American Airlines still has hundreds of flights without pilots assigned to them in December, the company said on Thursday, after a scheduling error gave too many pilots time off. The number of flights that remain pilotless is now “a few hundred,” the airline said, compared to a peak that the carrier’s Allied Pilots Association (APA) union estimated at 15,000. American said it expects the number to continue to decrease over the next several days as more pilots agree to operate flights during the busy holiday period. “In addition, we have more reserve pilots on hand in December than normal months, and they provide us with the ability to fly many of the trips that are currently uncovered,” spokesman Matt Miller said. “We have not cancelled any scheduled flights in December and will continue to work to ensure both our pilots and our customers are cared for.” However, the pilots union cast doubt on the carrier’s numbers. “The Allied Pilots Association is able to view in real time December flight crew assignments for American Airlines,” spokesman Dennis Tajer said. “In fact, thousands of flights are still listed as unassigned.” The error, disclosed to employees on Friday and widely reported this week, was an “isolated incident” and a “mistake,” Miller said. Rather than awarding a limited amount of time off based on seniority, a system blunder allotted off days to too many of the carrier’s pilots. American has offered its pilots 150% of normal hourly pay to cover certain unstaffed flights.<br/>
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Under pressure from the NAACP, American Airlines is promising changes in the way it trains employees and handles passenger complaints about racially biased treatment. The airline announced the steps Thursday after a meeting between CEO Doug Parker and NAACP President Derrick Johnson. The civil-rights group issued a "travel advisory" in October warning African-Americans they could face discrimination when flying on American. The alert followed several high-profile incidents including one involving an organiser of the Women's March who was booted from a flight after a dispute over her seat. American pledged to hire an outside firm to review its diversity in hiring and promotion, train all 120,000 employees to counteract so-called implicit bias, create a special team to review passengers' discrimination complaints, and improve resolution of employee complaints about bias. On Thursday, Parker said in a note to employees that the criticism has led to conversations with outside groups as well as the airline's own employees "that we may not have otherwise had." Since the start of 2016 through September, American has been the subject of 29 racial-discrimination complaints by passengers, more than any other US carrier although a tiny fraction of the airline's passengers. Paul Argenti, a professor of corporate communication at Dartmouth University who wrote about racism at the Denny's restaurant chain in the 1990s, called American's measures Thursday a good first step but inadequate to significantly change the airline's culture.<br/>
American Airlines announced that airplane maintenance work currently outsourced to South America will be transferred to its maintenance base in Tulsa. David Seymour, the airline's senior vice president of integrated operations, said the Tulsa Maintenance Base will be working on the CFM56-5B engine, which powers a significant portion of the company's Airbus narrow-body aircraft. The base, also known as Tech Ops-Tulsa, will take over maintenance on the engine beginning next year, the Tulsa World reported. Spokeswoman Linda Brock said maintenance on the engine is now done by GE Engine partners in Brazil. The airline will collaborate with its union over the next several months to determine how the work will be supported. "Tech Ops-Tulsa is here for the long term," Seymour said. "Much like the recent addition of another incremental B737 heavy check line, bringing the -5B to Tulsa builds on the goal of Tulsa performing high-volume, long-running work. When we can identify this type of work and move it to Tulsa, we will." Brock said that up to 80 positions are needed for the additional work. She said it's unclear if those positions will be new.<br/>
When Cathay Pacific flight CX123 lands in Christchurch early tomorrow morning, it will be breaking new ground. The airline has been flying to Auckland for the past 35 years, but the new seasonal service will directly link the South Island to Hong Kong for the first time. The airline will fly three times a week for the next three months, adding another 11,000 seats and boosting the South Island economy by an estimated $12m. Cathay will use a near-new Airbus A350XWB, the same type of aircraft it introduced to the Auckland service just over a year ago. The 280-seat plane has 38 business class seats, 28 in premium economy and 214 economy seats. Cathay's country manager for New Zealand and the Pacific Islands, Mark Pirihi, said commercial partner Air New Zealand would code-share on the Christchurch route. The service is part of a joint venture agreement (JVA) with the New Zealand airline where the Government required both to show they were growing links with Hong Kong in return for allowing co-operation. <br/>
Airbus’s talks with Qantas about a plane that can fly 20 hours non-stop from Sydney to London are centred around the A350-900ULR rather than reviving a shorter A350 variant, an executive at the manufacturer said Thursday. The comments by Airbus’s Iain Grant, head of sales for the Pacific region, could quash industry speculation the planemaker may revive the smaller A350-800, which had been put on ice after poor sales. Qantas had publicly challenged Airbus and its US rival Boeing in August to boost the range of the A350 and 777X models to allow it to complete “the last frontier” of commercial flying by 2022. The speculation about the A350-800 revival arose after Qantas CEO Alan Joyce told industry publication Flightglobal this week that Airbus was “saying they may” consider a shorter-fuselage variant if the A350-900ULR (ultra long range) could not meet mission requirements. Airbus’s Grant, however, said at a media briefing Thursday that talks with Qantas remained about the A350-900ULR, the same variant that Singapore Airlines will receive next year to restart non-stop Singapore-New York flights. “We are bringing in our A350-900ULR which is going to do the Sydney-London mission and we are very comfortable with that and we will continue to work with them to meet their requirements,” he said of the Qantas challenge.<br/>
Japan Airlines and Russian airline Aeroflot have signed an MOU for a strategic cooperation agreement to pursue commercial opportunities which will greatly benefit the customers of both airlines by providing more options for travel between Russia and Japan. Since the relaxation of visa requirements to the nationals of Japan and Russia from January 1, 2017, the demand between the two countries has been steadily increasing and the two airlines have agreed to work together to further stimulate travel between the two countries. As a first step, JAL and Aeroflot agreed to start codeshare cooperation between Japan and Russia as well as Aeroflot's domestic flights, and JAL's domestic and international flights. The first stage of the codeshare cooperation is planned to be implemented after fiscal year 2018. In addition to the codeshare cooperation, JAL and Aeroflot will pursue the development of the partnership in various areas, including frequent flyer programs, airport relocation, while considering a joint business in the future.<br/>