WestJet and Air Canada TSA's guidelines were spelled out more clearly.

Interestingly enough, I learned that the requirement for passengers to stay in their seats for the last hour of flight was lifted through a retweet of a WestJet tweet saying the ban was no longer in place.

Immediately after I saw the Tweet I rang TSA, who declined to confirm the ban was lifted.

An interesting side story has developed after two well-known travel bloggers posted a copy of TSA's directive on their websites. They have now been served subpoenas by TSA special agents. My colleague Mary Kirby has a complete rundown of the story on her Runway Girl blog.

No one is arguing TSA hasn't been crazed the last few days, but is attempting to track down how the directive was leaked really the best of use of resources  when some airlines themselves published portions of the document?   Just yesterday President Obama said that members of the US intelligence community were warned weeks ago  about the suspect that reportedly tried to use explosives to destroy the aircraft, and acknowledged that raises serious concerns.

 Let's hope the administration is committed to forging smart change in intelligence gathering and security enforcement.

As Larry Kellner winds down his tenure at Continental Airlines he is sharing some reflections on the industry he's departing and suggesting changes to its framework.

Kellner joined Continental in 1995 and became CEO in 2004. In July he announced he'd be leaving at the end of the year to start a new private investment firm based in Houston.

I had the chance to sit down with Kellner and Continental's CEO-elect Jeff Smisek in September for an Airline Business interview.

Here is Kellner in his own words, examining the industry's regulatory structure and the future of global alliances. He's leaving Continental as the carrier is launching a transtatlantic joint venture with its new Star Alliance partner and seeks antitrust immunity to develop a transpacific joint venture.

"I think they key issue is that the regulatory structure doesn't work. It doesn't work for employee and labor relations. It is not like this has been a hugely profitable industry for the last 25 years, and so I think you need to step back from a policy standpoint and say how do we put a structure in place that will allow for success and a piece of that is as simple as air traffic control. We've got an industry that's been studying advances in air traffic control for more than 15 years and yet we haven't really made a lot of progress, because we tend to do our best when there's a crisis.....I think we need to figure out a structure that allows for more efficient flow of aircraft, better labor relations and better passenger service."

Still, Kellner believes the core of the business today is much more stronger than it was ten years ago, and sees global alliances gaining dominance in lieu of an easement in foreign ownership restrictions.

"There is a lot of history around why countries want to control their own airline...I think the answer to that is global alliances. I don't see a big willingness to relax foreign ownership restrcitions from where we stand today. But I would have also said two years ago I didn't see serious discussions on open skies with Japan."

"There is a lot of debate in this industry, but one thing I've learned is that policy can actually move fairly quickly once there is a paradigm shift, so I wouldn't rule out some changes."  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

  

As another year passes, and a pretty awful one for the airline sector, the Airline Business editors take a look back at some of the key moments and stories of the year just gone and look at some of the stories that might make the headlines in the year ahead.

Mark Pilling, Airline Business, editor

As a reporter 2009 has been a brilliant year. That's what I always tell people when we bemoan the health of the Airline Business.

I say this because a crisis always sorts out the strong and weak, the best leaders, the worst leaders, the winners and the losers. And the stories that follow from this excitement are always more interesting in my experience than those during the good times.

And this crisis has been spectacular. In particular I would point to the staggering falls in business class traffic and the equally tragic (for the airlines, not the travellers) falls in yields. This more than anything else has holed the fortunes of the network carriers well below the water line.

Another big topic for 2009, and one that had threatened to be overshadowed by the recession, was the environment. It is deeply ironic in my view that the industry is fighting its corner on the environment, and essentially what green measures will cost in the longer term, when it is fighting for its short-term survival.

From the industry's point of view the adoption of a common position across airlines, airports, ATC etc was a ground-breaking move and did a lot to establish it on some moral high ground, at least for the time being. And it seems to have fought off punitive taxes for now.

I give a special mention to the strongly performing Latin American air transport industry in 2009, and especially Enrique Cueto and Pedro Heilbron, the CEOs of Chile's LAN and Panama's Copa Airlines respectively. Both were deserving winners at this magazine's 2009 Airline Strategy Awards and run two of the best airlines around.

