All Ops & safety articles – Page 1244
-
News
Single minded
Kate Sarsfield/LONDON The economic shackles are steadily being removed from the single-engined turboprop market as international aviation authorities reverse their longstanding prohibition on single-engined instrument flight rules (IFR) operations for commercial flights. The impressive safety record of Pratt &Whitney Canada PT6 turbine-powered aircraft has contributed a great deal to the ...
-
News
Eagle flies with massive Embraer order
Karen Walker A massive $2 billion order for 75 firm and 75 option Embraer ERJ-135 regional jets was announced yesterday by US carrier American Eagle. Bill Kostel, director of fleet planning at American Eagle, a regional subsidiary of American Airlines, said he expects deliveries of the 37-seat -135 ...
-
News
Escalating European delays reach record level
The European Airlines Association (AEA) has declared 1998 a "black year" for delays, with the figures for June reaching similar levels to those for the same month in 1989, the worst on record. Brussels, Belgium-based Eurocontrol says it has "no dispute" with the AEA statistics, which show that 29.1% ...
-
News
Investigation into SilkAir crash narrows
The Indonesian-led investigation into the December 1997 crash of a SilkAir Boeing 737-300 expects to produce a preliminary report by October, with the line of inquiries narrowed down to possible pilot suicide, or mechanical failure in the area of the vertical or horizontal stabiliser. Indonesian Aircraft Accident Investigation Commission ...
-
News
GLS to debut on Continental flight
Steve Nichols Honeywell will claim a world first later this month when a Continental Airlines MD-83 flight becomes the first revenue service to land using a GPS landing system (GLS). On 21 September, the aircraft will fly two approaches into New York Newark and Minneapolis-St Paul using the ...
-
News
Continental can weather downturn
Continental Airlines chairman Gordon Bethune says his company has the cash and the strategy to weather labour disputes, low-fare competition and the inevitable industry downturn. Bethune is sanguine about Continental's revival, which has seen the company rise from a $200 million shortfall to nearly $500 million in profit in ...
-
News
TT&S reveals clutch of simulator orders
Thomson Training & Simulation (TT&S) has revealed a series of contracts to supply full flight simulators to Alaska Airlines and Air France and manufacturer Airbus Industrie. For Alaska Airlines, the French company will produce its first Boeing 737-700/900 simulator as part of a contract covering a range of integrated ...
-
News
Chek Lap Kok inquiry highlights computer fiasco
Surprise details have begun to emerge from a public inquiry set up to investigate the controversial opening of Hong Kong's new airport at Chek Lap Kok. A select committee set up by the Legislative Council to probe the handling of the airport yesterday heard director of civil aviation Richard ...
-
News
Tata consigns plans for new Indian carrier to scrapheap
The Tata Group has finally thrown in the towel and abandoned plans to launch a privately owned domestic Indian airline in the face of more than three and half years of government procrastination, as well as repeated changes to its aviation policy. Tata dropped plans to launch the new ...
-
News
Swissair flight recorder blank for last six minutes
The flight data recorder (FDR) from the Swissair Boeing MD-11 which crashed off Nova Scotia last week carries only illegible information below 10,000ft (3,000m), specialists from the Canadian Transportation Safety Board have revealed. Experts had hoped that the FDR, which was recovered on Sunday, would give some clue why ...
-
News
UK wire specialist shortlisted for export award
The UK Department of Trade and Industry has made Spectrum Technologies' 10th birthday a very happy one, after shortlisting the company for a DTI export award for small businesses. The company (Hall 3, A3) supplies ultraviolet (UV) laser wire marking and processing systems which are used in the production ...
-
News
Mongolia takes Raytheon Autotrac system
Steve Nichols Raytheon has announced that its Autotrac 2100 system has passed site acceptance tests for the Civil Aviation Authority of Mongolia. The system provides communications, navigation, surveillance/air traffic management (CNS/ATM) services. The total contract, worth $12 million, is for a satellite-based, en-route, air traffic control system ...
-
News
White House observer to attend Northwest strike talks
Northwest Airlines and the US Air Line Pilots Association (ALPA) were due to be joined by a representative of US President Bill Clinton yesterday as negotiations resumed to resolve the dispute between the carrier and its striking pilots. After a break for the Labour Day holiday, the federally mediated ...
-
News
Delta/United alliance dies
Ramon Lopez/WASHINGTON DC The refusal of Delta Air Lines directors to give its pilots a voting seat on the board have scuttled plans for a wide ranging alliance with United Airlines. The strategic alliance proposal included a code-share which had to be approved by pilots' groups represented by the ...
-
News
Strikes ground North American airlines
Ramon Lopez/WASHINGTON DC Brian Dunn/MONTREAL The first week of strikes by pilots at Northwest Airlines and Air Canada have crippled the two carriers' operations. Estimates put the revenue losses in the two unconnected labour disputes at over $150 million by 5 September. Northwest was the first to be ...
-
News
Asian crisis bites hard into Chinese airlines
Paul Lewis/SINGAPORE Asian economic woes have finally begun to catch up with the Chinese air transport industry, with the country's two largest carriers China Southern Airlines and China Eastern Airlines sliding into the red in the first half of 1998 as the result of growing overcapacity and deteriorating yields. ...
-
News
Qatar steps up expansion with plans for new long-haul aircraft
MaxKingsley-Jones/LONDON Qatar Airways is accelerating its fleet expansion, with discussions for the lease of up to six Airbus A330s as part of a plan to boost long-haul operations. The Doha-based airline recently concluded a deal to bolster its short-haul fleet with A320s, placing an order for up to 11 ...
-
News
Airbag system holds hope for crash survival
They are commonplace in many cars, but airbags might soon be making the transition from protecting motorists to safeguarding airline passengers. US seatbelt manufacturer AmSafe is using Farnborough to promote its new airbag restraint system, which it says could dramatically reduce the number of lives lost in certain types ...
-
News
Results dampen Air New Zealand and Ansett prospects
Challenging regional market conditions are expected to continue dampening the prospects of Air New Zealand (ANZ) and its 50%-owned partner Ansett Australia. The tougher conditions were already evident in the results for the 12 months ending 30 June. ANZ relied on marginal improvements to domestic performance to produce a ...