Kenya Airways has appointed Sebastian Mikosz, who oversaw the turnaround of Lot Airlines, to be its new CE as it seeks to recover from 4 years of massive losses. Mikosz, who is currently CE of eSky.pl, an online travel agency, will replace Mbuvi Ngunze, who has held the post for 2 years, June 1. Ngunze announced his resignation last November after a staff rebellion triggered by the slow pace of reform at the lossmaking airline. Michael Joseph, Kenya Airways chairman, said Mikosz, who ran Lot on two occasions, was the unanimous choice of the board and offered him his “full support”. Under Mikosz’s leadership, Lot made its first profit for 7 years in 2014. It has since expanded significantly, carrying some 5.5m passengers last year, up from 4m in 2015. Kenya Airways has more than US$1b of debt following a botched expansion plan. <br/>
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The Italian council of ministers has approved a E600m (US$655m) emergency bridge loan for Alitalia, which should secure operations until November. Prime minister Paolo Gentiloni said this intervention will also protect certain services that are fundamental to the country. Alitalia announced it would enter extraordinary administration May 2 after Alitalia labour unions derailed the carrier’s turnaround plan by rejecting a labour agreement. That deal called for around 980 redundancies from the company’s 12,500 workforce and an 8% pay cut. The Italian govt agreed with the EU to grant the loan in order to avoid state aid, which requires EC approval. Gentiloni said he is against “re-nationalising [Alitalia],” reaffirming that “we don’t want to put the company’s burden on the Italian taxpayers.” <br/>
Air France-KLM is waiting to see how developments at embattled Alitalia affect the North Atlantic joint venture, following the Italian carrier's filing for extraordinary administration. But Air France-KLM retains only a small shareholding in Alitalia, and CFO Frederic Gagey pointed out, during a Q1 briefing, that a number of previous co-operative ties between the two have ended. "We're mainly a spectator of the Alitalia story," says Gagey. He says there is "not yet clear information on the position from the administrator" regarding the joint venture on the North Atlantic, in which Air France-KLM is a partner with Alitalia and Delta Air Lines. <br/>
Air France-KLM has reported a E216m (US$236m) Q1 net loss, widened from a E155m loss in the year-ago period. The group said Q1 trading was “resilient” and that unit revenues had begun to stabilise at -0.5%, following a decline since the end of 2016. Q1 revenue increased 1.9% to E5.7b, while total expenses rose 2.6% to E5.9b, producing an operating loss of E143m, deepened from a E99m operating loss in the prior-year quarter. “The operating result was notably impacted by currency effects, which had a negative impact of E72m,” Air France-KLM said. At constant currency the operating loss would have been E28m up on the comparable quarter. Air France-KLM described its passenger numbers as “solid,” increasing 5.2% to 20.9m. <br/>
Delta Air Lines apologized Thursday to customers, who were forced off its flight last month, and said it would refund them and provide additional compensation. A video was posted online by Brian Schear Wednesday, claiming that Delta "booted" him off a flight, along with his wife and 2 infants, due to overbooking. "We are sorry for the unfortunate experience our customers had with Delta," the company said Thursday. The flight was departing from Maui to Los Angeles April 23. This comes nearly a month after United Continental sparked outrage for dragging a passenger by his hands, out of an overbooked flight. However, the airline reached a settlement with the passenger last month. Following the United incident, Southwest Airlines said it would stop overbooking its flights. <br/>