Aviation Report

Did you know airlines are constantly looking for ways to make flights more efficient? From gate conflicts to operational challenges to air traffic management, the dynamics of a flight can change quickly and lead to costly delays. There is good news. Advancements in real-time big data analysis are changing the course of flight as we know it. Imagine if the pilot could augment their decision-making process with “real time business intelligence,”—information available in the cockpit that would allow them to make adjustments to their flight patterns. The Challenge as offered by GE and Alaska Airlines is the following: Use the different data sets found on this page under Get the Data to develop a usable and scalable algorithm that delivers a real-time flight profile to the pilot, helping them make flights more efficient and reliably on time. Source:  http://www.gequest.com/c/flight This competition is hosted on Kaggle, the platform at the crossroads between the seismic tr...

In what has been a year of “firsts” for Boeing, the 737 just added another “first” to its long list. A Next-Generation 737-700 BBJ flown by PrivatAir touched down at the Norwegian Polar Institute - an outpost dedicated to environmental and climate monitoring in Antarctica. The airplane was the first 737 flight to be operated to commercial standards on the southernmost continent. The goal of the flight from Cape Town, South Africa was to prove that a commercial airline could operate a service to Antarctica and maintain industry safety standards, while improving efficiency and minimizing environmental impact. The 737-700 BBJ was specially configured for polar operations, which included landing on blue ice. By the way, PrivatAir is a Geneva-based business aviation and private scheduled-service operator. Source: http://boeingblogs.com/randy/archives/2012/12/my_favorite_things.html

She likes the window seat; he likes the aisle. She wants the shade pulled down; he likes the shade up. She checks a bag; he only carries on. She curls up in a ball to avoid contact; he sits with his elbows and legs splayed out. The sexes can fly in different directions when it comes to airplane and hotel habits and preferences, adding stress to an already taxing experience for couples and families. Men still outnumber women among frequent fliers. Several airlines, US Airways LCC +0.78% and Delta Air Lines DAL +1.32% among them, say their customer base runs about 54% to 56% male. But the difference is leveling off. Virgin America says its passenger surveys over the past year average 52% men and 48% women. British Airways IAG.MC +3.57% actually carries more women than men, a spokeswoman said. Membership in Alaska Airlines' frequent-flier program is evenly split between men and women, at least among members for whom gender is known, according to a spokeswoman for the Seattle...

Just a few short months after Apple introduced the world to the iPhone 5’s Passbook app, people are still struggling to find a use for it, although nowhere near as much as they were when it first came out. The function it provides is highly useful in theory but so far there have not been many situations where it would prove useful. While this says nothing about the actual quality of the app itself, it does show that companies have been slow to jump on board and contribute their services to it. However this is bound to change with time as more companies cotton on and giants like Starbucks are already accepting vouchers through Passbook so it is certainly well on its way. In case you are unfamiliar with the app, Passbook is a new feature found on the iPhone and iPad that can collect all these different vouchers and tickets from various apps into one convenient place, from which they can be scanned for quick use. This includes Starbucks cards and movie tickets, making life all the m...

Qantas has scrapped plans to offer Wi-Fi onboard its Airbus A380s following average customer take-up of less than 5% during a nine-month trial. The OnAir Wi-Fi service was tested on selected Airbus A380s flying to London and Los Angeles from March to November. Qantas offered the connectivity option to customers in various data packages ranging in price from A$12.90 ($13.48) to $39.90. “Most of our A380 services operate at night and so another dampener on demand was the fact people preferred to sleep than surf the Web,” Qantas said in a release. “We remain focused on delivering services to our customers that they value. Right now, our customers are telling us that access to the Internet on the ground is more important than in the air. We are continuing to invest in upgrading Wi-Fi technology across our domestic and international lounge network. We will continue to evaluate demand for Wi-Fi options onboard.” Existing service, which allows customers to send and receive text mess...

