All Ops & safety articles – Page 1228
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News
Delta defers 777s as pilots pay protest proves costly
Delta Air Lines has deferred delivery of its remaining Boeing 777s on order and has decided to sell or lease two already in operation. The airline blames an ongoing dispute with its pilots and cites their failure to accept new pay rates and work rules for the aircraft type. ...
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UK cargo's agenda
As US-UK passenger talks begin, UK cargo carriers are pressurising the USA to include their demands on wetleasing rules in any new bilateral. The British Cargo Alliance (BCAA) points out that US cargo carriers "have a large and profitable business" leasing freighters to airlines such as British Airways - ...
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SAir reacts to Air France/Delta
The official confirmation of Air France's alliance with Delta Air Lines has provoked a sudden burst of activity from the US carrier's existing European partner Swissair. That included the announcement of plans to accelerate moves towards a "merger" with Sabena. Delta and Air France say that their deal, which ...
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Mixed results from Asia-Pacific
Year-end results for Asia-Pacific's airline groups were not universally bad but the struggle is not over yet. Asia-Pacific airline executives many well remember 1998 as the year of red ink. And for the region as a whole, it was certainly the toughest in recent memory. But as the year-end financial ...
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Fragmented ATC blamed for delays
Peter Bennet/VIENNA Europe's fragmented air traffic control (ATC) system is to blame for record breaking delays in Europe's airline industry, according to the Association of European Airlines (AEA). March was the worst month on record for punctuality, with more than a third of intra-European departures delayed, according to AEA ...
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Australia eases foreign entry
Canberra has rejected a proposal to give cabotage rights to foreign carriers, but has approved recommendations designed to ease the entry of foreign airlines into Australia. Australia's federal cabinet gave its verdict on proposals to liberalise Australian aviation policy put forward by a government-appointed productivity commission. Qantas and ...
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Cathay narrowly averts pilots strike
Nicholas Ionides ATI/SINGAPORE Cathay Pacific Airways narrowly avoided an all-out pilots' strike early in June by reaching an eleventh-hour agreement with cockpit crew on forced wage cuts. Cathay Pacific is widely seen as having won its longstanding dispute with cockpit crew over new contract terms, after narrowly averting an all-out ...
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The tie that binds
The game is far from over for the global airline grouping, as Delta's deal with Air France demonstrates. But if there is more realignment to come, the SAirGroup is putting its trust in old-fashioned equity. The course of love never did run smooth. Neither, it seems, do the course ...
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Circling the globe
Jackie Gallacher Antitrust immunity has allowed many of the global alliances to pursue schedule co-ordination and joint pricing initiatives. But as the "customer-driven" oneworld hopes to prove, there is still plenty alliances can do without it. There are no prizes for identifying the main landmark in airline strategy over ...
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Flying out of control
After years of restraint, carriers in Europe appear once more to be raising capacity faster than underlying demand. Yields have already come under pressure and the leading industry indicators being monitored by Airline Business and Commerzbank suggest that there could be worse to come. Last year it seemed that the ...
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French gamble on growth
Are Air France's fortunes looking up? Strong fourth quarter performance partially compensated for the pilots strike of mid-1998, limiting the damage to a 11% drop in profits. Higher load factors, meanwhile, have been aided by transatlantic codeshares and the its expanding Charles de Gaulle hub. The carrier has ...
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USA and UK revisit open skies talks
Talks on a new US-UK liberalised aviation bilateral agreement are due to resume at the start of July, but the hosts in Washington DC remain cautious about the likely outcome of this latest round. Talks were set to restart in mid-June but were cancelled by the UK Government, which said ...
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A touch of Swiss prudence
Jackie Gallacher/BRUSSELS Sabena is back in profit and experiencing one of the fastest growth rates in the industry. But under Swiss chief executive, Paul Reutlinger, there has been little fanfare surrounding the transformation. For a man who has just steered a foundering european flag carrier back to profits, Sabena's Paul ...
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surfing for value
Nancy Schwartz and Michael Zea at Mercer Management Consulting in Washington DC Many airlines have begun using the Internet to market and distribute their products, but few have yet made a success of the medium. Internet-related market value has exploded over the past few years, especially in the USA, so ...
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India agrees to fund Saras 14-seat turboprop
The Indian Government has cleared Rs1.3 billion ($30 million) for the manufacture of the Saras twin turboprop, India's first indigenous venture into civil aircraft production. Following cabinet approval in June, the government-owned National Aerospace Laboratories (NAL) and its partners will begin work on two prototypes of the 14-seat light ...
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Airbus sets targets for A3XX definition and line location
Max Kingsley-Jones/PARIS Airbus Industrie aims to complete the baseline definition of the A3XX programme by the end of this year and to finalise the selection of the assembly location and production method. This will ensure that the consortium is ready to begin taking commitments early next year in preparation for ...
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Airbus expects bigger share of corporate business with A319CJ
Max Kingsley-Jones/PARISAirbus Industrie is gearing up to take a bigger slice of the business jet market with its A319 Corporate Jetliner (ACJ), as the first one is prepared for service with UK sales and leasing company Twinjet. Airbus vice-president, commercial operations, Paul Mason says that 14 commitments have been made ...
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Upgrade will extend lives of 747 Classics
KLM and Canadian Marconi are finalising details of a turnkey cockpit upgrade package to offer operators of Boeing 747 Classics. The move follows the experience gained by the partners on the programme to upgrade KLM's own fleet of 747 Classics. The Dutch airline became the first to commit to ...
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Airlink accident
An Airlink Airlines Embraer EMB-110 Bandeirante (P2-ALX) crashed on 17 June on a flight in Papua New Guinea, killing all 17 on board. The flight from Lae to Goroka crashed about 20km (11nm) short of its destination. Source: Flight International