Battered by financial losses and rising competition from low-cost airlines, Cathay Pacific said Wednesday that it would replace its CE. Cathay. controlled by the Swire conglomerate, said in a stock exchange filing that Ivan Chu, a 3-decade veteran of Swire, would step aside as CE but would retain a seat on the board. Rupert Hogg, 55, who has been at Swire since 1986 and is currently Cathay’s COO, will replace Chu. The move is part of a broader reshuffling of the airline’s executive ranks. Like other full-service airlines in the region, Cathay has faced growing competition from low-cost carriers. It has also made unlucky financial bets on the direction of fuel prices, one of its biggest operating costs. Overcapacity on many popular routes to mainland China has also weighed on its performance. <br/>
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After years of benefiting from China’s growth, Cathay Pacific is being hurt by its strong ties to the mainland as travellers eschew the venerable airline and fly directly between Chinese cities and the US or Europe. Finding a way out of that conundrum will be the top challenge for Rupert Hogg, Cathay’s new boss. When Hogg takes over as Cathay’s CE May 1, he’ll also have to contend with Middle Eastern airlines expanding into Asia and a rash of budget upstarts taking customers away with cut-rate fares. Those factors contributed to the airline’s HK$575m (US$74m) loss in 2016, its first shortfall in 8 years. “As long as Cathay is based in Hong Kong and it cannot address these structural problems, it will continue to suffer,” said one analyst. <br/>
Cathay Pacific will replace all the business class seats on some of its Airbus A350s and undertake extensive modifications on others, due to "seat and surface finishing defects." The carrier says that the business class cabins in its early A350s are "most affected" by this problem, caused by early production line cosmetic quality issues. These seats are supplied by Zodiac Aerospace, and the aircraft have been flying with Cathay for less than a year. There have however been reports of poor fit and finish on the seats, with some latches on storage boxes broken. The modifications are primarily concerned with the build quality, but there will also be some detail changes to the materials, it adds. Cathay expects the seat replacement in each aircraft to take approximately 2 to 3 weeks. <br/>
American Airlines will drop its Auckland-Los Angeles service for 8 weeks later this year. It will drop flights between Aug 7 and Oct 6. "This 8-week suspension is in line with the airline's peak season in North America,'' it said. American began flying the route to Auckland last June around the time competitor United Airlines did. United has also dropped its daily service between Auckland and San Francisco from April 18 to Oct 30. The temporary withdrawal of flights will dent the travel market which had seen double-digit growth between the two countries in the past year. Intense competition between the US carriers and Air NZ had driven down fares. While American is dropping out for two months, it will return with a bigger aircraft, a Boeing 787-9 which will include a premium economy cabin, and new business class suites. <br/>
Fifteen passengers were injured on a Qantas flight from Melbourne to Hong Kong after a serious stall alert last Friday, it has just emerged. Authorities will now begin a serious incident investigation after a 'stick shaker' warning activated on the QF29 service April 7. Details of the in-flight incident, which took place at the end of the Boeing 747's 9.5 hour flight, some 110 kilometres south of Hong Kong, have only just emerged. The Australian reports that the plane also experiencing airframe buffeting, which often causes vibration. "The flight crew disconnected the autopilot and manoeuvred the aircraft in response," the Australian Transportation Safety Bureau said. One of the 15 people to be injured required hospitalisation but was later released, it was reported. <br/>
Airberlin has delayed the planned expansion of US connections because of continued ground handling problems at Berlin-Tegel Airport. According to Airberlin, it will postpone the launch of 2X-weekly Berlin-San Francisco services from May 1 to May 29. A third weekly frequency will be added in June. Additionally, Airberlin’s 4X-weekly Berlin-Los Angeles services will be moved from May 2 to May 16. AeroGround, a wholly owned subsidiary of Munich Airport, has been responsible for ground handling services at Berlin Tegel since March 26, the beginning of the summer schedule. Airberlin CE Thomas Winkelmann said the route delay will allow AeroGround “extra time to improve their performance so that we can again offer a good and stable product to our passengers and especially to our transfer passengers.” <br/>