China Eastern plans to raise up to $2.23b in a share sale to expand its fleet and to replenish working capital, the company said Tuesday. China Eastern, the country’s second largest carrier by passenger numbers, will use $1.78b proceeds from the share sale to fund the purchase of 18 airplanes, 15 flight simulators and 20 backup engines, it said. The remaining $452.4m will be used to boost its working capital, the filing added. China Structural Reform Fund Corporation Ltd, approved by the State Council to support state-owned enterprises, will invest $301.6m in the share sale.<br/>
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The hunt for a new CE to lead Air France-KLM, a group hobbled by union resistance to cost-cutting at its French brand, is testing President Emmanuel Macron’s resolve for a lighter state touch on the economy. Macron’s government has told the Franco-Dutch airline group its very survival is at stake if it fails to become more competitive and undergo the painful reforms completed by carriers such as BA and Lufthansa as they battle low-cost airlines and Gulf carriers. In what would signal a subtle shift in French industrial strategy, two sources familiar with Macron’s thinking said the government is open to considering a non-French national as chairman of the group for the first time. This chairman would sit above one CE for Air France, who would almost certainly be a French national, and one for KLM, one of the sources said. It is just one option on the table. Macron’s office expects to receive a shortlist of candidates from the group’s interim management by the end of next week, a third source said.<br/>
A Washington state man accused of screaming on a flight and causing the pilot to make an emergency landing in Oklahoma has pleaded guilty to a federal assault charge. Federal prosecutors in Tulsa say 29-year-old Bolutife Olorunda of Vancouver, Washington, pleaded guilty Tuesday and will pay Delta $9,118 for the cost of diverting the aircraft. Prosecutors say Olorunda verbally assaulted and interfered with a flight attendant on a May 30 flight from Portland, Oregon, to Atlanta, prompting the pilot to declare an emergency and land in Tulsa. The flight eventually continued to Atlanta.<br/>No sentencing date is set, but Olorunda faces up to six months in prison and a $5,000 fine.<br/>