general

Bombardier will miss its 2017 delivery target for the CSeries by 8-10 aircraft, but the manufacturer has signed the first sales agreement for the CSeries—with an unidentified European customer—since April 2016. The mixed news on the CSeries comes just over 2 weeks after Airbus agreed to take a majority stake in the CSeries program. Bombardier said an unidentified European customer has signed an LOI for 31 firm CSeries aircraft plus 30 options; the firm order is valued at US$2.4b. Bombardier president and CE Alain Bellemare said he expects to finalise the deal with the European customer by the end of December. “We expect to see accelerating [CSeries] sales momentum,” Bellemare said. But Bombardier continues to struggle to deliver CSeries aircraft on schedule, citing ongoing issues at Pratt & Whitney. <br/>

Airbus has completed the functional & reliability testing for the A350-1000, bringing the aircraft a step closer to type certification this month. The first customer delivery to Qatar Airways will follow in the coming weeks, according to Airbus. Airbus said: “The A350-1000 completed its exercise after landing in Toulouse, France Nov 1 coming from Barranquilla, Colombia. In less than 2 weeks the aircraft flew approximately 65,200 km representing 150 flight hours, as per certification requirements.” The latest tests were part of an intensive flight test campaign, which started less than one year ago designed to demonstrate readiness for airline operations. These included: high airfield performance, auto-landing trials, airport turnaround and handling services, cabin systems, navigation and connectivity function performance. <br/>

Airbus has embarked on a fresh search for a sales chief to take over from soon-to-retire John Leahy as the aerospace group seeks a clean break from turmoil over investigations into the use of middlemen, said people familiar with the plans. Leahy’s deputy, executive VP Kiran Rao, had been identified as Leahy’s successor earlier this year, but his appointment to one of the industry’s most visible jobs was never confirmed. CE Tom Enders has now decided to look outside the core part of the company in a bid to denote a fresh start, but Rao is not being targeted in the compliance investigation which centres mainly on a defunct headquarters team, the people said. The search comes as the Airbus marketing machine is seen as demoralised as a result of British and French probes, which have also sparked a blanket internal investigation. <br/>

The airline industry and Transport Canada should develop a program requiring pilots to be tested for drugs and alcohol, the Transportation Safety Board said Thursday after releasing a report into a crash that killed 2 people. Board chairwoman Kathy Fox called on both sides to work with employee representatives to implement a program that would protect public safety. She added that self-policing by the industry has not worked, so the issue of impairment will continue to go unrecognised and unreported. “Alcohol impairment almost certainly played a role,” Fox said of the cargo plane crash April 13, 2015, in north of Vancouver. Four other fatal crashes since 2009, 3 involving commercial operators, had drugs or alcohol as a contributing factor, said Fox, who added it was time to learn lessons from the latest disaster. <br/>

Middle Eastern carriers saw their slowest rate of international growth in September in over 8 years, with a temporary ban on electronics and proposed travel restrictions hitting demand, according to IATA Thursday. Demand, measured in revenue passenger kilometers, rose 3.7% in September, the slowest rise since February 2009, IATA said in its regular monthly traffic update. Gulf carriers such as Emirates and Etihad have come under pressure from overcapacity, security concerns and a drop in regional business travel. IATA said that traffic between the region and the US had dropped in August, the most recent month for which that data is available. That was the 6 straight month of declines making it the only international market not to have shown year-on-year growth in the first 8 months of the year. <br/>