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05 October 2022

Air Belgium welcomes two Airbus A330-200 aircraft for its passenger fleet

Air Belgium has disclosed the first picture of its first Airbus A330-200 for the passenger fleet, which was adapted to its standards and livery in Woensdrecht, The Netherlands. The aircraft was recently registered OE-LCL and will enter into service later this month. It is the first of two that are joining Air Belgium’s passenger fleet currently strong of two A330-900s leased directly from Airbus. Its sister aircraft bears registration OE-LAJ and will enter into service in November. Both new aircraft are ex-Etihad Airways planes leased from U.S. lessor Altavair. They will be deployed essentially on the routes from Brussels South Charleroi to the French Antilles, but also to destinations from Brussels Airport like Punta Cana, Curaçao and Bonaire.

Together, these four A330 aircraft replace four fuel-thirsty A340-300s quadjets used to launch operations in 2018. Air Belgium has already operated four A330-200s in freighter configuration on behalf of French shipping company CMA CGM, to help it start up its own airfreight operation. Air Belgium will also fly three A330-200 freighters for its largest shareholder, the Hongyuan Group (49%), in addition to two Boeing 747-8Fs. The first one is already in service and the second and third examples are set to join the fleet in November 2022 and February 2023.
 

Blue Air will not resume flights as planned on 10 October

Romanian private airline Blue Air has announced it will not be in a position to resume flying on 10 October as it originally planned. The airline is facing a crisis, and it is unclear if it will ever return to the skies. Blue Air announced yesterday it would not meet its target of resuming flights in two weeks’ time, saying: “Blue Air is currently still not in a position to start flying again on 10 October 2022. Blue Air will make an announcement promptly upon the finalization of the ongoing discussions as to when it expects to have its fleet flying again”.

The explanation behind this latest prolonging was given as follows: “The many severe hardships, financial and operational, created by the COVID-19 pandemic have been felt by all airlines, but even more keenly by private regional airlines struggling for survival. Notwithstanding these and other adverse elements, Blue Air, a proud Romanian private company, is doing its best to resume flight operations. To that end, Blue Air is currently in discussions with potential investors, lenders, and the Romanian Government to restructure its capital profile so as to be able to resume air operations”.

Furthermore, airlines have already responded by adding additional capacity in Romania. Wiz Air announced it was stationing a staggering five additional aircraft in the country, boosting its seat capacity by as much as 2.6 million seats for a total of 13.8 million.
 

Finnair starts change negotiations with its employees to discuss plans to reorganise the company through personnel redundancies and changing job descriptions. The plan is linked to Finnair’s new strategy published on 7 September which focuses on restoring Finnair’s profitability. The plan targets to build Finnair’s different functions to meet the size of the company and the changes in Finnair’s operating environment. Finnair will be operating with a smaller capacity than before the pandemic.   

Up to approximately 200 jobs at Finnair could be reduced globally if the plan is implemented. About 120 of the redundancies would be in Finland where the negotiations concern approximately 770 employees working in executive, manager and expert roles. Finnair has a total of approximately 5.300 employees globally. The negotiations do not concern crew or other operative employees.

Finnair CEO Topi Manner says: “Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the closed Russian airspace have impacted our business significantly. Thus, in addition to other actions to restore Finnair’s profitability, we have to discuss measures that are, unfortunately, the most painful ones for our employees”.
 

This week, Airbus delivered the 500th Airbus A350 aircraft, an A350-900 received by Iberia, a major European customer with 20 A350s on order and 14 in service. To date, the A350 family is operated by 39 airlines on over 900 routes worldwide, and the European OEM has a backlog of over 400 jets. “When we designed the A350 and delivered the first one, we were extremely proud to have created a real clean sheet, state-of-the-art aircraft, delivering unmatched performance and economics. It offers outstanding space, comfort, and quietness to the passengers, and it contributes significantly to decarbonizing aviation”.

This A350-900 joins Iberia’s long-haul fleet. The Spanish carrier now operates 14 A350-900s and expects to receive six more in the future. Iberia’s long-haul fleet is also composed of 18 Airbus A330-200s and eight A330-300s. 
 

The Italian parliamentary elections, and the country's swing to the far right, have had an impact on the exclusive negotiations on the partial privatization of the national airline ITA Airways. The Italian government has extended the deadline for negotiations to 31 October. The talks were originally scheduled to end on 30 September. This extension was decided in order to allow the new government, which will be formed by the middle of October, to take over the file.

The new leader, Giorgia Meloni, who is expected to be appointed President of the Council, has repeatedly spoken out against privatization in recent weeks. However, those close to her indicate that she is no longer so fiercely opposed to the sale.  

