Air New Zealand is suspending services between Auckland and Vanuatu in light of on-going concerns about the condition of the runway at Port Vila International Airport. General Manager Flight Operations Stephen Hunt says, “The condition of the runway at Port Vila has been gradually deteriorating and we have taken the difficult decision to suspend services before the situation becomes unsaf...
S7 Airlines, a member of the oneworld® global aviation alliance®, announces opening new flights to Rhodes Island (Greece). Air tickets are already available for purchase. S7 Airlines will operate direct flights from Moscow to Rhodes from 28 April 2016 up to three times a week – on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays. Flight S7-617 will depart from the Moscow Domodedov...
Turkey will offer jet fuel subsidies for flights to five of its tourist hot spots as part of its efforts to safeguard tourism revenue after a suicide bombing in Istanbul last week killed 10 German tourists. Airlines will receive USD$6,000 per flight to Antalya, Alanya, Dalaman, Bodrum and Izmir during the start of the tourism season in April and May, Turkey's tourism minister, Mahir Unal sa...
As a commercial venture, Concorde was a several-billion dollar failure. Between its introduction in 1976 and retirement 27 years later, the world’s only in-service supersonic airliner was only ever flown – as a loss-leader – by the national airlines of the two countries that led its development. Yet as a technological triumph and icon of aviation, it has never been surpassed, del...
Bahraini flag carrier Gulf Air has confirmed its future narrowbody fleet plan, adjusting a previous order with Airbus to sign up for an increased fleet of Neo-series A320s and A321s. To be delivered from June 2018, the new assets will include 17 A321neo and 12 A320neo aircraft, with the deal worth an estimated $3.4 billion. No engine choice has been announced. Detailed during the B...
Emirates plans to upgrade its Dubai (DXB) - Washington D.C. (IAD) service, with the introduction of its flagship Airbus A380 on the route beginning February 1. Daily Flights to Washington, D.C with the Emirates A380 Replacing the existing Boeing 777-300ER used on this route, the A380 will serve the strong customer demand and restore route capacity following United Airlines’ planned withdr...
United Airlines has ordered 40 Boeing 737-700s as part of its programme to retire small regional jets. Deliveries of the 737s will begin in the middle of 2017 and will allow the Chicago-based carrier to reduce its fleet of 50-seat aircraft by more than half by 2019, it says. United had 256 50-seat regional jets at the end of 2015. "These aircraft are an efficient way to mee...
The aircraft manufacturer set a new record of deliveries with 88 aircraft. It received 76 firm orders and 81 options. It passed the threshold of 200 operators. ATR achieved a new record turnover in 2015, increasing to 2 billion dollars (2014: 1.8 billion). During the year, the aircraft manufacturer also set a new record in terms of aircraft deliveries, with a total of 88 aircraft (2014:...
A jury today ordered a Van Nuys-based aviation firm to pay $1.86 million to a former top saleswoman for the company, who alleged she was stalked on business trips by a then-FBI agent/client. A Los Angeles Superior Court jury deliberated for less than a day before finding that 47-year-old Doreen Olson Mackey was a victim of sexual harassment and retaliation in her lawsuit against Helinet Aviatio...
A newly launched European airline association wants the European Union to reform its regulations to bring down the cost of using airports in the region. Airlines for Europe, or A4E, founded by IAG, Air France-KLM, easyJet, Lufthansa and Ryanair, said a new study showed that charges at the largest 21 European airports have risen 80 percent since 2005, with a 90 percent increase at the 10 biggest...
GE Aviation will build the advanced turboprop engine for Textron Aviation’s new turboprop single at a development, test and engine production headquarters planned in the Czech Republic. Dubbed the GE Turboprop Center of Excellence, the facility is expected to open in 2020 to develop and manufacture new turboprop engines in the 1,000- to 2,000-shp range, including the 1,300-shp powerplant for...
Weather that sharply deteriorated from VFR to IFR conditions surprised a possibly tired crew that lacked specific training for the Citation 560 XLS+, leading to spatial disorientation. That was the conclusion of Brazil's Cenipa in its final report on the Aug. 13, 2014 crash that killed all seven aboard the airplane carrying Eduardo Campos and members of his presidentia...
Starting this month, North American FBOs, airports and others with an interest in aircraft ground handling will have a new option when it comes to moving aircraft with the debut of the TugMaxxe line of remote-operated tug vehicles (ROTV). The system, developed in Germany by TNA Aviation Technologies, has been in use elsewhere for more than a decade, with approximately 3,000 devices...
Quest Aircraft's parent Setouchi Holdings has sold a 12.5% stake in the Kodiak single-engined turboprop manufacturer to fellow Japanese company Mitsui. The equity sale gives Sandpoint, Idaho-based Quest more than $10 million in much-needed investment to help it expand its product portfolio and grow its share of the global utility aircraft market. “This investment is great...
London Oxford Airport has been awarded two new accreditations. Its OxfordJet FBO has become one of the first FBO’s in the UK to receive the International Standard for Business Aircraft Handling (IS-BAH). The airport’s OxfordJet FBO passed the highly stringent audit in December following an external assessment by an IBAC-accredited (International Business Aviation Council) auditor, w...
The world’s leading provider of global mobile satellite communications services, Inmarsat, has opened its new Singapore office, which is the company’s largest facility in Asia Pacific region. Inmarsat’s investment in the 1,700 sq metre (19,500 sq feet) office in Toa Payoh, Central Region Singapore, sees the company’s regional hub providing a new solutions lab, demonstrat...
There is one certainty for Abigail Comber, head of customer for British Airways, and it is this: passengers who fly business and first expect a good night’s sleep before they land. “We want people to walk off a plane feeling they’ve had a great experience and they’re fully ready for whatever lies ahead,” says Comber, who has been with BA since 2002 and overseen all...
Germany is continuing to promote the creation of a multinational pool of up to 20 NH90 rotorcraft to be used for combat medevac missions. It first floated the idea in late 2014 amid contract revision talks with the NH Industries consortium which resulted in it retaining 20 options for the troop transport helicopter. Maj Gen Thomas Marlow, commander of the German army’s rapid forces div...
Bell Helicopter begins 2016 with final assembly of its V-280 next-generation tiltrotor 23% complete and on target for first flight in September 2017, with the next major milestones being mating of the wing and fuselage in April. The company’s VP of advanced tiltrotor systems Vince Tobin says the straight, composite wing for the US Army technology demonstrator is almost fabricated, includi...
Thai Airways International will postpone delivery of 14 widebody aircraft originally scheduled to enter the fleet between 2016 and 2018. The 14 aircraft comprise 12 Airbus A350-900s and two Boeing 787-9s, says a company spokeswoman. “This resulted from decisions put forth by the State Enterprise Policy Committee (SEPO) that advised [Thai] to be cautious of introducing new aircra...
Ryanair, Europe’s favourite airline, today (20 Jan) announced that it has negotiated 5 year pay and conditions deal with all of its 76 cabin crew bases across Europe, following the successful conclusion of similar 5 year deals at all 76 pilot bases. Following weeks of direct negotiations between Ryanair and its elected cabin crew representatives, using long established collective bargaining...
