ATW Daily News

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Wednesday November 4, 2009

Pinnacle Airlines and Colgan Air parent Pinnacle Airlines Corp. reported an $11.4 million profit in the third quarter, an 84% increase from the $6.2 million earned the same period a year ago. Revenue dipped 2% year-over-year to $217.2 million while expenses fell 4% to $193.4 million. Operating income was $23.8 million, up 19% from $20 million in the 2008 third quarter. During the quarter, Pinnacle saw a 5% drop in aircraft utilization, primarily owing to network changes that resulted in shorter flights. Colgan saw a 16% reduction in block hr. and a 15% decrease in departures. For the nine months ended Sept. 30, the company reported net income of $36.2 million, a dramatic reversal from the $5.5 million loss suffered in the year-ago period.

US House of Representatives ranking Republicans on committees with jurisdiction over labor and transportation pushed back against the National Mediation Board's proposal to change airline union-certification voting rules, saying the suggested rule alteration is "troubling" and shows "union favoritism." NMB has proposed revising its rules to allow an airline work group to unionize if a majority of those casting ballots in a union-certification vote approve, rather than a majority of the total work group (ATWOnline, Nov. 3).

Reps. John Kline (R-Minn.), ranking member on the Education and Labor Committee, and John Mica (R-Fla.), ranking member on the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, issued a joint statement calling the proposal ill-advised. Mica said the rule change would "allow a clear minority of workers to force unionization upon all workers, including those who are not interested in being represented by a union." In a recent letter to NMB anticipating the proposal, Kline and Mica wrote that the rule change would mark "a drastic and fundamental change to longstanding rules under the Railway Labor Act, rules tied to important national policies recognizing the importance of air transportation to commerce and the need for union representation that has majority support." The Air Transport Assn. said it remained "firm in our position that the National Mediation Board does not have the authority to change the rules, which is a right reserved for Congress."

Juneyao Airlines expects to report a net profit in excess of CNY70 million ($10.2 million) this year, a significant increase over the CNY50 million forecast in July (ATWOnline, July 21), and now expects earnings greater than CNY100 million in 2010 owing to strong domestic demand and fleet expansion, according to Chairman Wang Junjin. It posted a CNY11.5 million surplus in 2008. The privately held Shanghai-based carrier operates 12 A320s and plans to introduce two more by year end. It expects to expand to 16 in time for Expo 2010 in Shanghai and add 13 more by 2013. It is considering listing on the Shanghai Stock Exchange and would prefer to add an investor from inside the industry rather than from the financial sector, although Wang said, "it's not our current priority." Juneyao parent Juneyao Group recently sold its share in United Eagle Airlines (ATWOnline, Oct. 19). It also holds a controlling stake in Tianjin-based Okay Airways but, "from now on, we will give priority to Juneyao Airlines' growth," Wang said.

Single European Sky prospects took another step forward last week following the signing of an eight-year, €50 million agreement by Eurocontrol and SITA to launch the Pan European Network Service, which will allow air navigation service providers from 38 countries to exchange operational data and voice communications across a common network for the first time. PENS will replace today's ad hoc bilateral communications, resulting in "huge efficiency gains" and a "minimum €1 million per year" in reduced costs, SITA Director-Air Traffic Management Akhil Sharma confirmed to ATWOnline.

"SITA's selection, following an intensive competitive tendering exercise, is the culmination of over 15 years of discussion and reflects the vision of a pan-European network as a means to integrate the national telecommunication networks of the ANSPs," Eurocontrol DG David McMillan said. PENS replaces and combines the two current IP network services, Eurocontrol's Central Flow Management Unit and the European Aeronautical Information Service Database. The new managed IP-based regional communications service also will help ANSPs still using the legacy X25 protocol move to an IP service "in a cost-efficient and manageable way in order to comply with the Single European Sky regulation," according to Eurocontrol and SITA.

by Cathy Buyck

Air India pilots represented by the Indian Commercial Pilots Assn. warned they are ready to strike on Nov. 24, issuing a statement saying, "We intend to tell the public and the political leadership what is wrong with Air India. . .if issues including that of pending arrears are not addressed by Air India management by Nov. 10," the Press Trust of India reported.

Air Transport Assn. President and CEO James May last week wrote US State Dept. Envoy for Climate Change Todd Stern urging him to "strongly and expressly oppose" the International Air Passenger Adaptation Levy, a tax on airline tickets that has been proposed by a group of countries led by Maldives. The measure would see "anywhere from $6 to $62 added to the cost of an international airline ticket" to pay for "climate change projects to be built in developing countries," according to ATA. The tax "unfairly and unreasonably targets one industrial sector, a sector that has a tremendous fuel and GHG efficiency record," May said. It also would "damage an already crippled financial industry," and likely would add to the "patchwork quilt of economic measures sprouting up all over the globe," covering "the same ton of aviation GHGs over and over."

Astraeus announced the introduction of its first A320, a former Iberia aircraft on lease from DVB Bank. "Our fleet has traditionally been 100% Boeing, but in leasing and contracting out of our aircraft over the past 18 months under our new business model, we've come across a great deal of operators who want, or need, different options," CCO and Director-Aircraft Leasing Shaun Monnery said. The London Gatwick-based ACMI airline also operates 11 737 and 757 aircraft.

Arik Air took delivery of the first of four ordered 72-seat Q400s (ATWOnline, July 26, 2007).

Wizz Air announced the launch of a Web check-in service starting with flights from Budapest and extending to the rest of the network by next spring.

EasyJet will launch 25 new routes this winter: Manchester to Marrakech (Oct. 29), Copenhagen and Munich (both Nov.6); Basel-Dusseldorf (Nov. 2); Liverpool to Fuerteventura (Nov. 2) and Lanzarote (Nov. 3); Lyon to Nantes (Nov. 2) and Brussels (Dec. 17); Rome Fiumicino to Lamezia, Amsterdam, Lisbon (all Nov. 2) and Dusseldorf (Feb. 1); Madrid-AMS (Nov. 2); London Gatwick to Porto (Nov. 2), Agadir (Nov. 4), Dusseldorf and Hamburg (both Feb. 2); London Luton to Tel Aviv (Nov. 2), Sharm El Sheikh (Nov. 3) and Paphos (Nov. 4); London Stansted-Fuerteventura (Nov. 4); Geneva to CPH (Dec. 12), Sharm El Sheikh and Toulouse (Dec. 15); Edinburgh-Lyon (Dec. 17).

WestJet will launch weekly service from Kelowna to Los Cabos (Nov. 6) and Cancun (Dec. 12). Flights to Puerto Vallarta began Sunday.

Eastern Airways yesterday launched 10-times-weekly Southampton-Durham service.

Royal Jordanian will launch twice-weekly flights between Amman and Mosul, its fifth Iraqi destination, on Nov. 15.

Ryanair transported 6.2 million passengers in October, up 15% year-over-year, while load factor was level at 85%.

Sensis announced that Houston Intercontinental became the 21st airport to operate its Airport Surface Detection Equipment, Model X runway incursion detection and alerting system. Miami International became the 20rh on Monday.

United Airlines parent UAL Corp. named VP-Corporate Real Estate Ajay Singh as VP-business management and information technology and appointed MD-Procurement Kate Gebo to succeed Singh. In addition, Praveen Sharma was named MD-Mileage Plus finance, strategy and information technology.