Japan Airlines said Tuesday net profit dropped in the 9 months to December due to a slump in income from international flights, but the carrier left its full-year forecast unchanged. JAL posted a net profit of JPY108.3b (US$955m), down 24.6% from the same period the year before. Revenue fell 4.7% to JPY975.5b. Income from international passenger flights dropped nearly 10% during the period, while that for domestic flights edged down less than 1%. JAL, which slashed its full-year earnings outlook 3 months ago, left its latest target unchanged, forecasting a net profit of JPY161b and sales of JPY1.28t for the year to March. While the airline did not elaborate on negative factors behind the slump, analysts and local media said increased personnel costs, particularly rising salaries, were squeezing the bottom line. <br/>
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The head of American Airlines said weekend airport chaos stemmed from a “divisive” US travel ban on 7 mostly Muslim countries -- a view that runs counter to president Donald Trump’s effort to blame protesters and a Delta Air Lines computer failure. “Crews, reservations agents and airport teams have witnessed turmoil in our airports that shows how divisive this order can be,” CE Doug Parker said in a letter to employees. “It is the current law of the US, and so long as that is the case, we must comply.” Trump’s edict erased US$3.75b in market value from 5 major US carriers Monday, as concern that the US restrictions would expand or spark retaliation by other nations pushed a Standard & Poor’s airline index to the biggest tumble in 4 months. <br/>
British Airways will start serving a range of vacation destinations from Manchester this summer, its first flights to continental Europe from Britain’s second-biggest urban area in a decade. The airline will link the north English city with Alicante, Malaga and the islands of Ibiza and Mallorca in Spain, as well as Nice in France and the Greek island of Mykonos. The service will use 98-seat Embraer SA E190 jets from BA’s CityFlyer arm. The move shows how Alex Cruz, who took over at BA in April after running Vueling, is exploring options for expanding leisure services even where that means confronting discount specialists such as Ryanair, EasyJet, Jet2 and Monarch Airlines, all of which have operations in Manchester. British Airways will also add 3 more routes from London Stansted, Ryanair’s biggest base. <br/>
British Airways said that all passengers will be able to fly to their destinations Feb 5, 6 and 7, despite a strike by its mixed fleet cabin crew. All London Gatwick and London City flights will operate as normal, plus all long-haul London Heathrow flights. Some Heathrow short-haul flights will be ‘merged’, with passengers affected by the cancellations contacted about switching to earlier or later flights. The airline said plans for the second tranche of strike days, Feb 9, 10, and 11 will be announced Thursday. All passengers will reach their destinations on those days the carrier said. BA’s mixed fleet crew, who work under different terms to the rest of the airline’s cabin crew, have so far had 2 work stoppages for a total of 5 days. <br/>