IATA warned Tuesday that the British government’s papers on a no-deal Brexit exposed the “extreme seriousness” of what is at stake. “The UK government’s papers on the air transport implications of a ‘no deal’ departure from the EU clearly exposes the extreme seriousness of what is at stake and underscores the huge amount of work that would be required to maintain vital air links,” IATA DG and CEO Alexandre de Juniac said. “While we still hope for a comprehensive EU-UK deal, an assumption that ‘it will be all right on the night’ is far too risky to accept,” he said.<br/>
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Some regional carriers are doing better keeping their flights on time than industry behemoths such as American Airlines and Southwest, according to a first peek at new data compiled by federal regulators. A US DoT report released Tuesday is the first to include details on regional carriers, a huge part of the airline industry that was absent from the department’s performance surveys for several decades. This year, more than half of domestic flights were on regional airlines or “branded codeshare partners” as DOT terms them, carrying about one quarter of US air travellers. In July, four large regional airlines -- SkyWest, Endeavor Air, ExpressJet Holdings and Republic Airlines -- delivered a better on-time percentage than American, United Continental, Southwest and JetBlue. SkyWest ranked fourth across the industry, with 80.4% of its flights on time. Mesa Air Group also placed among the top five carriers in some months going back to the spring. With the new report, “the flying public will see a more complete picture of the performance of scheduled passenger service,” the department said<br/>
Singapore’s Changi International Airport reported a 7.9% year-on-year (YOY) passenger growth in August, seeing 5.7m passengers passing through its gates. Since the beginning of 2018, Changi’s four terminals have handled 43.5m passengers. Operator Changi Airport Group said the European market grew 22% in August, followed by South Asia at 13%. Traffic to/from Oceania also achieved a 10% YOY increase for the first time in 2018. Commercial aircraft movements increased 3.6% to 32,890 takeoff and landings on its two runways, although air cargo growth was modest at 1.8%. “China and India are growth markets for us; China has overtaken Indonesia in terms of visitor arrivals into Singapore. And traffic volume between Singapore and China was 6.3m in 2017,” CAG associate general manager-airline development and air hub development Liew Zhong Yao said. He observed the emergence of new cities that can sustain demand for direct service and gave the example of how China’s Zhengzhou was decoupled from a transit flight via Xiamen to a nonstop flight to Singapore. Similarly, he also foresees routes such as China Eastern’s Yantai-Fuzhou-Singapore service maturing into direct flight from Yantai.<br/>
Sometimes an airport is just a strip of asphalt on a flat bit of land outside of town. Other times, as with India's new Pakyong Airport, it's a breathtaking piece of engineering on the roof of the world. Set in the Himalayan mountains at a height of over 1,400m, the facility serving a remote area of Sikkim state offers one of the most dramatic airport approaches on the planet. Its inauguration Monday also marked a milestone for aviation and travel in India. "After the opening of the airport there are now 100 operational airports in India." said Narendra Modi, India's prime minister, during a speech at Pakyong's opening ceremony on Monday. "This airport was built at a cost of $68.7m and showcases our engineers, workers and their potential -- how the mountains were cleared, the ditch was filled, the heavy rains they dealt with. This is truly an amazing feat of engineering." As part of that work, an 80.38m embankment was built to make space for the 1.7-km-long and 30m-wide runway, which is enclosed by deep valleys. The airport's 2,380-sqm terminal can accommodate up to 100 passengers. But its real asset is the incredible Himalayan scenery -- a widescreen landscape.<br/>