According to the Italian press, Meloni wants to try to understand whether the sale of the majority of ITA is the best solution, whether Certares is the right investor, and whether the 600 million euros that the Certares fund wants to pay for the subsequent recapitalization is also a benefit for the public purse.
 

Passenger numbers at Ryanair rose 49% in September to almost 16 million, the airline said. That compared with 10.6 million in 2021 and brings to 153 million the total number of passengers that have flown with Ryanair in the last 12 months.

Load factor, a measure of how full airplanes are, was 94% in September. That was up from 81% in September 2021. Air traffic has recovered steadily from measures imposed to help slow the spread of COVID-19. Last month, Ryanair said it expects to grow its Irish passenger traffic by ten million over the next decade to 30 million a year, while creating 2.000 new jobs in Ireland.
 

Ryanair Chief Executive Officer Michael O'Leary says Britain’s revamped fiscal policy could bankrupt the country, while rising inflation and interest rates combined with a declining UK pound has one of his top executives saying the airline could quit the UK market. Putting forward the Ryanair point of view in Dublin this week, O'Leary told journalists that "I think what they have done in the UK is nuts. I think they could bankrupt the UK economy in the next two years".

At the same event, Ryanair CEO Eddie Wilson warned the airline had the ability to withdraw from the UK market if economic conditions kept deteriorating and dampened demand for low-cost airline travel. According to a Bloomberg report, Ryanair is ready and willing to transfer its UK-based aircraft to any one of its 36 European bases. "If there’s issues with demand, we have that ability to grow and locate aircraft in places that have the best cost base and where demand reflects putting in that capacity", he said.

O'Leary adds that so far, despite the unfolding economic uncertainty in the UK, demand for seats is strong and presently Ryanair's scheduled seat capacity to and from the UK over the upcoming Northern Hemisphere winter is running around 8% above pre-pandemic levels.
 

Ryanair will be hosting recruitment days in Zadar next week for cabin crew positions at its Lauda Europe subsidiary in Zagreb and Zadar. The open days will be held at the Hotel Bastion on 8 and 9 October. Lauda Europe’s Head of Inflight Planning & Resourcing, Maria Cristina Civiletti, will be in attendance. She noted, “Our cabin crew roles offer exciting career opportunities for ambitious crew members to progress their career while exploring Europe's favorite destinations. We have organized these recruitment days to meet interested candidates in person and relay the exciting and dynamic career opportunities available within Europe’s largest airline group. We hope to be able to offer to as many Croatian people the adventure and experience of a lifetime within our cabin crew network in Zadar and Zagreb”.
 

Virgin Atlantic has delayed the service entry of its A330-900N. Virgin Atlantic has 16 of the A330neos on order, however, the first of the type - G-VJAZ (msn 2018) - is still to deliver. In July, Virgin Atlantic said it expected three A330neos to be delivered in the last quarter of 2022, with deliveries of the remaining planes timetabled through to 2026. In addition to the Airbus order, the airline plans to add at least seven A330neo from lessors, including at least six from Air Lease Corporation. An airline spokesperson has confirmed that the delayed arrival of the first A330neo is behind the Boston flight delay.

Virgin Atlantic plans to deploy the A330neo onto five London Heathrow-US routes over the IATA 22/23 summer. Virgin also operates ten A330-300s - which average 11 years of age - alongside nine A350-1000s and 17 B787-9s.
 

Wizz Air Holdings PLC said Tuesday that it carried more passengers in September on year. The Central and Eastern European low-cost airline said it carried 4.6 million passengers in September compared with three million for the same month a year earlier.

For the rolling 12-month period, Wizz Air carried 41.1 million passengers compared with 15.6 million a year earlier. Load factor was 87.1% in the month compared with 78.7% in 2021, up 8.4 percentage points.
 

Airbus is offering the chance to own a piece of aviation history through an auction of parts from an A380 superjumbo. Proceeds from the auction will go to the Airbus Foundation, which funds humanitarian initiatives. Other proceeds will be donated to AlRitage, an organisation that protects aviation heritage.

The three-day auction runs from 13 October to 15 October and will feature 500 parts. It will be hosted by auctioneer Marc Labarbe in Toulouse, France. The majority of the parts come from the A380 MSN13, which entered service in 2008 with Dubai's Emirates airline, and was deconstructed in 2021. The A380 was introduced in 2005 and is the world's largest passenger aircraft with room for 545 passengers, although theoretically it can carry a maximum of 853.

In February 2019, Airbus announced it would scrap production of the A380. It was hit hard during the early part of the coronavirus pandemic when international travel took a major hit and airlines turned to smaller, more fuel-efficient aircraft. Airbus sold only 251 of the planes and the last delivery, to Emirates, was made in December 2021.
 

