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IndiGo, the biggest customer for Airbus’s A320neo jets, is considering slowing deliveries of the single-aisle aircraft to give supplier Pratt & Whitney more time to make improvements to the model’s engines. The Indian carrier may seek the delivery slowdown “to allow Pratt & Whitney to catch up on the production of upgraded engines,” InterGlobe Aviation, which operates the airline, said Monday in its fiscal first-quarter financial statement, without providing details. IndiGo’s A320neo order at Airbus totals 430 planes, with the first aircraft handed over last March. The carrier, which has a contract with Pratt to provide power systems for the first 150 planes, said earlier this year it would consider switching to rival CFM International Inc.’s engines for later orders. IndiGo President Aditya Ghosh declined to say whether the airline would shift to the CFM models for the first batch of aircraft. “The A320neo operations continue to be a challenge,” Ghosh said on a conference call with analysts. “We are struggling with maintaining our schedule integrity and our technical dispatch reliabilities at the same level” as the plane’s predecessor model, the A320ceo. Even so, IndiGo is sticking to a target of operating 24 A320neos by the end of March 2017. It currently flies five of the planes. Stefan Schaffrath, an Airbus spokesman, declined to comment, saying IndiGo is still taking deliveries of the planes.<br/>

Pakistan has arrested at least 12 staff of its national carrier following the discovery of 6 kg of heroin in the toilet of an aircraft bound for Dubai, an airline spokesman said Monday. The latest instance of misbehaviour by the staff of cash-strapped Pakistan International Airlines was uncovered after the military-run Anti-Narcotics Force raided a flight from Lahore to Dubai flight on Saturday, Danyal Gilani said. "Around a dozen employees of PIA have been detained and are being interrogated in connection with heroin seizure," he told Reuters. "If proven guilty, they will face action with respect to their jobs, in addition to the legal consequences." <br/>

Emirates is seeking to raise as much as $2.5b to fund the purchase of Airbus Group SE A380 superjumbos, according to two people with knowledge of the deal. The Dubai government-owned carrier plans an 18-month bridge loan priced at about 135 basis points over the London Interbank Offered Rate, said the people, asking not to be identified because the information is private. The bridge facility will later be converted to a 12-year loan to fund about 10 A380s, which will be delivered before the year end, one of the people said.<br/>Emirates, which has built Dubai as a hub for transcontinental traffic from the U.S and Europe to Asia, will take delivery of 21 A380s in the fiscal year through March 2017. Profit surged 50% in the financial year ended March 31 to 8.2b dirhams ($2.2b) as it carried more passengers and benefited from a decline in oil prices. The funding for the planes is for a combination of operating and financial leases, according to one of the people. The airline is seeking short-term financing due to the lack of funding from the European export credit agency, although that is expected to become available over the next six to 12 months, said the people. ECA-backed funding will replace the bridge facility when it’s available and some of the lenders will be repaid, according to the people.<br/>

Southwest Airlines pilots called for the replacement of CEO Gary Kelly, saying a nationwide computer outage that grounded the carrier last month capped a list of problems caused by a “misguided focus” on cost control and stock performance. “We can no longer sit idly by and watch poor decision after poor decision deeply affect our customers and Southwest Airlines,” Jon Weaks, president of the Southwest Airlines Pilots’ Association, said Monday. The union, representing about 8,000 pilots, also called for the ouster of COO Mike Van de Ven. The union’s comments are an effort to pressure the airline into meeting pilots’ demands during contract talks, Randy Babbitt, Southwest’s senior VP for labor relations, said by e-mail. Talks between the two have been underway for about four years. “SWAPA leaders should understand that we want to work with them, not against them,” Babbitt said. “As soon as they take a similar approach, we’ll be closer to finalizing a contract for our pilots that rewards them for their service and professionalism.”<br/>

Ryanair is to reduce the number of flights it operates from City of Derry Airport to London Stansted this winter. The Irish airline said it plans to cut its weekly service to London from seven down to six. The change will come into effect from 30 October. City of Derry Airport said it understands the move has been made because of the budget airline's financial results and growth plans. Ryanair said it wants to "pivot growth" away from the UK towards Europe. A spokesperson for City of Derry Airport said management is involved in ongoing discussions with Ryanair regarding the winter schedule.<br/>They added that in addition to the remaining six weekly services to London Stansted, the airport provides five weekly services to Glasgow International and five weekly services to Liverpool.<br/>The Airport said it had also enjoyed a very successful summer season.<br/>

As many airlines across Asia join a rush to expand their fleets by ordering hundreds of jets, China’s top budget carrier is putting a pause to its new plane orders and said it will instead focus on operations. After signing an agreement in December with Airbus Group SE for 60 A320 aircraft, Spring Airlines said it has enough planes to grow its capacity by a targeted 15 to 20% annually. The operator isn’t likely to buy more in the “foreseeable years to come,” Chairman Wang Zhenghua said in an interview in Shanghai on Friday.<br/>“How many more do you expect us to buy?” said Wang, who is also the founder of the airline. “Some of the new planes we prepaid for will be gradually put into service.” The company has 60 in its fleet at present, including 33 leased jets. Wang’s strategy of capping new plane orders is in contrast to the approach taken by companies such as AirAsia, which last month announced a deal to buy 100 A321neos from Airbus, taking its total orders of the A320-series planes to 575. Shanghai-based Spring Airlines in December said it would buy 45 A320neo planes and 15 A321neo jets in a deal valued at $6.3b at list prices, not including discounts customary for large orders. The aircraft would be used on some of the 36 new international routes Spring Air had introduced last year. The company has 116 planes on order so far and its fleet will reach about 100 by 2018, Wang said.<br/>

Kuwaiti hybrid carrier Jazeera Airways reported a half-year net profit of KD6m ($19.9m), down 3.6% year-over-year (YOY) because of overcapacity in the local marketplace. It achieved the H1 profit figure on revenue of KD24.7m, down 7.3% YOY. Net profit for 2Q was down 38.1% at KD2m as yields were squeezed, but chairman Marwan Boodai said he remained optimistic for the remainder of the year. Despite the fall in profit, Q2 had seen higher passenger numbers in both volume and load factor. Passenger numbers were up 3.2%, and load factor reached 72.4% compared to a year ago. The load factor figure was “a full 10% higher than our peers’ average load factor on the routes we operate,” Boodai said. “That’s not to say it wasn’t a challenging quarter. We saw more capacity being dumped on our routes, rising fuel costs, and an expected shift of the summer season as most of Ramadan has now moved into Q2, thus shifting revenue and travel trends and slightly impacting our earnings... Our outlook for the year remains unchanged and in line with our sector’s seasonality. While the excessive overcapacity on the sectors we operate poses a downward pressure on our yields, we expect to counter this pressure in Q3, which only had five days of Ramadan, and close the year with growth in our operational profits and our bottom line.”<br/>