Graham Dunn, Airline Business managing editor

For a journalist I think it is harder to look any further than Lufthansa for stories in 2009. The Star Alliance carrier led the consolidation trail with its acquisitions of Austrian Airlines, bmi and Brussels Airlines - and if the latter deal provided little in headlines, the purchases of Austrian and BMI certainly kept us busy. The deal for Austrian, with its last minute dealings with the EC on concessions accompanying the purchase, went right to the wire during the summer. Similarly not only were the twists and turns aplenty in its acquisition of bmi, having acquired it, there were just as many questions about what it intended to do with it - the long-term plans for which are still to be decided. Throw in that also launched two new airlines in 2009 - Milan Malpensa-based Lufthansa Italia and cargo joint venture Aerologic - no airline was busier than the German national carrier.

For the year ahead, I think the focus - especially in Europe - has to be on labour and to what extent the network carriers are able to push through the changes they are seeking to adjust their cost-bases. We've already seen the strain across various airlines in Europe, notably cabin crew strike at BA - aborted at least into the new year. My feeling is it won't be the only run-in airlines have with labour this year.

Lori Ranson, North America Editor - Air Transport Intelligence

Big stories for 2009. Captain Sullenberger's historic ditching of a US Airways A319 into New York's Hudson River. Sullenberger dedicated part of his time in the limelight to express concern that low pilot pay rates could be driving talent away from the industry.

The February 2009 crash of a Colgan Airways Bombardier Q400 that unleashed a wave of scrutiny of US regional airline fatigue management, training and hiring practices.  A proposed pilot fatigue rule is scheduled for publication in January.

Larry Kellner's surprising announcement in July that at 50 he would be vacating the top post at Continental Airlines at year-end. It was interesting to sit down with Kellner and his successor Smisek, who have worked in tandem at Continental for roughly 15 years together and see them interact first hand. .

Southwest's failed attempt to buy its rival in Denver Frontier Airlines, which ultimately led to US regional Republic Airways Holdings buying two branded airlines.  Talking to Bedford in the middle of the competition for Frontier, he hinted at both the cross fleeting planned between Frontier and Midwest and plans to shed Midwest's excessive costs.

The planned merger of El Salvador's  TACA and Colombian carrier Avianca will create the fourth largest airline group in Latin America, and combined will serve over 79 destinations.

Air Canada's previous CEO Montie Brewer steps down suddenly and is replaced by a former executive with the carrier Calin Rovinescu, fueling widespread speculation that a second formal restructuring this decade was imminent. But Rovinescu and Air Canada's management eventually won key concessions from labour groups, won a key reprieve on pension funding and secured a financing package to build a foundation to weather the current economic downturn.

Late in the year American and Delta started a heated competition to take a stake in struggling Japan Airlines, with both carriers and their partners offering substantial financing packages to JAL.  If Delta succeeds JAL will join the SkyTeam alliance, leaving Oneworld with a significant and strategic geographical gap in Asia.

United's decision to split its widebody fleet revamp between Airbus and Boeing ordering a total of 50 A350s and 787s. The carrier heads into 2010 examining its narrowbody options and has reportedly invited Bombardier and Embrarer into those discussions.

What might be in store for 2010. Oneworld carriers seeking anti-trust immunity will weigh accepting DOT's tentative approval of the deal that includes carve-outs. I expect DOT will follow a similar pattern from its approval of the Star Alliance joint venture, which ultimately required carve outs after the US Department of Justice voiced concerns over competition.

Both the Transportation and Justice will co-operate more closely during evaluations of antitrust applications on transpacific routes filed by members of the Star Alliance and Japan Airlines and its yet-to-be antitrust partner.

If JAL chooses Delta, American will mount a ferocious campaign to block anti-trust approval for those carriers.

Overall for the industry the one wildcard is sustained capacity discipline. It will be interesting to see if carriers continue to adhere to conservative growth targets if current positive revenue trends continue.

