Malaysia Airlines reported continuing progress as it tries to turn the loss-making flag carrier around. As the airline is owned by Malaysia’s sovereign wealth fund, Khazanah Nasional, it does not publish financial statements. The airline did say, however, that it expects to make a loss for its 2016 financial year, but smaller than originally expected. For Q3 it saw a reduced operating loss of 7% compared to Q2. It carried 3.6m passengers in Q3, up 9% from Q2. Load factor rose 10.7 percentage point to 79.3%, again measured against the previous quarter. “The focus in the first half was on reducing costs and improving the customer experience. From July 2016 we began to push hard on revenue generation with more aggressive sales and marketing initiatives,” Malaysia Aviation Group CE Peter Bellew said. “The quarter saw expansion plans with an order of up to 50 new Boeing 737 MAX aircraft. Malaysia Airlines has also expanded its network as it launched nine new routes to China for 2017.” The group said it remains cautious for financial year 2017, with a weak Malaysian ringgit, uncertainty over the UK’s departure from the EU, and overcapacity in Malaysia dominant features. <br/>
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American Airlines issued an apology after an incident over the Thanksgiving holiday weekend. According to NBC Charlotte, a woman and her son were removed from a regional flight from Charlotte, North Carolina, to Evansville, Indiana, on Thanksgiving Day. The flight was operated by American Airlines subsidiary PSA Airlines. The family in question was travelling with a service dog that detects their son's seizures. The boy’s mother claims she filled out the required paperwork to fly with a service dog. When the family flew to Charlotte they did not encounter any problems with the dog. However, on their flight to Evansville, the son was asked to put his dog under a seat. After unsuccessfully trying to coax the 110-pound dog under a seat, a flight attendant called airline management to help remove the family from the flight. The family spent Thanksgiving night in Charlotte and was re-booked on an American Airlines flight on Friday to St. Louis. From St. Louis, the family rented a car to drive to Evansville. American Airlines issued a statement after the Thanksgiving holiday saying, “We are aware of this issue and apologise to the passenger. Our customer relations team is reaching out to the passenger directly. We are looking into the issue with PSA Airlines, the regional carrier who operated that flight.” <br/>