Philippines aviation chief quits
MANILA, 23 December 2010 – The Philippines’ chief aviation regulator has abruptly quit, the government said Tuesday, after he blamed President Benigno Aquino for keeping the country on an international flight safety blacklist.
Civil Aviation Authority of the Philippines director-general Alfonso Cusi tendered his resignation effective 31 December.
Cathay makes pay offer to pilots
HONG KONG, 21 December 2010 – Cathay Pacific and its pilots union have reached a tentative pay deal, a company spokeswoman said Monday, averting possible labour action over the busy holiday period.
The Hong Kong-based carrier’s pilots must still vote in favour of the deal which union negotiators endorsed after negotiations last week.
“The talks were professional and courteous with some understandable differences in perception but we did get to a point where it was feasible to place an offer on the table,” the company spokeswoman told AFP.
SEAIR flies to Singapore
December 9, 2010 by TTRweekly Staff
Filed under News
MANILA, 9 December 2010 – Philippine budget carrier South East Air Lines said Wednesday it will begin overseas flights from next week, with a service to Singapore and added that it would introduce more routes in the New Year.
SEAIR will launch the service, 16 December, flying a leased Airbus A319 from its base at Clark Airport north of Manila, said its president Avelino Zapanta.
“The introduction of these new flights will create a welcome boost to the Philippine tourism industry and create more high-calibre local jobs,” said Zapanta, a former president of flag carrier Philippine Airlines.
Flights to Hong Kong, Macau and Bangkok are also planned to take of some time next year when SEAIR gets its second Airbus, the company said. Read more
Dubai reviews airport plan
December 8, 2010 by TTRweekly Staff
Filed under News
DUBAI, 8 December 2010 – Dubai Airports said on Tuesday it may delay the scheduled March launch of a passenger terminal at a new airport, as it unveiled plans to expand its old airport’s capacity to 90 million passengers by 2018.
“We are currently reviewing the master plan for the new airport,” Dubai Airports CEO, Paul Griffiths, told reporters.
“With everything going on time and according to schedule, we are reviewing the opening date for the new terminal and we may push it a little just to get everything right,” he said. Read more
QF sore over A380 payload restriction
SYDNEY, 7 December 2010 – Australia’s Qantas on Saturday said new rules imposed after an A380 engine blast meant the 470-seat superjumbo could carry just 80 passengers to Los Angeles and was “un-commercial” on the key route.
The regulations, which direct lower engine thrust, made the A380 commercially unsuitable for the trans-Pacific trip, according to legal documents filed in the carrier’s case against engine manufacturer Rolls-Royce.
Critical safety issue on RR engine
SYDNEY, 2 December 2010 – Australian officials probing a Qantas A380 engine blast last month reported a “critical safety issue” with the Rolls-Royce turbine Thursday, which they said could lead to “catastrophic engine failure”.
The Australian Transport Safety Bureau said a misaligned component had thinned the wall of an oil pipe in the engine, causing “fatigue cracking” that prompted leakage and a fire “central to the engine failure”.
“This condition could lead to an elevated risk of fatigue crack initiation and growth, oil leakage and potential catastrophic engine failure from a resulting oil fire,” the ATSB said, noting it was “understood to be related to the manufacturing process”.
Cambodia demolishes colonial heritage
PHNOM PENH, 1 December 2010 – When Cambodia tore down a century-old school in the capital this year, conservationists bemoaned the loss of yet another piece of history in former French Indochina in the rush to modernise.
French colonial architecture — with its shuttered windows, grand balconies and pitched tiled roofs — for decades defined the look of cities in Cambodia, Laos and Vietnam, even after the French pulled out of Indochina in 1954.
But now, hundreds of historic buildings across the region are being knocked down as governments capitalise on rising land prices and attempt to create eye-catching skylines.
ANA speaks out on Boeing nightmare
TOKYO, 30 November 2010 – The head of Japan’s All Nippon Airlines has voiced “great disappointment” at repeated delays by Boeing in delivering its hi-tech 787 Dreamliner, a report said Monday.
ANA, Japan’s second largest airline after troubled Japan Airlines, is to be the launch customer for the Dreamliner, which features a lightweight part-carbon composite structure for greater fuel efficiency.
But the project has suffered a number of setbacks, including a fire on a test flight this month.
Wiring snag grounds QF plane
SYDNEY, 28 November 2010 (AFP) – Qantas grounded a Boeing 747 overnight because of a wiring malfunction, the Australian airline said Sunday, the latest incident to hit the carrier since a mid-air engine blast earlier this month.
The London-bound flight was cancelled late on Saturday after the pilot experienced “an issue with one of the engines” before take-off, a Qantas spokesman said.
Protest over scanners flops
CHICAGO, 25 November 2010 – US airline passengers seemed resigned to invasive security screening early Wednesday, the busiest travel day of the year, as a much-hyped, if loosely organised call for protests against intensive security went largely unheeded.
The online organiser of National Opt Out Day was urging holiday travelers to request full-body pat-downs rather than submit to what he calls a “naked body scanner” to “send a message to our lawmakers that we demand change.”