British Airways announced they have committed to buying $500M in aviation biofuel produced at the GreenSky London facility for the next ten years and consent is now being sought to begin construction of the facility at a site in East London. GreenSky London is a joint development between British Airways and Solena and once built will be Europe’s first commercial scale low carbon jet fuel production facility. The first-of-its-kind facility will annually convert around 500,000 tonnes of locally-sourced waste, that would otherwise go to landfill, into 50,000 tonnes of sustainable aviation biofuel and 50,000 tonnes of bionaphtha and biodiesel. The facility will also have a renewable power generating capacity of 40 MW. Keith Williams, Chief Executive of British Airways, said: “We are delighted that the GreenSky London project is getting ever closer to fruition. With world-class technology partners now in place, we are well on our way to making sustainable aviation fuel a reality f...

Boeing started a new brand awareness campaign with very well done infographics about the company's impact and innovation legacy. The slides are available here:  http://boeing.com/stories/impact.html The timeline is available here:  http://boeing.com/stories/timeline.html

Lufthansa is launching its new concept for European direct services on July 1, 2013, six months after the group’s direct services unit has been merged with low-fare affiliate Germanwings. The new airline, to be branded Germanwings, is a blend of premium and no-frills products and the group’s last effort to turn around its short-haul network to profitability. Germanwings will operate 32 Airbus A319s and A320s that have formed the fleet of the current low-fare airline. Lufthansa is shifting over 29 A319/320s for a fleet of 61 narrowbodies. The unit also is wet-leasing 23 Bombardier CRJ-900s from Eurowings, one of the group’s regional subsidiaries. The new Germanwings is to reach €1.8 billion in annual sales and 16 million passengers with a combined fleet of 84 aircraft, slightly fewer than the 90 originally envisaged. Lufthansa has decided not to transfer all of the existing non-hub fleet to the new unit. Some aircraft are shifted to hub flying, and the company has decided to accele...

Where will you go next? Find out with Google Flight Explorer , the latest addition to Google Flights . Unlike Google Flights, which launched in September 2011, Flight Explorer appears to be much more customizable. Not only does it let you easily modify your trip length on the left-hand side, but the top bar is full of options: stops, airline, duration, outbound time, and return time. The first two are drop down menus while the other ones are sliders helping you pick the timeframe you want. The default page loads the “Lowest fares for trips of 3-5 days” and the outline is clearly something we haven’t seen before. There’s a picture of your destination and then a graph of the lowest prices to get you there, taking your filters into account, for the last few months. Clicking on any of them redirects you to Google Flights, suggesting that this appears to be an augmentation of the previous service, not a replacement. Maybe the two will end up being merged together, but for now they ...

Missouri Sen. Claire McCaskill tells the agency she's "prepared to pursue legislative solutions" if it doesn't move at a reasonable pace to allow gadget use on planes. Missouri Sen. Claire McCaskill wants you to be able to tweet a photo of St. Louis' famous Gateway Arch while you're soaring above it in your commercial airliner of choice. At least that might be one option open to you if a letter she sent to the Federal Aviation Administration yesterday has the desired effect. The Democratic senator said in her letter that she was "prepared to pursue legislative solutions" if the FAA takes too long to loosen its restrictions on the use of portable electronic devices during flights. "We live in an increasingly connected world, and information is traveling at the speed it takes our e-mail to refresh," McCaskill is quoted as saying in a press release on her Web site. "The current rules are inconvenient to travelers, don't ma...

Germanwings customers can now pay for their tickets using e-commerce firm PayPal. The new option allows payments to transferred from customers’ PayPal accounts, meaning that no credit card data needs to be stored with Germanwings. It's worth noting though that customers will still be charged the same fee for PayPal transactions as for purchases using credit card (currently £8 per person per flight segment to European destinations). PayPal started out as a method of enabling secure payments for online auction sites like Ebay (which now owns the company), but has grown to include mainstream companies within its portfolio. Several US carriers including United, AA and Delta allow PayPal transfers, as do British Airways, Emirates, Malaysia Airlines, Singapore Airlines and Germanwings’ parent company Lufthansa. Last month it was confirmed that the Germanwings brand would be expanded to operate Lufthansa flights within Germany and Europe from January next year. Source: htt...

