All Ops & safety articles – Page 1311
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News
Asiana defers 777-200/300 deliveries
Paul Lewis/SINGAPORE Asiana Airlines is to defer delivery of its first Boeing 777 on order because of South Korea's worsening economic difficulties, and will instead acquire additional 767-300ERs and 747-400 freighters. The airline is planning to push back deliveries of its first 777-200/300s by up to two years, ...
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Boeing slows 777-200X/300X product-development work
Boeing has switched the emphasis of product-development work on the proposed 777-200X/300X ultra-long-haul and stretch derivatives for at least three months. The 300 staff working on the two planned variants are understood to have been switched from new-product development to focusing on reducing programme costs. Sources in Seattle say ...
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Japan authority may rethink Saab 2000 inspecton order
Andrew Mollet/TOKYO The Japan Civil Aviation Bureau (JCAB) is reviewing plans to order additional Saab 2000 flight-inspection aircraft, in the wake of the Swedish firm's announcement that it is considering ceasing production of civil turboprops. Japan has already ordered two Saab 2000s for delivery in late 1998 and ...
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Airbus ponders its A3XX systems role
Ian Sheppard/LONDON Airbus Industrie is considering passing responsibility for the integration of avionics on the proposed A3XX to a specialist, allowing companies outside the consortium to bid for the work. Speaking at the 1997 ERA Avionics Conference in London on 19 November, Michel Comes, director of systems at ...
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FAA orders changes to 747 tanks
Ramon Lopez/WASHINGTON DC The US Federal Aviation Administration has issued two airworthiness directives (ADs) aimed at removing potential ignition sources in or near the centre-wing fuel tank of older Boeing 747s. It says that it is best to eliminate ignition sources because it is not possible to purge ...
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Regionals add CRJs
Two major US regionals have boosted their Bombardier Canadair Regional Jet (CRJ) orderbooks. Atlantic Coast Airlines has converted 12 of its 36 options to fuel growth at Washington's Dulles Airport, for delivery between late 1998 and mid-1999. Comair's CRJ fleet will grow to 80 with the firming-up of 12 conditional ...
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EC moves closer to setting up new air safety authority
The European Commission (EC) will present plans to a meeting of European Union (EU) transport ministers this month aimed at creating a European aviation-safety authority. The new agency could be operational as early as 2000, says a well-placed EC official. Detailed work on pulling together recommendations on the role ...
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Alitalia on path to privatisation as state and IRI cut back stake
Kevin O'Toole/LONDON Italy's giant state-holding company, IRI, has agreed to cut its stake in Alitalia to 60% in what is being billed as the first step towards the flag carrier's privatisation, which could now come in 1998. The deal, agreed at a meeting of the IRI board on ...
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Braathens settles into KLM alliance
Ian Sheppard/OSLO Braathens SAFE has entered into a co-operation agreement with Northwest Airlines, strengthening its alliance with KLM and allowing it to link its Scandinavian routes to the US carrier's Detroit and Minneapolis hubs through Amsterdam's Schiphol and London Gatwick. Anders Fougli, Braathens director of planning, says that ...
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Future avionics architecture is proven
A group of major European avionics manufacturers has designed an avionics architecture for future aircraft which will vastly reduce development and support costs and improve interoperability between aircraft and systems. The Industrial Avionics Working Group (IAWG) has completed a risk-reduction study into software techniques for integrated modular avionics (IMA) ...
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Asia-Pacific economic crisis hits South Korea
South Korea's carriers have become the latest of Asia-Pacific's airlines to be marked down by financial analysts as economic problems continue to reverberate throughout the region. Analysts warn that flag carrier Korean Air (KAL) and its competitor, Asiana, are facing hefty end-of year losses, as the South Korean economy ...
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Asia's economic haze
Brent Hannon/KUALA LUMPUR Concerns over the state of the once-unstoppable Asia-Pacific airline market were underlined again as the Association of Asia Pacific Airlines (AAPA) met in Kuala Lumpur in mid-November for the 41st assembly of presidents. The latest figures show a 25% drop in collective operating profits over ...
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Unleaded avgas 'more expensive'
Fuel supplier Phillips 66 has warned that environmental pressure to switch to unleaded aviation gasoline could increase US avgas prices by up to 50%. The Oklahoma-based firm expects today's 100-octane low-lead (100LL) avgas to be available for the next five years, but admits that pressure to eliminate this last ...
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BAe wins Boeing work
British Aerospace has confirmed a contract from Boeing to supply "machined components" for the Next Generation 737. The deal marks a coup for BAe's aerostructures business, which has be pushing hard for more work from Boeing, although the group points out that its Airbus agreements prevent it taking any major ...
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Frontier bids for WestPac
Graham Warwick/WASHINGTON DC A US bankruptcy-court judge will make a decision on 3 December between rival bids for Western Pacific Airlines. Frontier Airlines, which called off plans to merge with WestPac earlier this year, has switched tack and is bidding to take over its bankrupt would-be partner. WestPac ...
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Boeing's long stretch
Guy Norris/SEATTLE BOEING'S stretched 777-300 carries a list of superlatives almost as long as the aircraft itself. The latest member of the Boeing family is the largest twin-engined aircraft ever built, the world's fastest widebody twin, the longest airliner ever made and the first transport big enough to replace the ...
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Europe's FAA?
Alan George/BRUSSELS The European Commission (EC) is preparing to push radical new proposals to set up a European AviationSafety Authority (EASA) at a meeting of transport ministers later this month. The new agency, which will have sweeping powers, could be operational by 2000 according to well-placed sources in Brussels. ...
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Kitty Hawk refinances
Fresh from its merger with the Kallita air-freight grouping, UScargo carrier Kitty Hawk has completed its refinancing, netting $39.5 million from a share offering and another $340 million through a bond issue. The cash will be used to fund the merger, which the carrier says makes it the world's seventh-largest ...
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Lycoming inspection
The US National Transportation Safety Board has requested that all Textron Lycoming IO-320-B1A engines with older-style, thinner, propeller-mounting flanges be inspected for cracks after aerobatic manoeuvres, following the 1996 fatal crash of a Lancair 320. Source: Flight International
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Routes
++ United Parcel Service (UPS) has launched a service to Penang six times a week as an en route extension to its existing operation from the carrier's Taipei hub to Kuala Lumpur and Singapore. ++ New Zealand has signed an open-skies agreement with Malaysia, permitting each national carrier the right ...