Victoria Moores, Features Editor, Airline Business

My personal highlight of 2009 would have to be back in February, when I travelled "around the world in eight days" with Virgin entrepreneur Richard Branson. The trip was to flag up the launch of V Australia, which joined the transpacific gap in the Virgin long-haul network.

It's not every day that an opportunity like this comes along, but this trip also stands out because it marked my personal leap into our various social media channels and video content, which became increasingly important as the year progressed.

On the Virgin trip I travelled with our mascot, Stefan the Pilot, who has his own cult following. I began to write for the Airline Business Blog and Twitter through my @VictoriaOnAir account, which I later used to cover the World Low Cost Airlines Congress in Barcelona in real-time.

I also dived into the deep end of video presenting, interviewing Branson on very little sleep, marking the first of many video interviews throughout the year. Our latest Airline Business Debate programme shows just how far we're come and you can be sure we'll be pushing things along still further in 2010.

For the year ahead, I'm keen to see how the relationship between short- and long-haul operations evolves. Low-cost carriers have aggressively taken short-haul market share, putting intense pressure on legacy airline yields and pushing their focus on to long-haul routes.

For a long-haul carrier to be successful you need feed, but for the low-cost model to work you need simplicity. With carriers like British Airways having scaled back their short-haul presence, partly in response to low-cost competition, there's an obvious disconnect there.

How will these two contradictory objectives tie together as we move forward? That's my question for 2010.

A well-known beer here in the UK claims it is "probably the best lager in the world".

Well, in that vein, these are "probably the best Michael O'Leary interviews in the world".

One is of course ours, written from interviews at Ryanair press conferences...

...and the other is from the FT's new transport correspondent Pilita Clark, who remarkably was bought lunch by the Ryanair boss.

Both are, I suggest, worth your time over the festive break if you want a/ some insightful writing b/ an entertaining read.

During Delta's recent investor day carrier CEO Richard Anderson had some interesting things to say about the climate for consolidation in the US.

The comments are timely given Delta closed on its merger deal with Northwest about 13 months ago, and anticipates receiving a single operating certificate by year-end.

Responding to a question about consolidation in the airline industry Anderson says:

"Internationally..it is very pro consolidation. We've seen that in the EU. We've seen it in Asia. In the US I would say the change of administration is decidedly more regulatory focused and we've seen that across the board. While we haven't had a merger transaction obviously presented to the Department of Justice, I would be a bit concerned that this administration would be more activist with respect to anti-trust laws."

Anderson says if a merger transaction did in fact occur, economics should prevail. He also believes how competition is examined in the US industry could also use an overhaul.

"Our competition policy in the US is a bit outdated, because our competition policy tends to focus on city pairs and not effective networks."

He further states that there was a lot of discussion about the Delta-Northwest merger, and if it would trigger anti-competitive effects --

"....none of which was true...so we are actually in the process of getting some papers published from our economists....on the contestability of markets to get people to better understand the network effects in this business and the ease of entry and the ease of exit.."

Here's some testimony from Anderson when he was making the case for the merger to US legislators that touches on some of the competitive aspects raised by combining the two carriers.

...and one of those people is the controversial columnist at the Times/Sunday Times newspapers of the UK Jeremy Clarkson.

Plenty of British humour in here all, but Jeremy's take on travelling overseas at Christmas is a hoot and any piece that manages to get the line "twang the hostesses' suspender belts" gets my vote!

Here's what Jeremy actually looks like for those not in the UK...

And just for the hell of it here is a shot of what BA (well either BOAC or BEA I'll let any of you lot tell us which - my vote goes to BOAC) hostesses looked like back in 1951. "Strike, not in my day!" I hear you cry.

Ryanair has announced that it will display third-party advertising on its boarding cards from early 2010. My first thought was: fair enough, why not?

But then I twigged that Ryanair will be raking in revenues from all angles and outsourcing all of the costs - no surprises there then.

Think about it. Ryanair passengers have to pay £5 per sector for checking in online, or more at the airport. This means that travellers will essentially pay for the privilege of printing this boarding card advertising, using their own ink, on their own home computers.

