Airlines Financial News

By Joanna Plucinska and Rajesh Kumar Singh

Airbus said Thursday that Vietnamese airline Vietjet Air has agreed to buy 20 of its A330-900 planes. Vietjet signed a memorandum of understanding with Airbus for the wide-body aircraft, which will replace its current fleet of leased A330-300 planes, Airbus said in a statement. "We are excited to work with Vietjet on the next phase of the carrier's expansion," said Christian Scherer, chief executive of Airbus's commercial aircraft business.

Boeing has removed the head of its troubled 737 MAX programme from the planemaker, amid scrutiny around production and safety measures following a mid-air blowout on a plane last month, Al Jazeera reported. The company also reshuffled its leadership team at the Commercial Airplanes division, according to a company memo sent to staff by Boeing Commercial Airplanes (BCA) CEO Stan Deal, Al Jazeera reported, citing the Seattle Times.

Across the United States, chronic worker shortages have led many companies to invest in machines to do some of the work they can’t find people to do

Boeing says the head of its 737 jetliner program is leaving the company immediately, paving the way for the aircraft maker to appoint new leadership at the troubled division

United Airlines flight from San Francisco to Boston was diverted to Denver on Monday after the plane’s wing started coming apart mid-flight — and a passenger managed to capture footage of the unnerving issue.Kevin Clarke pulled out his phone to record video of damage to the plane’s structure, which appeared to show the wing slat missing large chunks and beginning to separate from the rest of the wing.“Just about to land in Denver with a broken wing on the plane,” Clarke can be heard saying in the video.Clarke told WCVB that as the wheels lifted off in San Francisco, he felt an “incredibly strong vibration” and started to become worried about the plane’s shaking.“All of a sudden I hear this loud vibration and noise that I’ve never heard from a plane before and it stopped within seconds and I’m like, well that’s good it stopped,” Clarke told ABC.He told the outlet that the plane’s pilot soon entered the cabin and checked out the wing from a window, before retreating back into the cockpit.“Minutes later, he comes on the PA system and announces that we’ve sustained some damage to the slat underneath the wing,” said Clarke.Another passenger shared a photo of the damaged wing on Reddit mid-flight.“Sitting right on the wing and the noise after reaching altitude was much louder than normal. I opened the window to see the wing looking like this,” user octopus_hug wrote.

Ed Clark, the executive leading Boeing (NYSE:BA)'s 737 MAX program, has stepped down, Reuters reported Wednesday after obtaining a company memo.

India will allow foreign airlines to operate non-scheduled cargo flights from all international airports in the country for three years, lifting 2020 curbs that had restricted them to six — Delhi, Mumbai, Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Kolkata and Chennai. This followed lobbying by exporters against the restrictions. While India had an open sky policy in air cargo that allowed unhindered movement by foreign airlines, the government amended it in 2020 to give Indian carriers a boost. However, exporters have been protesting that goods capacity had shrunk as Indian carriers failed to deploy enough aircraft to meet demand.

Boeing 737 MAX-8 jets in March 2019, staff at his department prepared three very different speeches.They outlined three different scenarios: restricting the aircraft from Canadian airspace, as many countries already had, declaring the MAX-8 safe to fly, as the Americans did, or allowing the aircraft to operate “only if certain standards were met.”The speeches are part of a newly released trove of internal documents on the federal government’s decision to ground the Boeing jets following a deadly 2019 crash in Ethiopia that killed 18 Canadians.Next month marks the fifth anniversary of the disaster.It’s not unusual for staff to draft multiple versions of speeches for ministers. But the fact that each of Garneau’s three prepared remarks contained vastly different decisions on the grounding of the MAX-8 illustrates the uncertainty at Transport Canada over the jets’ safety.Emails, memos and briefing notes obtained by Global News through access to information law show three days of flurried activity at Transport Canada as the agency’s position continuously evolved.

NEW DELHI : Global supply chain challenges that have weighed down Indian airlines the past few years are unlikely to go away anytime soon, going by French aircraft manufacturer ATR’s projections. The company expects its aircraft deliveries to return to pre-covid levels only by 2027-2028, with a gradual easing of supply chain constraints in the aviation ecosystem. In 2023, ATR delivered 36 aircraft, down from 68 in the pre-covid year of 2019.

By Lisa Barrington, Brenda Goh and Joe Brock

₹1000 for 15 Kg on domestic flights and ₹1300 for 20 Kg on international flights. Taking to X, Air India Express wrote, “#LightenUp your journeys with Xpress Lite - Introducing special cabin bag-only fares! Save More, No Queue, Enjoy 7 kgs cabin baggage, and pre-book an additional 3 kgs for free" In a press release, the airline stated, “Xpress Lite fares enable guests who prefer travelling without check-in baggage to make the most of fares which are lower than regular fares.

Mexico's president acknowledges the armed forces have taken over yet another civilian role: filling potholes on the nation's highways

Canada’s inflation rate for January decelerated to 2.9 per cent, dropping more than economists were predicting and possibly opening a window for the Bank of Canada to start cutting rates as early as June. Here’s what economists are saying about the numbers.

American Airlines flights will have to pay more as the carrier has decided to raise the price of checking bags. The new rates will be applicable for travel tickets booked on or after February 20, as per a Reuters report. Passengers will now have to pay $35 to check their first bag for domestic flights if the service is booked online in advance, or $40 if they purchase the option at the airport, the carrier said. A second checked bag will cost $45 if purchased online or at the airport.

By Lisa Barrington

American Airlines is raising bag fees and pushing customers to buy tickets directly from the airline if they want to earn frequent-flyer points

Thousands of travelers across Germany have found themselves stranded after ground staff walked off the job at seven of the country’s biggest airports

The Singapore Airshow – Asia's largest – kicks off Tuesday with an array of aerial displays including some by China’s COMAC C919 narrow-body airliner

Ryanair, of low cost and sustained profitability, India’s newest airline Akasa Air’s journey to the top of the charts has been rather astounding. The airline, backed by legendary investor Rakesh Jhunjhunwala, who died soon after the launch of the airline in August 2022, is set to cross a milestone. It will fly beyond the Indian borders from March 28 with its first international flight scheduled to Qatar. Notably, this achievement comes in merely 19 months of its going operational. Akasa was granted the licence to fly internationally by the Ministry of Civil Aviation last year on September 20. Exiting 2023 with a fleet size of 22 aircraft, including 21 Boeing 737 MAX 8 and one Boeing 737 MAX 8 200, the first of its kind in Asia, Akasa Air is ready for its next phase of growth. It further fuelled its international flying ambitions when in January the new airline welcomed two Boeing 737 MAX 8 aircraft to its growing fleet. Since it started flying in 2022, Akasa has garnered a market share of 4 per cent as against another low-cost but much older airline SpiceJet's 5.6%. The Indian aviation market is dominated by IndiGo, which has a nearly 60 per cent market share, and the Tata Group whose airlines have a combined share of nearly 26 per cent.

By Francois Murphy