All news – Page 6428
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Sydney's second airport moves closer
David Knibb BRISBANE A decision could come as early as August on whether to build Sydney's second airport after the project was cleared by an environmental report. The Badgery's Creek project, which has been stalled for years by long debates, made a breakthrough in July when a second audit of ...
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Australian ownership rules criticised
Australia's new limits on airline foreign ownership have come under fire due to the special treatment of Qantas. British Airways chairman Lord Marshall claims the new limits discriminate against the foreign owners of Qantas, particularly BA. In June, Australia's government announced, as part of a package of ...
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Ansett applies for codeshare
Ansett Australia has applied for approval to share codes with Star Alliance partners Air New Zealand and United Airlines on flights between Australia and the USA. Ansett had been studying services of its own to Los Angeles for a launch ahead of next year's summer Olympics in Sydney, but says ...
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Cool head in a hot seat
The glass must always look half full to Fernando Pinto. The first thing that Varig's president and chief executive officer wants to point out is that his airline is in a better position today than it was three years ago. It would be easy to overlook this piece of ...
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The ATC obstacle course
Currently available statistics only reflect the amount of delays and the average time of delay. Few detail why an aircraft is late. European airspace is divided into 240 sectors, each controlled by an ATC centre on the ground. An air traffic controller in each of the 39 ATC centres ...
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Australia's road to privatisation
David Knibb MELBOURNE Two years after privatising its airports, Australia may provide some lessons for the rest of the world. two years after Australia privatised its major airports, some effects of that process are starting to emerge. It is too early for conclusions, but the way Australia faced a ...
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Virgin truce puts Irish operation on hold
Simon Montlake ATI LONDON Virgin boss Richard Branson has brokered a truce between disgruntled pilots and managers at Virgin Express, the Brussels-based low-cost carrier. But the agreement, signed by Branson and staff representatives, has only put off the day of reckoning for Virgin Express Ireland, the new subsidiary at ...
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SAir takes Portugalia stake
Swissair parent SAirGroup has taken a further step towards consolidating its European alliance with the acquisition of a 42% stake in Portugalia. The regional airline, which operates 12 aircraft to 20 destinations in Europe, codeshares on Swissair flights and will become the twelfth member of the rapidly expanding ...
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EasyJet gives tickets away
London Luton-based easyJet has taken low-cost travel into new territory with its decision not to charge for some of its flights. In response to Swissair's successful block on the application for a route licence between Geneva and Barcelona, the carrier will fly passengers free. These services would be classed as ...
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Speedwing tackles Olympic problems
Tom Gill/Lois Jones LONDON Next month Speedwing will reveal a rescue plan for Olympic Airways, as the initial phase of the 30-month management contract it won in June. Olympic remains tightlipped about its future and Speedwing says it is too early to say what changes will have to be ...
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Arkia move sparks Arab backlash
Peter Bennett VIENNA Israeli group Arkia says it will invest up to $100 million in loss-making flag carrier Balkan Bulgarian after it won the rights to buy a majority stake. But problems with some of Balkan's Arab routes have set in, with some countries objecting to dealing with an Israeli-owned ...
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EasyJet goes for Gatwick
EasyJet will begin flying out of London Gatwick to Geneva this autumn in a move that departs substantially from its use of lower-cost airports such as London Luton and Liverpool. The no-frills airline has also applied for slots at Heathrow, but says that its fares will remain "affordable". Source: ...
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New dawn for Sun Air?
Roger Makings JOHANNESBURG South African Airways (SAA) is poised to move in on its ailing domestic competitor, Sun Air, after securing an exclusive three-month agreement with shareholders to work out a commercial relationship. Sun Air, in desperate need of a cash injection following the eight-month price war on South ...
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Japan's start-ups lose ground
David Knibb BRISBANE Skymark Airlines and Hokkaido International Airlines (Air Do), Japan's domestic start-ups, are taking a beating as a result of fare cuts by Japan's major airlines. In a full-blown fare war leading into Japan's summer season, falling ticket prices are bringing down the newcomers' load factors. Skymark ...
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Indian fare war erupts
India's airlines have slashed their fares by 20-25%, taking them to their lowest level in four years and setting the scene for a long and bitter war. Besides discounts, a wide range of gifts are on offer, from free holidays to complimentary stays in hotels and free travel for spouses. ...
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Qualiflying seamless service
With its new joint sales initiatives, the Qualiflyer grouping could be stealing a march in the alliance stakes. The promise of seamless customer service from the global alliances may seem a little distant, but progress appears to be under way. At the forefront has been a series of announcements from ...
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Playing your cards right
Jackie Gallacher LONDON Frequent flier co-operation is reaching new levels of sophistication within the global alliances, threatening to leave others out in the cold. Not so long ago, an alliance based only on links between frequent-flier programmes (FFP) would have seemed hopelessly optimistic. Yet the real force of the global ...
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Capacity crisis hits European skies
Peter Bennett VIENNA Air traffic control is the chief culprit of record delays in Europe, and the mostly piecemeal improvements offer little hope of a rapid solution to the region's capacity crunch. Ask a European airline executive about air traffic control (ATC) and the response is almost universal. A ...
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Playing it safe at KAL
Nicholas Ionides SEOUL A big management shake-up at Korean Air has produced a new president and chief executive, Shim Yi-taek. His main task is to improve KAL's safety. Each day at noon, thousands of Korean Air (KAL) employees working at the carrier's Kimpo Airport headquarters building in Seoul make ...
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KAL grapples with training
Korean Air's efforts to improve its operation still leave some unanswered questions about just why the airline has had such a poor record. "Korean pilots are as good as any other pilots in the world," says deputy head of flight operations and Boeing 747-400 captain, Bill Hardy. The problem ...