Ryanair even mentions this in its statement: "This will allow advertisers to reach the 66 million Ryanair passengers that will print their boarding cards from the comfort of their own home next year."

But the Irish budget carrier is keen to stress the passenger benefits: "The revenue from online advertising will help Ryanair to continue to lower fares for its passengers."

So that's alright then...

For an update on the latest airline ancillary trends, see our January edition which will be available in print and online from w/c 22 December.

Last night 2009 claimed another airline casualty: Scottish carrier Flyglobespan's parent went into administration and the airline is ceasing operations today.

In a touch of irony, last year Flyglobespan was at the centre of a spat when Irish gambling website PaddyPower offered odds on a variety of airlines going under. Flyglobespan was its 6:4 favourite as the next carrier to enter administration and cease operating. At the time Flyglobespan chairman Tom Dalrymple rebuffed speculation, sending an open letter to the media outlining the airline's fortunes.

Budget carriers have, as usual, come up with a bunch of rescue packages to help stranded travellers (and boost their own bottom lines) and the union Unite has fired some choice words at the airline's management.

The Unite statement, which landed in journalists' inboxes this morning, accuses Flyglobespan of "shocking mistreatment" of its workers, condemning the company for casting aside its 800 employees and throwing them into "a Christmas of misery with no wages and no job".

I have every sympathy for Flyglobespan's staff and passengers and there is no doubt that the timing is unfortunate, but to accuse management of mistreatment?

It's a painful moment when a company has to admit failure and enter administration. From the outside, rather than mistreatment, this looks like this was an extremely tough - and largely unavoidable - decision.

Your thoughts?

And she's off. The Boeing 787 has just taken to the skies for the first time at around 1830 GMT. Keep an eye on Flightglobal for our latest coverage.

To see the moment in photos, take a look at these early images which we've collected, along with a bit of background on what it took to get here.

Check out the live coverage from our in-house 787 expert Jon Ostrower (Flightblogger), who has been following the programme since its inception.

And here's a link to Boeing's coverage of the event and our data page which has all you need to know about the aircraft.

Congratulations to all over in Seattle!

If you needed any reminder that airlines are operating in a different world now, look no further than the recent auction of paintings and artwork collected by Alitalia in the 1950s and 1960s at Rome's Finarte Casa d'Aste auction house. The collection, comprising around 200 pieces, was hung in its lounges and VIP facilities to illustrate Italian art. The auction raised €1.2 million. The sad sign of the times, of course, is that the proceeds are being used by Augusto Fantozi, administrator of the old Alitalia (the bits that were left behind after the CAI Italian investor group acquired prime assets to relaunch the operation earlier this year), to help pay the former operation's creditors. It might just be me, but I can't help thinking €1.2 million worth of pictures does kind of give a clue about why the airline struggled to make any money in the first place.

It might not be as farfetched as you think. In the span of two days Frontier's new owner Repubic has expressed a direct interest in the CSeries while United has reportedly invited Bombardier and Embraer to chat about its potential narrowbody order next year.

It's well known that United and Frontier have long competed in Denver, and Southwest joined the fray in 2006. But things got more interesting late this year when United's regional partner Republic bought Frontier upon its exit from Chapter 11.

While United characterises Republic as a competitor, the two still seem to have a copasetic relationship, and contracts that run through 2014 and 2019.

But I digress. So now Republic says it is evaluating re-fleeting options for its new branded operations that include Frontier and Midwest, and it's very interested in the CSeries. Its managment is also talking to Airbus and Boeing.

A key manufacturer notably absent from the list of companies Republic CFO Hal Cooper supplied during a 9 December investor presentation was Embraer.

Republic is an E-Jet pioneer, and is the only US regional operating E-170s/175s. Its only involvement with Bombardier aircraft were some CRJ200s it operated for Continental that are cycling out of operation.

I can't imagine that Republic wouldn't include its long-term airframe partner in its discussions about options for the potential replacement of Airbus aircraft currently in operation at Frontier. So, it begs an entirely speculative question. Does Embraer not have an aicraft offering to fit the mission Republic is seeking?

