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Aviation History
1987
1987 - 0070.PDF
AIR TRANSPORT Europeans press for US domestic access WASHINGTON D.C. Foreign airlines are putting increased pressure on the US Department of Trans portation to allow them to carry domestic American traffic, both passenger and cargo, although US laws forbid it. According to a Boston securities analyst, the foreign flag carriers are willing to open their own markets to US airlines if it will enable them to gain access to US markets. Dan Kasper, analyst for Harbridge House in Boston, told the regional airlines at their recent meeting that foreign flag carriers will be pushing hard for domestic US rights during the coming 18 months. The fact that many US airlines have what amounts to domestic rights in Europe will help gain foreign carriers similar rights in the USA, he said. American carriers are strongly resisting the foreign flag carrier initiatives in this area, Kasper said. Even so, he predicted that the foreign airlines will gain some entrance to US domestic routes by the end of this century, if not sooner. Few regional carriers are able to benefit from a direct traffic exchange agreement with foreign flag carriers, the RAA audience of airline executives was told. Foreign carriers operate too • few frequencies into any one US city to make such a traffic- sharing agreement profitable, Kasper said. In addition, a regional that wants to carry foreign flag traffic over a domestic route could only do so, under present US laws, if rights to the route are also held by the foreign carrier. *//f* ^^LJ. /% J9?J §§i IllSifa ." If ATfONAf ft CAN AD h Shfc1' j$» Fuselage fares Nationair, mainly a charter specialist until recently, begins its low-price scheduled services between Montreal and Brussels on May 3. It is committed to a C$299 one-way fare for at least as long as it takes to hire a painter to change the livery, which displays the fare in large numbers on the aircraft fuselage. Later this year the Montreal-based Canadian carrier intends to start a similar service to London Gat wick. The airline started as a charter operation in 1984. EIAI breaks losing streak TEL AVIV El Al Israel Airlines expects a net profit of at least $10 million in fiscal year 1986/87, after nine years of losses. "The profit may be even higher," a company source tells Flight. A few weeks ago the Israeli Government agreed to contri bute to the national airline's security budget with a grant of $15 million for the current year. El Al is now evaluating service frequencies to a number of destinations in North America and Europe. Jacob Yaron, El Al's vice- president commercial, says: The goal is to operate more flights to destinations with "a promising potential". He added that Los Angeles is one of the US destinations that seems to merit a daily flight instead of the present two services a week. European routes are also to be re-evaluated. A decision already made is to operate direct flights to Manchester in the UK from July. The two weekly flights to this desti nation are now combined with flights to Amsterdam or Brussels. Two 757s will be delivered to El Al by the end of this year, configured with 164 seats in economy class and 24 seats in business. In the coming months El Al will have to decide on what type of aircraft to buy to cope with the steadily growing traffic. The candidates are the 767-300ER, more 757s, or more 747s. Several hundred staff of the Belgian national carrier Sabena went on strike on March 19 over pay and condi tions. Many flights were can celled over the next few days, with a skeleton service being run through the airline's char ter subsidiary, Sobelair. The dispute is rooted in a 15 per cent pay cut that the staff took in 1982, in order to stop the airline going bankrupt. The workers believed that it was time that their full pay was restored. On March 25, after a number of employees had slowly drifted back to work, the strike came to an end. The management agreed to restore 10 points of the 15 per cent cut over three years, in increments of about 3j per cent. However, the retirement age has also been raised from 55 to 57 (53 to 55 for women). Sabena president Carlos Van Rafelghem says that early retirement costs Sabena about Belgian francs 1,000 million ($26 million), and says that the airline cannot afford to maintain it, • Maersk Air's pilots have been working to rule in support of a 40 per cent pay rise. They want salaries in line with those of pilots with other Scandinavian carriers. Maersk says few flights have been cancelled, although some have been delayed. Controllers prepare for union WASHINGTON D.C. The US Federal Aviation Administration's 12,500 air traffic controllers are expected to begin voting next month on whether to accept the National Air Traffic Controllers Association to be their union for collective bargaining purposes. Unions of government workers are prevented by law from striking, but they can be effective in handling work- related grievances, of which the FAA's controllers seem to have a growing number, mostly concerning enforced overtime and excessive hours. The election will be held between May 6 and June 10 by the Federal Labour Relations Authority. The previous con trollers' union—the Profes sional Air Traffic Controllers Organisation (Patco)—was decertified as a union and most of its members were fired by the FAA after it led an illegal strike in 1981. FLIGHT INTERNATIONAL, 11 April 1987
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