JetPhotos.Net Aviation News

Porter Airlines, the two-year-old Canadian carrier, plans to double its fleet of Bombardier airplanes as it adds more destinations that may include Boston or Washington. Porter will increase its fleet to 18 Bombardier Q400 planes this year, Chief Executive Officer Robert Deluce said in an interview today. Porter “could well have a follow-on order in place” next April, after it gets its full initial order of 20 planes. The Toronto-based airline serves Canadian cities including Ottawa and Montreal, as well as U.S. destinations Chicago and New York with 70-seat turboprop planes made by Montreal-based Bombardier. The airline will start flying to Thunder Bay, Ontario, in June and add to its U.S. flights.

Airline stocks tumbled worldwide on Monday, dragging a benchmark U.S. index to its biggest drop since 2001 on concern that the swine flu outbreak will damp travel demand. U.S. carriers reported some cases of suspected flulike symptoms to health authorities, the Air Transport Association trade group said, adding that details weren’t available. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommended that nonessential travel to Mexico be avoided.

Angola’s flag carrier TAAG Angola said Friday it had suspended a pilot and his co-pilot for landing at the wrong airport in Lusaka, the capital of Zambia. The pilot landed the Boeing 737 at Lusaka City Airport when he should have landed at Lusaka International Airport during a regular stopover from Harare to Luanda on April 17, TAAG said in a statement. The state carrier was banned from European airspace in 2007, the same year one of its planes crashed, killing six people on board. The government fired TAAG’s board last year and created a commission to investigate and improve safety.

U.S. airlines cut 27,500 jobs in the year that ended in February, a 6.6% drop, the U.S. Department of Transportation said. Passenger airlines employed 391,682 U.S. workers in February compared with 419,200 during the same month in 2008, the agency’s Bureau of Transportation Statistics said. Airline employment, however, is up by 100 jobs nationwide since January 2000. Airlines were hit hard last year by record spikes in jet fuel prices and weak consumer and business spending.

A Japanese passenger plane damaged part of its wing on landing at Osaka International Airport. No one was injured but the runway was closed for about an hour to clean up debris. Japan Airlines spokeswoman Mari Yanagawa says 168 passengers and crew were aboard Wednesday’s flight from Niigata. She says the MD81 aircraft tilted during landing, and the landing light and slats were damaged as the left wing rubbed against the ground.

A gunman forced his way though airport security and hijacked a Canadian jet near Montego Bay, holding six crew members hostage for eight hours before police and soldiers stormed the aircraft on Monday and captured the man. Nobody was killed or injured in the ordeal, which ended with a raid near daylight after talks broke down with a 20-year-old Jamaican hijacker described as “mentally challenged.” The hostage crisis that began around 10:20 p.m. Sunday and ended near 6:40 a.m., when members of the Jamaica Defence Force Counter Terrorism Operations Group stormed the aircraft’s cabin, according to a police statement. The man boarded CanJet Airlines Flight 918 in Montego Bay and demanded to be flown to Cuba, Vaz said.

Amid the deepening economic crisis, Australian flag carrier Qantas announced today that it will defer the delivery of Airbus A380 and Boeing 737-800 aircraft, slash capacity, and cut jobs. The airline says that it will defer the delivery of four A380s by 10-12 months and 12 737-800s for an average of 14 months. Additionally, 10 aircraft will be grounded and made available for sale.

A passenger landed a twin-engine plane in Florida after the pilot died in flight with a total of six people on board. Federal Aviation Administration officials say the pilot died after takeoff from an airport in Naples on Sunday. It was on autopilot and climbing toward 10,000 feet when the pilot died. An air traffic controller helped the passenger down by calling a friend in Connecticut who knows the King Air plane and relaying instructions. The plane landed safely at Southwest Florida International Airport in Fort Myers.

AirTran Airways pilots plan to picket Monday outside the North Terminal of Atlanta Hartsfield-Jackson Airport, the biggest airport in the nation and an AirTran hub. According to the Atlanta Business Chronicle, pilots are protesting what they claim is “a pattern of threats and intimidation” by the airline against the pilots. The National Pilots Association (NPA) said nearly 1,700 members will picket against AirTran management from 1 p.m. to 3 p.m. The demonstration will take place outside the AirTran ticketing counter in the Atlanta Airport.

Boeing announced today that it will adjust its twin-aisle airplane production plans for 2010 due to significant deterioration in the business environment for airlines and cargo operators driven by unprecedented global economic conditions. Monthly production of the 777 will decline from seven to five airplanes per month beginning in June 2010. Boeing will also delay previous plans to modestly increase 747-8 and 767 production. No change is being made
at this time to the 737 production rate.

In addition, the weak global economy has contributed to significant declines in the escalation indices that affect forecasted pricing for commercial airplanes already ordered.

