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For some airlines, the net-zero target was nothing new. But for all carriers, the important task is working out how to get there – and then implementing that plan.
The IATA AGM marked by a shift away from the harmonious front seen in parts of the commercial air transport industry at the height of the pandemic.
Airline leaders left IATA’s World Air Transport Summit this week in a buoyant mood, sensing the industry’s worst days are behind it, and that normalcy is months, not years, away. They also left having made firm commitments to reduce carbon output, saying the industry is emerging from the pandemic-driven aviation downturn with invigorated dedication to environmental stewardship. Exactly how airlines will significantly cut carbon, however, remains unclear.
The transition will continue a period during which the role has been taken by the chief executive of an airline outside the group of network carriers that are traditionally the high-profile core of IATA’s membership.
Even though the final Airbus A380 has rolled off the production line in Toulouse, Emirates Airline – and president Tim Clark – are still madly in love with the superjumbo, as the carrier looks forward to welcoming the last three of the type into the fleet later this year.
An IATA survey has revealed significant frustration with Covid-19 travel restrictions, and that air travellers believe the freedom of travel should be restored.
Developing new aircraft powered by novel technologies such as un-ducted fans and hydrogen-burning engines remains essentially unfeasible without billions and billions of dollars in direct government aid.
A senior airline executive warns that a further casualty of the coronavirus crisis - in addition to at least two years of financial pain - will likely be innovation and new products.
Ambitious carbon-reduction goals have led airframers to pursue longer-term, more-revolutionary technologies rather than bringing incremental efficiency improvements to market faster, according to a top Airbus executive.
The upcoming reopening of transatlantic air travel can serve as an example of how other travel markets can be restarted – which is why the aviation industry has so much riding on the process going smoothly.
Ahead of this year’s IATA AGM in Boston, FlightGlobal spoke to the airline association’s director general Willie Walsh about his aims for the gathering – and his views on the challenges and opportunities ahead for the airline industry
Aero occupies airspace somewhere between commercial and private flights. More specifically, it offers air travellers a hybrid of first-class flying and chartering an aircraft.
The recent launch of Global Crossing Airlines Group’s new subsidiary UrbanX is part of a long-term plan to develop an electric aviation ecosystem in South Florida that will build off the expanding cargo and charter operations of GlobalX and its fleet of Airbus A320s.
For Sherrexcia Rolle, the path to the airline C-suite began as a child on Andros Island, helping out at the airport where her parents established the Bahamas’ now thriving Western Air.
A deployed maintenance engineer supporting Air Canada’s corporate charter fleet, Jenny Tung is an ‘aircraft whisperer’ able to fix any fault – a skill developed from her early experience repairing cars
While the UK’s decision to leave EASA remains a source of contention, the CAA’s new chair Sir Stephen Hillier is determined that the agency can rise to the challenge and demonstrate its status as a “world-class regulator”.
We speak to Allison McKay, the chief executive of Women in Aviation International (WIA): the world’s largest special interest group for women interested in aviation and aerospace.
Turboprop manufacturer’s chief executive argues that smaller airlines’ problems risk being drowned out by the need for billions of dollars in bailouts for flag carriers, with deep consequences for the communities that rely on them.
