Networks – Page 1129

  • News

    X-34 makes first captive flight

    1999-07-07T00:00:00Z

     The first Orbital Sciences X-34 vehicle made its maiden captive flight beneath a Lockheed L-1011 TriStar on 29 June, from Edwards AFB, California. Captive flights will be made to get US Federal Aviation Administration approval. Next year, another X-34 will fly unpowered glide flights to a runway after being dropped ...

  • News

    Eagle 150 popularity soars in North America

    1999-07-07T00:00:00Z

    Australia's Eagle Aircraft has started to export its two-seat Eagle 150 to its US subsidiary, less than six months after the single-engined aircraft was granted US certification. According to the Orlando, Florida-based company that will assemble the Teledyne Continental IO-240-powered aircraft for the North American market, orders "are nearing ...

  • News

    Controlling Chile

    1999-07-07T00:00:00Z

    Chile has a good safety record despite unusual air traffic challenges David Learmount/SANTIAGO DE CHILE No other country is as long and thin as Chile. Few other countries contain such vast distances and terrain so unkind that its main 5,500km (3,420 mile)-long north-south trunk road has to retreat temporarily ...

  • News

    Boeing doubts demand

    1999-07-01T12:07:00Z

    Boeing is raising further doubts over likely demand for a new airliner in the class above 400 seats. At the Paris air show, Randy Baseler, vice-president marketing, said that Boeing sees only 80 deliveries of such aircraft over the next decade. The number rises to 360 over the next 20 ...

  • News

    Routes

    1999-07-01T11:31:00Z

    Iberia ends dispute with pilots - Iberia has struck a deal with its pilots that paves the way for the integration of subsidiary Aviaco and the unification of its Airbus fleet. The company has dropped plans to sue pilots for damages for strike action earlier this year and pilots have ...

  • News

    Routes

    1999-07-01T11:30:00Z

    KLM/Alitalia's Latin rejig - Alliance partners KLM and Alitalia are reorganising their networks to Latin America. For summer 2000, KLM will replace indirect flights between Amsterdam and Sao Paulo and Buenos Aires with direct services, while dropping its Rio de Janeiro service in favour of Alitalia, which flies there five ...

  • News

    The tie that binds

    1999-07-01T00:00:00Z

    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 ...

  • News

    USA and UK revisit open skies talks

    1999-07-01T00:00:00Z

    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 ...

  • News

    SAir reacts to Air France/Delta

    1999-07-01T00:00:00Z

    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 ...

  • News

    Flying out of control

    1999-07-01T00:00:00Z

    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 ...

  • News

    Mixed results from Asia-Pacific

    1999-07-01T00:00:00Z

    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 ...

  • News

    Delta defers 777s as pilots pay protest proves costly

    1999-07-01T00:00:00Z

    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. ...

  • News

    USA offers extra-bilateral rights via Alaska

    1999-07-01T00:00:00Z

    David Knibb/SEATTLE Washington is offering almost any foreign airline the right to serve the USA without regard to existing bilateral rights so long as that airline will stop in Alaska. Foreign carriers serving the USA may add Alaska as a co-terminal point on existing US routes or launch ...

  • News

    French gamble on growth

    1999-07-01T00:00:00Z

    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 ...

  • News

    Alliances battle over LOT and Malev

    1999-07-01T00:00:00Z

    Peter Bennett/VIENNA British Airways could be thwarted in its ambitions to buy an equity stake in Poland's LOT and Hungary's Malév, following better offers from Star Alliance and the Qualiflyer Group. British Airways was favourite to take a 38% equity stake in Lot, but relations between the two have deteriorated. ...

  • News

    UK cargo's agenda

    1999-07-01T00:00:00Z

    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 - ...

  • News

    Cathay narrowly averts pilots strike

    1999-07-01T00:00:00Z

    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 ...

  • News

    Lufthansa links may help ease PAL's problems

    1999-07-01T00:00:00Z

    Two Lufthansa units are in talks with Philippine Airlines (PAL) on business tie-ups as the troubled Asian flag carrier continues the battle to rehabilitate itself. Lufthansa chairman Jürgen Weber says Lufthansa Technik has "intensified" talks with PAL on a possible investment in its engineering operation at the carrier's ...

  • News

    Australia eases foreign entry

    1999-07-01T00:00:00Z

    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 ...

  • News

    A touch of Swiss prudence

    1999-07-01T00:00:00Z

    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 ...