A cargo plane crashed into a hillside in Indonesia’s eastern-most Papua province today, killing all six people on board, police said. The British Aerospace BAe 146-200, operated by Aviastar Mandiri (registration PK-BRD, cn E3189), was carrying food and building supplies from the provincial capital, Jayapura, to the nearby district of Wamena. The bodies of the pilot, co-pilot and four crew members were pulled from the smoldering wreckage, and an investigation into the cause of the crash was underway.

Twenty-four Indonesian military personnel were killed Monday when their training aircraft crashed into a hangar at an air base in West Java, a hospital source said. The Fokker 27 was making a landing during a regular training flight when it crashed and burst into flames in Bandung, 74 miles southeast of Jakarta, an air force spokesman said. He could not confirm the final death toll but a doctor at the West Java hospital where the victims were taken said all 24 people on board the plane had died.

In the face of a down economy, U.S. airlines experienced their best performance in four years in 2008, according to a study by the Airline Quarterly Rating, AQR. The study looked at government statistics provided by the Transportation Department that showed airlines were on time 3% more often. The statistics show that for 17 airlines, complaints went down to 1.15 complaints per 100,000 passengers in 2008 from 1.42 complaints per passengers in 2007. Overall, Southwest Airlines scored the best with only 0.25 complaints per 100,000 passengers.

An Indonesian pilot has been sentenced to two years in jail over a 2007 Garuda Indonesia plane crash that claimed 21 lives. Captain Marwoto Komar’s 737-400 was traveling at almost twice the normal landing speed when it overran the runway and crashed while landing at Yogyakarta airport.

Capt. Komar been found guilty of negligently causing death.

Photo: The wreckage of PK-GZC is seen in this 2007 photo. (Photo Copyright Baron F. Hussein)

The FAA predicts that nearly 9 percent fewer passengers will board major U.S. airlines for domestic flights this year, and that traffic on international flights will also decline as the bleak economy curbs business travel and vacation plans. Domestic boardings on major U.S. airlines are expected to fall 8.8 percent, and by 2.4 percent internationally in 2009. Including smaller regional carriers, enplanements on U.S. routes are expected to drop 7.8 percent this year — a substantial decline compared with 2008’s 1.5 percent year-over-year dip. But the agency says that traffic will pick up again in 2010, with domestic boardings growing 2.3 percent a year to reach 690.2 million by 2025. International boardings on the big carriers and smaller regionals will grow 4.3 percent a year from 2010 through 2025. The FAA forecast that total enplanements will hit 1.1 billion in 2025, up from 757.4 million last year.

Delta Air Lines (Atlanta) is expected to start flights from its Atlanta hub to Nairobi via Dakar, Senegal on June 3, 2009. The Boeing 767-300ER flights will depart Nairobi every Monday, Wednesday, Friday and Sundays.

Delta Air Lines is supplying some aircraft from its Northwest subsidiary to offer free charters to evacuate elderly residents and people in assisted living facilities in Fargo, North Dakota, which is preparing to experience heavy flooding. CEO Richard Anderson told his employees in a recorded message Friday that Northwest Boeing 757s and DC9s will be used for the effort. Anderson didn’t say how many planes or flights were being offered, but said the airline was cooperating with the Fargo mayor. Flight crews are volunteering their time.

Alaska Airlines has canceled all flights to and from Anchorage as Mt. Redoubt continues to erupt. The volcano, located 100 miles southwest of Alaska’s largest city, erupted again today at 8:40am AKDT, sending a fresh plume of ash 50,000 feet into the atmosphere. An airline spokesman says Alaska Airlines is continually monitoring the situation, and will issue further updates as the situation warrants. UPS, FedEx, and other cargo airlines that heavily utilize the Anchorage airport as a freight hub have also canceled all operations.

The National Transportation Safety Board said Wednesday that the flight data recorder from last month’s crashed of a Colgan Air/Continental Connection Bombardier Q400 near Buffalo, New York shows the plane’s stall warning system had activated before the accident and there was some ice accumulation, but no mechanical problems were found with the plane. The board said the data “shows that some ice accumulation was likely present on the airplane prior to the initial upset event, but that the airplane continued to respond as expected to flight control inputs throughout the accident flight.” NTSB accident investigator Greg Phillips said it appears so far that the ice in the Buffalo crash “wasn’t anything the plane shouldn’t have been able to handle.” All 49 people and one man on the ground were killed when the plane lost control and crashed about 5 miles short of Buffalo’s runway 23.

Britain’s British Airways and Spain’s Iberia are edging close to agreement on a merger that would create Europe’s third largest airline after Air France-KLM and Lufthansa. Iberia’s board will discuss the final details of the proposed all-share deal at a scheduled monthly meeting in Madrid March 26. BA and Iberia would continue to operate as separate brands under a new operating company, mirroring the merger of Air France and KLM, to protect landing rights which are mostly based on a carrier’s nationality.