In July Embraer said it could be 18-24 months before it makes decision about its next commercial aircraft project.  Could the latest interest expressed in the CSeries by one of its most long-time and loyal customers hasten that process? 

I understand it is a bit premature to have both United and Frontier competing against each other with the CSeries in Denver.  United's reported interest in inviting Embraer and Bombardier to compete could very well be a tactic to pressure Airbus and Boeing to solidify their narrowbody replacement plans. And Republic could just be playing hardball with Airbus.

But I can't help but think that expressions of interest in the CSeries by AirTran, Mexicana and now Republic have not been ignored by Embraer.  

So, we finally managed to get a cover profile with Michael O'Leary to run in the January edition of Airline Business, which is no mean feat when he labels our audience as "aerosexuals". Charming. Basically we had to get creative. We're going to press next week, so the full, colourful story will be out in print and on the web shortly.

My challenge right now is to track down a copy of Ryanair's route network from 1998 to run with the feature.

Can anyone out there help? Even a list of destinations would do the trick. Apparently Ryanair is so fast-moving that it would be "near impossible" for their press office to help with this request and even more difficult for a journalist to track down the info. Do you fancy proving Ryanair wrong?

Many thanks in advance,

Victoria

News that Andy Harrison is stepping down as easyJet chief executive got me wondering - there do seem to have been an awful lot of changes at the top of European airlines this year. A quick count shows no less than eight out of the top 20 European airlines by revenue in the latest Airline Business airline rankings have changed CEO this year - a mix of moving onward and upward, being pushed out or getting frustrated at the pace of reforms. I don't know if its a record, but I'd wager this is the only time you'll see more changes at the top of Europe's 20 leading carriers then changes in manager at England's 20 premier league clubs in a calendar year (the usually high turnover in football managers I make an unusually low 7 since January including two each at Portsmouth and Newcastle).

Here's a list of who's gone where in 2009 - shout if there are any I have missed!

Top 20 airlines in Europe by revenue (2008)

• Lufthansa - no change though its subsidiary Swiss appointed Harry Hohmeister as its new chief executive in April to replace Christoph Franz, who moved to become Lufthansa's deputy chairman
• Air France-KLM
• British Airways
• Iberia - Fernando Conte resigned in July, replaced by Antonio Vazquez
• SAS Group
• Air Berlin
• THY Turkish Airlines
• EasyJet - Andrew Harrison to step down summer 2010
• Virgin Atlantic
• Ryanair
• Aeroflot - Valery Okulov replaced in April by Vitaly Savelyev
• Austrian Airlines - Alfred Otsch quit in January, replaced by Peter Malanik and Andreas Bierwirth
• Finnair - Jukka Hienonen announced he was quitting in July amid frustrations in pushing through reforms with the unions. Telecom executive Mika Vehvilainen will takeover in Feburary next year
• TAP Portugal
• Aer Lingus - Dermot Mannion stepped down from the struggling carrier in April and has since been succeeded by Christoph Mueller
• Cargolux
• Condor
• BMI - Jet Airways chief executive Wolfgang Prock-Schauer took over as BMI chief executive in October following Lufthansa's acquisition of the carrier, with former CEO Nigel Turner becoming deputy chairman
• Air Europa
• S7 Airlines - Vladislav Filev moved up to take the top job at S7 Group and was succeeded at the airline by first deputy general director Vladimir Ob'edkov
  

Here is an interesting slide from Continental's presentation today at the Next Generation Equity Research airlines conference.

Good reference of a large number of financing deals done in the second half of the year.

*UPDATE*

A quick follow-up on this - the UK climate change committee has delivered its view on the compatibility of aviation growth and the UK's environmental targets - and believes passenger demand must be limited to a 60% rise on 2005 figures if it is to meet 2050 carbon targets. But while much of the coverage centres on a third runway for Heathrow - the report demonstrated the effect on demand that could be achieved if expansion is limited to London Heathrow, London Stansted and Edinburgh - the committee insists it is "agnostic" as to where airport expansion takes place. Read our story from ATI on this here and check out the full CCC report here

Plenty of talk about on aviation and the climate change issue at the moment with the start of the UN climate change talks in Copenhagen and the release of a number of relevent reports in the UK on the future strategy for its aviation sector.