In 2013, IATA will launch projects related to Simplifying the Business, a strategic program agreed by the Board in December 2011 (See: http://fr.scribd.com/doc/115696540/Simplifying-the-Business ). E-Borders:  Rather than relying on Airlines for the verification of compliance with border rules (including visas and ESTA-like procedures), Goevernments will own the whole pipeline by providing e-visas, validating them and giving the green light directly to passengers. Customer contact information: Travel agents will have to share direct contact information with customers with the airlines in order to facilitate push notifications about flight status and other urgent messages. Open Source Data Model:  The IATA will work on promoting a standard data format (or API) that will make it very easy for customers to access data about flight cancellations and delay both from airports and airlines. This extends to data formats used between companies, airports and GDSs. The goal is t...

European aerospace giant Airbus will build its first airplane factory in the U.S., aiming to compete better against archrival Boeing in the battle to dominate the global aviation industry. The Mobile, Ala., factory — due to start up in 2015 —is expected to employ 1,000 people when it reaches full production two years later. Airbus hopes the plant will lower costs and improve its chances of winning business from the U.S. military. Last year, Boeing beat out Airbus' parent for a major Air Force contract. "We needed to be visible in the States under the Airbus flag," Airbus President and CEO Fabrice Bregier said. The new $600 million plant will make A320 passenger jets, which compete head-to-head with Boeing's 737. Those planes are the minivans of the airline world — widely-used people-haulers generally flown on short- and medium-haul trips. They generally carry about 150 passengers. North America is the biggest single market for that type of plane, Airbus exe...

U.S. airlines are facing what threatens to be their most serious pilot shortage since the 1960s, with higher experience requirements for new hires about to take hold just as the industry braces for a wave of retirements. Federal mandates taking effect next summer will require all newly hired pilots to have at least 1,500 hours of prior flight experience—six times the current minimum—raising the cost and time to train new fliers in an era when pay cuts and more-demanding schedules already have made the profession less attractive. Meanwhile, thousands of senior pilots at major airlines soon will start hitting the mandatory retirement age of 65. A rule requiring new airline pilots to have at least 1,500 flying hours will postpone the day flight instructor John Adkins, above, can join a carrier. Another federal safety rule, to take effect in early 2014, also will squeeze the supply, by giving pilots more daily rest time. This change is expected to force passenger airlines to incr...

A four-minute-long Air New Zealand safety video celebrating the upcoming premiere of the first film in the Hobbit trilogy has gone viral within 24 hours of being posted on YouTube.

The Turkish government is moving forward with plans for a third airport in Istanbul, joining Istanbul Ataturk (IST) and Istanbul Sabiha Gökçen. The proposed new airport, which would include five runways, would handle about 100 million passengers annually. The first phase should be completed by 2016; the second phase should open by 2023, expanding capacity to 150 million passengers. Turkish Airlines CEO Temel Kotil told ATW in Istanbul the carrier helped motivate the government to plan for the new airport. He declined to comment on the expected cost of the new airport, saying it would be “close to double-digit billion US dollars and is one of the biggest private investments [in Turkey].” “What the government is expecting is not only a base for TK, but also a hub for other airlines, becoming the first entry point from Asian airlines into Europe,” he said. Offering a new infrastructure, airlines will benefit in terms of quality and of costs. For example, Asian carriers could feed ...

In a unique partnership to facilitate travel around Europe, Skywards, Emirates award-winning frequent flyer programme, and EasyJet, Europe's fourth largest airline, announce the launch of a redemption agreement of Skywards Miles for flights on EasyJet; connecting Emirates 31 destination strong European network with all of EasyJet destinations. As of 06 November, members will be able be use their Skywards Miles to fly with EasyJet to over 30 countries across Europe and North Africa. Used in conjunction with an Emirates flight or for separate travel itineraries, Skywards members will have the choice to expand their travel options across Europe. The functionality will be available to Skywards members in every tier and the flights are bookable online. "With over 130 destinations within Europe and North Africa partnering with EasyJet was an obvious choice for Emirates. Like Emirates, EasyJet is committed to expanding its operation by connecting an increasing number of cities...