A senior executive at the Dubai-based airline Emirates says the carrier plans to train thousands of new cabin crew in the metaverse in a major shift away from in-person classroom training. Speaking at the Dubai Metaverse Assembly last week, Emirates’ chief operating officer Adel Ahmed Al Redha said the metaverse would allow cabin crew to train in a virtual reality environment and even participate in simulated real-life scenarios.

Emirates is on a mission to recruit thousands of new cabin crew as it seeks to bolster its workforce to keep up with travel demand, but Al Redha points out that the sheer number of new recruits is putting pressure on the airline’s training facilities. Al Redha said the airline could ease the pressure by taking some in-person training sessions into the metaverse. Around 4.000 recruits could be training in the metaverse by next year.

Trainees will still need to go to the airline’s state-of-the-art training aviation training college close to Dubai International Airport to complete practical hands-on sessions like aircraft evacuation, ditching and medical emergency scenarios. Earlier this year, Qatar Airways unveiled its first metaverse member of cabin crew – a virtual MetaHuman called Sama who is able to take visitors on a virtual journey onboard a Qatar Airways aircraft.
 

Etihad Airways, the national airline of the UAE, will host the Arab Air Carriers’ Organization (AACO) 55th Annual General Meeting (AGM), to be held in Abu Dhabi from 24 to 26 October. The opening ceremony will be held at the Louvre Abu Dhabi, welcoming senior aviation leaders and decision-makers with the participation of 34 airlines from across the region, as well as international and regional organisations in the aviation sector.

His Excellency Mohammed Ali Al Shorafa, Chairman of Etihad Aviation Group, stated: “We are proud Etihad Airways is hosting the upcoming AACO Annual General Meeting for the second time since 2011. This highlights the vital role airlines have in supporting the economic development of the region, which became more evident with the challenges the pandemic imposed on the aviation industry. The AGM is an opportunity to highlight the achievements we have accomplished together as an industry over the past years, as well as a chance to strengthen the existing cooperation on issues of common interest”.
 

The State of Qatar has won membership of the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) Council for the first time in its history, in the elections that took yesterday, at the meetings of the 41st Session of the ICAO Assembly, which is convened in Montreal, Canada, with participation of delegations of 193 countries. The membership will be for the next three years (2023-2025) on Group C. Qatar achieved a landslide victory in elections and garnered 160 votes, making it one of the highest-scoring candidates on Group C.

Following the announcement, Minister of Transport HE Jassim Saif Ahmed Al Sulaiti said that Qatar’s winning of an ICAO Council membership emphasizes the country’s ranking and recognition at international fora, regionally and globally. He said it also reflects ICAO Member States’ confidence that Qatar is capable of significantly contributing to finding solutions to the aviation industry’s current and future challenges.

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Korean Air has signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) with Shell to obtain sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) from 2026. The arrangement, which will run for five years, covers SAF at major airports in the Asia-Pacific and the Middle East, says Korean. It adds that it will work with Shell in regard to obtaining SAF in other regions, namely Europe and the USA.

“SAF has surfaced as an important carbon reduction tool in the aviation industry to cope with global climate change, and efforts to boost SAF production and distribution has gained momentum from targeted investment and policy support in the U.S. and the EU”, says Korean. “However, with shortage of production facilities, and high costs, supply falls short of expected demand”.

The carrier has already conducted flights using SAF, including a November 2017 flight from Chicago and a February 2022 flight from Paris, both of which landed in Seoul Incheon. In addition, Korean is working with local firms regarding SAF in South Korea. It also has an MOU with Incheon International Airport, Airbus, and Air Liquide to explore the development of hydrogen fuel infrastructure in South Korea.

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Oman Air, the national airline of Oman, has carried out almost 500 simulator training sessions, 83 courses for pilots, and 230 cabin crew courses over the first half of 2022 alone. The airline also saw the promotion of seven First Officers to Commanders and 11 Second Officers to First Officers, it said. 
With all training provided in-house at Oman Air’s Flight Training Centre in Muscat, it continues to enhance its operational capabilities in line with international standards, provide rewarding job opportunities to talented young Omanis, and drive the development of Oman’s aviation sector, said the airline.

Captain Nasser bin Ahmed Al Salmi, Chief Operating Officer at Oman Air, said: “In order to meet the demands of a constantly evolving industry, we continue to invest heavily in training and capacity building. Our various flight operations programs are designed to strengthen essential technical and safety skills in line with current global aviation standards. Furthermore, where we used to have to send trainees abroad, we are now able to provide all the training they need at our on-site facility, which has positively impacted our operational efficiency and cost-effectiveness. With various courses on offer, we unlock valuable opportunities for professional development, contribute to improving national aviation standards and ultimately, provide the best possible experience to our guests”.

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