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Fall In Air Passengers Blamed On Poor Weather
A sharp fall in airline passenger figures last month has been blamed on bad weather and bank holiday disruption.
Airport chiefs expected a modest 3.5 per cent decrease compared with a year ago, after recent months showed the decline prompted by the economic downturn was slowing.
But they claimed wet and windy conditions — which delayed flights over the final weekend in August — were responsible for a heavy 5.3 per cent loss (3,670 people) borne out in the latest figures.
Isle of Man Airport director Ann Reynolds said she was ‘disappointed’ by the drop from 69,222 flyers in August 2008 to 65,552 last month, as it is traditionally the busiest time of the year.
She said: ‘The economic downturn continues to affect the whole of the aviation industry.
‘But we were hopeful our peak month of August would reflect the recent trends of a recovery in passenger numbers.
‘The Island, like the UK, has not experienced the best weather during August and this has perhaps turned people’s heads towards warmer climates, despite the economic situation.
‘Operational disruption due to the weather at the end of the month compounded this effect.’
The hardest-hit routes were Luton, Southampton and Glasgow, which lost a third of passengers on average.
Operators Flybe and Loganair cut the frequency and capacity of flights on these routes last year in response to falling demand.
Numbers on Manx2’s Belfast International route were down by almost a quarter.
Loganair’s Edinburgh route was down by almost a fifth and losses were also recorded to Gatwick (16.6 per cent), Dublin (13.3 per cent) and Manchester (12 per cent).
Newcastle and Birmingham suffered much smaller drops than expected (13 per cent and 6.5 per cent) after Eastern Airways pulled out of the Isle of Man.
This was thanks to Manx2’s replacement Newcastle route and Flybe’s increased Birmingham services.
The big success story was Aer Arann’s London City service, filling the gap left by VLM, which saw almost four-and-a-half times as many people use the route (from 936 to 5,075).
Travellers to Blackpool went up by a quarter and there were smaller increases for Gloucester (9.9 per cent), Liverpool (3.7 per cent) and Leeds (2.1 per cent).
Services to the Channel Islands on Blue Islands were holding steady, with a loss of only eight passengers (down from 770 to 762).
Transport Minister David Anderson MHK said he remained ‘cautiously optimistic’ about the future.
He said: ‘August was not as good as we had hoped, but the underlying trend still shows a gradual recovery.
‘As businesses return after the summer holiday period, we are hopeful the vital business traffic that airlines need as the foundation for their routes will improve in September.’
British Airways To Take Christmas Strike Cabin Crew To Court
British Airways goes to court today in a desperate bid to get the Christmas strike by cabin crew ruled illegal.
The 12-day walkout could cost loss-making BA £30million a day and ruin the airline. It will also wreck Christmas travel plans for more than a million passengers.
Many were yesterday scrambling to book with other airlines. But increased demand has led to carriers bumping prices even higher and thousands of travellers will be priced out.
Cheapest flights from London to New York on December 22 – first day of the strike, returning on December 27 – were quoted at £1,485 with American Airlines.
Virgin wanted £1,517 and United Airlines £3,222. All are much higher than usual.
Last night BA chief executive Willie Walsh said: “We do not want to see a million Christmases ruined.” But union Unite said passengers were being held hostage to “a madhouse macho management”.
The decision to go to court came after a tense day. BA gave Unite until 2pm to call off the strike by 12,500 crew over job cuts, pay and conditions.
But the deadline passed and BA was heading for the industry’s biggest continuous strike. Bosses said legal action was needed to protect customers.
Lawyers are expected to argue this afternoon that there were irregularities in the strike ballot which made the resounding nine-to-one in favour vote invalid.
They will seek an injunction, claiming Unite failed to respond to three letters pointing out alleged flaws. Mr Walsh said: “Unite was told about the problems on Friday. Yet it cynically went ahead with an extreme, highly publicised threat to our customers.”
Derek Simpson, joint general secretary of Unite, said: “Christmas travel is being held hostage by a macho management which prefers imposition and confrontation, or even litigation, to negotiation. If BA suspend contractual changes we’ll suspend the strike.
“That is the choice – a pause for peace or madhouse macho management.”
Yesterday airline managers were trying to find crew willing to work during the strike.
It is believed BA wants to keep lucrative long-haul transatlantic routes open.
Some passengers yesterday vowed never to fly BA again as they left for holidays that could be ruined. Sarah and John Sims, from Shalford, Surrey, said they were unable to get alternative flights to Cape Town.
Mr Sims, 49, said: “We just have to go and see. I certainly won’t fly BA again.”
Roger Withey, from Bath, travelling to Saudi Arabia with wife Maureen said: “We are due back on December 27 and if we are stranded, we will not be very pleased.”
The strike – the first by cabin crew in 12 years – comes after BA lost £401m last year and notched up £292m losses for the six months to September, the worst results in its history.
Airline Flight Service Cut Seat Capacity
Delta Air Lines Inc., trimming costs because of a “global economic recession,” said it will cut seating capacity by as much as 8 percent in 2009 and eliminate an unspecified number of jobs.