First up today were the findings of a UK cross-party parliamentary transport committee which backed development of a third runway at Heathrow and suggested Gatwick might be a better choice for an additional runway for London, if required, then Stansed as current earmarked. It also suggested the EU's emissions trading scheme, which aviation joins from 2012, might prove a weak tool for pushing development of low-carbon air transport.

Meanwhile tomorrow the UK's Committee on Climate Change will deliver its view on how UK aviation emissions can be constrained up to 2050 in order to contribute to efforts to tackle climate change. And if that's not enough, the Carbon Trust will formally publish its report on the likely economic impact on the airline industry of entry into the emissions trading scheme - for more on how they think some airlines could even increase profitability as a result, click here.

But of course the bigger picture, and dominating all the headlines today (and for the next two weeks no doubt), is Copenhagen, where global leaders meet to try and reach a successor agreement to Kyoto. Precisely what agreements emerge from Copenhagen in two weeks time, and how this impacts the aviation sector, is anyone's guess (imagine 192 people trying to carve up the bill after a meal out - who had extra garlic bread? Who only had tap water? I didn't have a starter and I left before pudding!)

For its part the aviation sector, which is pushing for a global sectoral approach and has set its own long-term targets, continues to press its case hard. And in particular it will be hoping to avoid aviation becoming subject to a tax, as a mechanism for helping to fund climate change projects in developing nations, along the lines of the International Air Passenger Adaptation Levy proposal floated by the Maldives on behalf of the group of least developed countries last year. You can read more about the airline response to such concerns in this FT report here.

If you were on board Lufthansa's flight LH4729 from London Heathrow yesterday, then you'd have been left in no doubt about why the aircraft left Terminal 1 well after its scheduled 13:55 departure time.

In a marvellously restrained cabin rant (listen here) the fed-up A320 pilot ignored don't-mention-the-war-on-terror conventions, pinning the blame squarely on Heathrow security procedures and encouraging his passengers to kick up a fuss with operator BAA:

"It is my pleasure to welcome you on board on behalf of the entire crew for the flight to Frankfurt. I'm extremely sorry about travelling so late today. The reason for the late arrival of the crew at this aircraft was that we were held up in a security post here at Heathrow Airport for almost 45 minutes.

 

"For some reason the checks that we have to go through now unfortunately were extremely unefficient (sic) today, taking much longer than usual, and that is the reason for the late arrival here. I will, of course, report the situation to all Lufthansa's departments concerned with that - but if you want to give us some help here, please direct your complaints to British Airport Authority because this is actually a situation that nobody should accept for granted here.

 

"We'll do everything we can to take you now to Frankfurt as quickly as possible under these circumstances and I hope you will feel comfortable on board in spite of this."

Now the Internet is prone to all sorts of misleading mischief but I've no reason to believe this recording is anything but genuine, and a quick look at flight-tracking data suggests that LH4729 did indeed leave at 14:32, some 37min late, and that the crew managed to make up some of that time by arriving 18min behind schedule.

No word from BAA on whether it's received any German-postmarked advice on where it can shove its metal detectors.

I have reached a new low: Making a special trip to take photographs and video of aircraft at an airport.

I do have an excuse: Mike Targett the editor of Flightglobal asked me because he knew I would be in one of the best places in the world to do it, and he knows a lot of our Flightglobal audience love it.

And I've got to admit it was fine, especially as there was a beach, sun, beer and chips.

Here are the results, and we've got video which we'll process shortly.

This first shot is the aircraft most people at Maho Beach in St Maarten were waiting for: an Air France A340. As you can see the beach is narrow and there is a sandy road in between the beach and the runway threshold fence.

The aircraft roar in just metres above the sun-seekers here at this Caribbean island. And the landing spectacle is clearly a popular local attraction.

There is an old surf board mounted in the sand telling the bar dwellers what time the aircraft are scheduled to arrive.

And it is not just jetliners of course. Here's a Winair Twin Otter.