British Airways has begun the process of fitting out ex-Bmi aircraft with a new fully-flat product to be used on mid-haul routes. As previously reported, a total of seven former Bmi A321 aircraft are being refitted with 23 Thompson Aero Seating business class seats, featuring a 78-inch fully-flat bed and 45-inch seat pitch, and 131 economy seats with a 31-inch pitch. In addition the aircraft are being fitted with the Thales i5000 AVOD in-flight entertainment system. Two of the aircraft refits have now been completed, with a further two to be completed by the end of this month, followed by one in November and two in December. Source:  http://www.businesstraveller.com/news/ba-rolls-out-fully-flat-business-class-seats-on

When asked about the future of the low-fare airline industry, Vueling Airlines CEO Alex Cruz has a simple answer: “We will grow and the legacy carriers will shrink.” But that is only the short version of a more complex story. While most low-fare carriers are continuing to grow, strategies and behavior patterns are changing, particularly in Europe. EasyJet is introducing assigned seating and has started selling its tickets through global distribution systems (GDS). Vueling, Norwegian Air Shuttle and others are actively pursuing connecting traffic, and Norwegian plans to launch long-haul flights next year. “We are evolving the low-cost model,” said Ali Sabanci, CEO of Turkish low-fare carrier Pegasus Airlines, on the sidelines of the World Low-Cost Airlines Congress last month in London. “Only two years ago, ‘GDS’ was a swear word.” By introducing new possibilities for the model, airlines are trying to gain access to a broader customer base. EasyJet’s drive to GDS cooperation, ...

Employers are asking their executives to fly more but with smaller budgets, a new survey of aviation professionals has found. Aviation consultancy Ascend's 2012 survey, which polled 624 frequent travellers in Europe and North America, suggests companies expect an average 1.5 percent increase in flights against an estimated 1 percent travel budget increase. The survey tallies with data from Carlson Wagonlit Travel CWT.L, who manage travel for corporate clients. Their 2013 forecasts show that fares are expected to rise globally throughout the rest of 2012 and into 2013, with travel budgets continue to be squeezed. This means, thinks Ascend's chief economist Peter Morris, that travel suppliers that can provide good value without loss of business functionality will do well. "Unlike some other business budget areas, we are not seeing overall cuts which means respondents appreciate the value and necessity of business travel by air in a global marketplace." Of ...

The global airline alliances are moving into the Middle East. American Airlines and British Airways said Monday that Qatar Airways would join their Oneworld alliance, giving them access to one of the world’s fastest-growing airlines and a modern hub in Doha, the capital of Qatar. The announcement came just hours after Air France-KLM revealed a commercial partnership with Etihad Airways, based in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates. And last month, Emirates of Dubai, the biggest of the Persian Gulf’s vibrant carriers, announced a wide-ranging combination with Qantas Airlines of Australia. “It’s a recognition they are taking Gulf carriers seriously after writing them off,” said Akbar Al Baker, the chief executive of Qatar Airways. “When you cannot defeat someone, you’ve got to join them.” These deals are just the latest in a flurry of global partnerships in recent months. The three big airline coalitions — Star Alliance, SkyTeam and Oneworld — have been busy courting new members ...

THE decision made on October 10th by Britain’s BAE Systems, the world’s third-biggest defence firm, and EADS, the Franco-German owner of Airbus, to call off their proposed €38 billion ($50 billion) merger is a bitter blow both to the two companies and to hopes for the emergence of a more integrated European defence and aerospace industry. Executives reluctantly concluded that there was no hope of securing the political agreement of all three governments involved (France, Britain and Germany) that the deal should proceed. Perhaps surprisingly, it was the Germans—specifically the chancellor, Angela Merkel—who blocked it. Mrs Merkel informed France’s president, François Hollande, of her decision in a phone call on the evening of October 9th. Although the intended merger, which would have split the new entity 60/40 between EADS and BAE shareholders, had its critics, it was in the long-term strategic interests of both companies. It offered BAE a way back into the booming civil-aviatio...