Domestic capacity at the world’s largest carrier will be pared by as much as 10 percent and international flying by up to 5 percent compared with 2008. The 75,000-person payroll will fall as a result, Delta said today in a regulatory filing.
The cuts extend this year’s second-half pullback in U.S. flying of at least 10 percent at each of the biggest carriers as economic growth slows. Atlanta-based Delta said the new projections take into account the year-over-year impact of the previous retrenchment.
“We have seen a fairly significant dropoff in demand, starting in October,” President Ed Bastian said on a Webcast of a Credit Suisse Group AG airline conference in New York. “The revenue environment is as cloudy as it’s ever been. We’ve never seen the level of demand destruction that some are forecasting for our business.”
Delta will offer “voluntary programs” to shrink its workforce as it reduces flying, Bastian and Chief Executive Officer Richard Anderson told employees in a memo. A spokeswoman, Betsy Talton, said no details were available.
Buyouts allowed Delta to cut 4,000 jobs this year, or about 7.3 percent of its total before buying Northwest Airlines Corp. in October. That was double the number of reductions it initially targeted. Northwest eliminated 2,500 jobs, or 8.1 percent of its payroll.
Shares Gain
Delta rose 14 cents, or 1.8 percent, to $8.10 at 9:31 a.m. in New York Stock Exchange composite trading. The shares fell 47 percent this year before today.
The total seating-capacity cuts will be in a range of 6 percent to 8 percent, Delta said. Reducing the number of available seats helps airlines improve unit revenue, or revenue for each seat flown a mile.
While industrywide unit revenue historically hasn’t dropped by more than 2 or 3 percentage points in any year, Delta is “anticipating obviously a much greater degree of revenue leaving the industry on a short-term basis,” Bastian said.
Automotive customers have slashed travel budgets, while the pharmaceutical and energy industries have been resilient, he said.
“These economic hurdles are difficult, and we remain committed to building our company on a durable financial foundation,” Bastian and Anderson said in the memo.
Delta said it will end this year with about $5.6 billion in cash, including $1.1 billion in collateral it must put up to cover fuel hedges. If crude oil prices remain around $50 a barrel, Delta would have a $5 billion benefit in 2009, Bastian said.
Qantas Airways to Investigate Damage Tire of Airbus A380 Landed in Sydney
Airbus A380 aircraft owned by Qantas Airways was damaged when it landed at Sydney airport. The plane suffered damage to the aircraft tires. When the plane landed ban sparks a worrying issue of passenger aircraft.
Witnesses reported seeing flames and hearing a loud bang as flight QF32 touched down late on Wednesday, while media said two tyres burst. Video footage showed bright flashes from under the plane.
None of the 244 passengers was hurt in the incident, which comes just a day after a Boeing 747 was forced to abort a flight from Sydney to Singapore.
“On landing last night, two tyres were damaged. The aircraft was assessed on the runway by engineers and it was determined it was unable to be towed to the gate,” a Qantas spokeswoman told AFP.
“Therefore passengers were disembarked and taken to the terminal by bus.”
An airport worker told Sydney’s Daily Telegraph that he feared the worst when he saw the dramatic landing.
“I thought there was a serious crash, there were sparks and flames shooting out everywhere,” he was quoted as saying.
“And the noise was deafening, like cannons going off. I really thought something catastrophic had happened.”
The Qantas spokeswoman said the incident was “completely unrelated” to Tuesday’s engine surge, which forced the 747 to turn back shortly after take-off.
“This is the first time this has happened to one of our A380 aircraft,” she said of the latest mishap. “Engineers are looking into it.”
source : AFP
Airlines Company To Develop Flight Services, New Italian Airline Brand
Lufthansa today said it plans to launch Lufthansa Italia, a new Italian airline brand that would use a fleet of Airbus A319 aircraft to serve such European destinations as Paris and Barcelona from Milan as soon as February 2009.
The announcement comes amid an ongoing bid for a stake in the Italian carrier Alitalia, in which Lufthansa and Air France are the chief rivals. Italian consortium CAI last week finalized a deal to purchase the assets of the long-suffering Italian flag carrier for more than €1 billion in cash and assumed debt, with plans to relaunch the airline next month and the potential for one of those foreign carriers as a partner.
A Lufthansa spokesperson today said the launch of Lufthansa Italia is “completely separate from anything that might take place with Alitalia. It’s the start of a new Italian brand with an Italian operating certificate,” a spokesperson said.
Lufthansa said the new brand would serve Barcelona and Paris beginning Feb. 2, 2009, with service to Brussels, Budapest, Bucharest and Madrid following within a month. The carrier also said it expects to add London and Lisbon to the network “with the start of the 2009 summer flight schedules at the end of March.”
Lufthansa said it would outfit the A319 fleet with 138 seats configured into two classes and plans to sell the tickets through “Lufthansa’s usual distribution channels.”
“Lufthansa Italia will position us in an important market that is characterized by strong demand and holds opportunities for buoyant growth in the future,” said Lufthansa CEO Wolfgang Mayrhuber in a statement today. “We will be offering our Italian customers an extensive route network from northern Italy to destinations throughout Europe.”