US Airways makes it in as well.

And notice those warning signs - here's a close-up.

Flightblogger eat your heart out mate!

The Sticky Wicket in question is literally a stone's throw from VC Bird International Airport in Antigua. This fine establishment, which is a bar/restaurant just over the road from the airport, was recommended to me by former LIAT CEO Mark Darby as he knew I had a couple of hours to kill before my connecting flight to St Maarten.

Now he should know as he's just spent three years or so running Antigua-based LIAT, which operates a fleet of Bombardier Dash 8-300s around the Caribbean islands. This shot shows a couple of LIAT's Dash 8s and one still in Caribbean Star colours at VC Bird (the two carriers were merged a while back).

Coming off the British Airways 777 from Gatwick I started snapping a few shots but got the eye from security so I can't show you the guy with the mike welcoming travellers to Antigua along with his reggae band. That was one of the warmest welcomes I ever had to a country I must say.

Anyhow, here is the ramp at VC Bird.

For more on Mark Darby's adventures at LIAT read the stories he wrote for Airline Business here. Mark's first 100 days at LIAT.

And the reason for all this Caribbean activity is I am here for the Airline Business Network Latin America event, which brings together airlines and airports from around the Caribbean and across Latin America to discuss new routes.

Mark Darby is moderating the conference session here on Monday morning.

Come back for more about the event over the next couple of days.

Korean Air chairman and chief executive Cho Yang-ho was in London yesterday to mark the formal launch of the new multimedia guide handsets at the British Museum, which the SkyTeam carrier is sponsoring. The multimedia guides provides information on 220 objects in the museum in 11 languages, including Korean of course, and follows on from the carrier's recent sponsorship of the multimedia guide at the Louvre in Paris and a Korean language track at the State Hermitage Museum in St Petersburg. "It is a way they can access the art objects of the world in Korean," says Cho (pictured left using the new guide). "When I was young I went backpacking around Europe. Then there were guides in many languages, other than Korean. This provides an opportunity now to do so."

To further underline the initiative, Korean is adorning one of its Boeing 747-400s with images featuring artworks from the museum (see below)

And here's a link to a video showing the aircraft being repainted.

Korean is due to start taking its first Airbus A380s - its has ten on order - in December next year and expects Seoul-London to be one of the routes the ultra-large aircraft will be deployed on. "We will allocate this on the bigger markets and London is one of those," says Cho, indicating these would be operating on the route in time for the London Olympics in 2012.

You can find out more about Cho's ambitions for Korean Air by reading the Airline Business cover interview from July this year here. And, as the British Museum was looking particularly stunning in some rare London sunlight, here is a pic of its centre-piece roof.

Continental's traffic figures are always closely examined as the carrier posts unit revenue performance for the month. The airline is also ususally among the first to release traffic data, and industry analysts today have already supplied their assessment of the carrier's performance in November.

FTN Equity Capital analyst Michael Derchin predicts a consolidated revenue per available seat mile (RASM) at Continental fell 6% last month, while JP Morgan analyst Jamie Baker estimates a consolidated unit revenue drop of 7.5%.

While those numbers are far from pleasing they are a marked improvement from consolidated RASM decreases of 14-15% in October and a 19.2% slide in September.

The sequential 7.4% improvement in US mainline carrier revenue from September to October was encouraging to Baker, who sees it as clear evidence a recovery is under way. He explains you'd have to return to prior recovery periods to see a similar level of improvement, such as the 2003 post-war start of 8.6% or the post-SARS 9.8% improvement the follow year.

That improvement should carry over into next year as JP Morgan expects mainline revenue to grow 8.5% following a 19.5% drop this year as total revenue should rise 7.5% compared with a 17% plummet this year.

So what's driving this? Baker says JP Morgan gets constantly challenged by investors, which is welcome, about the company's confidence in a recovery. "The answer is simple," he says. "If one assumes typical 2005-2008 'monthality' from here, 2010 mainline revenue should naturally translate into a 5% to 7% 'improvement (versus our +8.5%) simply by lapping the breakdown in sequential trends witnessed during the first half of 2009."