All Ops & safety articles – Page 1246
-
News
KAL faces new penalties after two new incidents
Andrzej Jeziorski/SINGAPORE Korean Air (KAL) is facing fresh sanctions and possible fines after suffering a Boeing MD-83 crash and an aborted landing by an Airbus A300-600 just three days later. Airline analysts say the latest incidents could raise doubts about KAL's joint safety drive with Delta Air Lines, a ...
-
News
Cargo Air takes to Israel's open skies
Israeli freight specialist Cargo Air Lines (CAL) is preparing to launch independent services in December, after receiving Israeli Government licences to operate scheduled cargo flights. CAL was set up by Israeli agricultural growers' organisations in 1977 to serve as a broker agency, leasing cargo aircraft capacity from Israeli national ...
-
News
Boeing confirms new large aircraft study
Guy Norris/LOS ANGELES Boeing says it is still studying all-new large aircraft concepts, dubbed the Large Airplane Product Development (LAPD), despite its deliberate focus on 747 derivatives and opposition to more costly all-new concepts such as the the proposed Airbus A3XX. "Boeing is studying a large aircraft," says the ...
-
News
Bombardier wins and loses in trade battle with Embraer
Bombardier and the Canadian Government are claiming victory in their long battle with Embraer and the Brazilian Government over the subsidising of regional aircraft exports. The Canadian manufacturer believes that a World Trade Organisation (WTO) ruling against Brazil's Proex export finance programme will give its de Havilland Dash 8 turboprop ...
-
News
US carriers optimistic as market shows recovery
ChrisJasper/LONDON The USA's major carriers are suddenly more bullish about their financial prospects for the rest of the year following a modest improvement in overall market conditions and better than expected performance in the first quarter. Most of the country's big airlines expressed serious concerns about their likely fortunes ...
-
News
UPS contract leads Thomson to Windows NT
Thomson Training &Simulation (TTS) has launched a Windows NT-based full flight simulator with an order from United Parcel Service. TTS says the simulator, for the Airbus A300-600R, will be the world's first to feature a PC-based real-time computing architecture using the Windows NT operating system. Presently, the company uses ...
-
News
EC resignations delay new rules
Alan George/BRUSSELS New European aviation initiatives have been put on hold following the mass resignation of top officials at the European Commission (EC) in the wake of a damning report into fraud and cronyism at the Brussels headquarters of the European Union. Despite the chaos caused by the resignations ...
-
News
ICAO figures show improvements in safety
There were 22 accidents involving passenger fatalities on scheduled airlines in 1998 according to figures released by the International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO). This compares with 27 fatal accidents in the same category during 1997. Passenger fatalities last year were 909, against 930 in 1997, but ICAO points out ...
-
News
Loran-C reprieved as USA sets timetable for move to sole GPS
Ramon Lopez/WASHINGTON DC It will take at least 10 years for the USA to complete its transition from ground-based navigation aids to the satellite-based global positioning system (GPS) for "sole means" navigation, according to US aviation officials. Meanwhile, Loran-C, which is operated by the US Coast Guard for en ...
-
News
Y2K live test set for US airspace systems
Graham Warwick/WASHINGTON DC The first live test of changes made to the US national airspace system to overcome year 2000 (Y2K) computer problems has been scheduled for the early hours of 10 April, centred on Denver, Colorado. The Federal Aviation Administration says it is on course to complete ...
-
News
737 wiring checks
Compulsory inspections for chafed fuel float switch wiring in the centre fuel tank of US-registered Boeing 737-100s through to -500s have been ordered by the US Federal Aviation Administration. The FAA says that wire chafing caused by vibration could provide an ignition source inside the fuel tank. Source: Flight ...
-
News
FAA rules out 737 rudder malfunction crash link
Ramon Lopez/WASHINGTON DC Recent Boeing 737 rudder malfunctions are not being linked to rudder control unit failures suspected of causing fatal 737 crashes in 1991 and 1994, senior US Federal Aviation Administration officials say (Flight International, 3-9 March, P13). Preliminary rulings refer to a MetroJet Boeing 737-200 incident on ...
-
News
Lufthansa eyes new 767 options
Guy Norris/SEATTLE Lufthansa is studying a possible new version of the Boeing 767 being evaluated as a potential spin-off development of the new -400 entering production. The German flag carrier could be interested in a longer-range version of the 767-300ER and an extended-range variant of the -400ER, which ...
-
News
Airline chiefs to be told likely causes of next accident
David Learmount/LONDON The UK's airline bosses are to be told by the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) what is the most likely cause of their companies' next fatal accident. The unprecedented safety warning - to come at a meeting scheduled for 19 March - is aimed at ensuring the airlines ...
-
News
Safety boards act on cockpit recorder safety
Canadian and US safety boards are recommending changes to cockpit voice and flight data recorders (CVRs and FDRs) to prevent power interruptions which have complicated recent accident investigations. Canadian investigators say their efforts to determine the cause of last September's Swissair Boeing MD-11 crash have been compromised by missing ...
-
News
AeroPeru suspends flights while debt renegotiations take place
Troubled Peruvian carrier AeroPeru has suspended flights for 60 days while it attempts to renegotiate its $174 million debts. Peruvian president Alberto Fujimori says his government, which holds a 20% stake in the carrier, may bail it out if the debt is restructured, while the carrier's legal advisor Raul ...
-
News
Airbus seeks exit rule changes
Andrew Doyle/MUNICH David Learmount/LONDON Airbus Industrie is trying to persuade European and US regulatory authorities to modify certification rules to allow it to build the A340-600 with the same number of emergency exits as the smaller -300, despite the fact that the new variant seats nearly 100 more passengers. To ...
-
News
Indonesia pushes for transport safety board
Andrzej Jeziorski/JAKARTA The head of Indonesia's Aircraft Accident Investigation Commission is pushing for the formation of a body, modelled on the US National Transportation Safety Board, to take control of air safety issues by 2004. The move is being pursued in the wake of the much-criticised investigation into ...
-
News
Lufthansa plans capacity rise despite decline in yields
Andrew Doyle/BERLIN Chris Jasper/LONDON Lufthansa is planning to buck the European trend and increase capacity by 13% with the introduction of its summer schedules, despite sharing industry concerns over declining yields. Other European - and US - majors have been saddled with excess capacity over the past 12 months ...
-
News
'Irregularities' ground flying college
Australia's Civil Aviation Safety Authority (CASA) grounded China Southern's flying college near Perth, Western Australia, on 27 February, following the resignation of the college's chief pilot/chief flying instructor (CFI). The safety authority says that, although the college had nominated a new CFI, the authority had delayed its approval of ...