BA is to trial a new service allowing passengers to be automatically checked in ahead of their flight. The automated service will check in passengers 24 hours before their flight, assign them a seat and send them their boarding pass electronically. Launching this month, the trial will initially be offered to selected passengers departing from French airports, before being extended to “a larger group of travellers in the spring”. If these trials are successful, BA says it will then make the service an option for all customers across the BA network by the end of next year. BA says that during the trial "seats will be allocated on a individual basis", adding that "if customers wish to change the seat allocated they will be able to do so". The carrier also said that "In the future, the vision is to allow customers to store their preferences and if they are available, be allocated seats accordingly". Commenting on the move BA’s managing director o...

Easy Jet is introducing the new online 'Inspire Me' tool feature designed to help customers find exactly what they are looking for at the click of a mouse. 'Inspire Me' gives customers ideas on where to go, whatever their budget, helping them to see how far their budget can take them or just to pinpoint the right destinations for their trip, all displayed on a map of Europe. The feature enables customers who are browsing the site to search by multiple criteria including price and by the type of trip they are looking for. Easy to identify symbols, like a heart for a romantic getaway or a sun for a beach break, help narrow options so customers can find their perfect trip faster than ever before. Each destination includes a link to easyJet's booking process or to newly created destination guides for further destination specific information. Source :  http://www.easyjet.com/en/inspireme

Virgin Australia has just announced that a major new marketing campaign will debut this afternoon during the broadcast of the AFL grand final. The campaign will feature a new 60 second TV commercial which was filmed on the salt plains of Western Australia, and will also incorporate online, print, outdoor and social media elements. “When we launched the new Virgin Australia brand and identity last year, we made a promise to put the magic back into flying,” said Chief Customer Officer Mark Hassell. “This campaign highlights how we have delivered on that promise. We have completely overhauled the customer experience, transforming the look and feel of travelling with Virgin Australia both in the air and on the ground. “We now have a brand new product that can compete with the best airlines in the world,” he added. Source:  http://www.virginaustralia.com/au/en/about-us/media/2012/WONDERFUL-CAMPAIGN/

The €700 million ($899 million) terminal complex is 800m-long and is the largest above-ground construction project at Frankfurt Airport since the opening of Terminal 2 in 1994. It will be exclusively used by Deutsche Lufthansa AG and its Star Alliance partners. It will also provide more docking positions for serving wide body aircraft like the Airbus A380 superjumbo and the Boeing B747 family. Pier A-Plus will offer 185,000 square metre of total useable floor space. It provides seven docking positions for long-haul aircraft with four designed for double-decker jets like the A380 superjumbo served by three passenger bridges, and three more positions with two passenger bridges for aircraft like the Boeing 747-8 and Airbus 340. It also features five Lufthansa lounges, including one First Class, two Senator and two Business lounges. These facilities combined together expand Lufthansa’s total lounge space by almost 50% to more than 14,000 square meters. The lounges are designed to off...

ParisTech Review. Air traffic is expected to rise globally, particularly in Asia, but if it is to comply with the environmental objectives set out by the international community, the energy consumption of aircrafts has to be reduced. Are we on track? Didier-François Godart. The whole aviation industry is focused on this ambition. Engine improvements, the electrification of planes and new solutions such as “green taxiing” (rolling on the tarmac with engines offline) will allow airline companies to save both CO2 and money. One should not underestimate the operational benefits: punctuality will increase and congestion at gates and parking areas will be reduced. As an indication, a major airline that adopts “green taxiing” on all its planes will save enough to buy a new plane each year. It is anything but a marginal factor. The “electric plane” is all the rage in aeronautics. But what will truly be electric in it? The only primary energy source on board of a commercial plane, in ...