Indonesia has found the cockpit voice recorder from a Lion Air plane more than two months after the Boeing Co 737 MAX jet crashed into the sea near Jakarta, killing all 189 people on board, search officials said on Monday. Naval Lieutenant Colonel Agung Nugroho told Reuters a weak signal from the recorder had been detected for several days and that it had been found buried in about 8 metres (26 ft) of mud in waters about 30 metres deep. "We don't know what damage there is, it has obvious scratches on it," Nugroho said. The cockpit voice recorder is one of the two so-calledblack boxes crucial for the investigation of a plane crash. The other black box, the flight data recorder, was recovered three days after the crash. Investigators brought in a navy ship last week for a fresh search after a 10-day effort funded by Lion Air failed to find the recorder.<br/>
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Emirates plans to reduce its number of flights by 25% during the closure of Dubai International Airport’s southern runway for 45 days. The closure, scheduled between April 16 and May 30 for maintenance, will result in up to 48 Emirates aircraft not being utilized, the world’s largest long-haul carrier said in a statement. The northern runway, one of the two at the airport, was closed for 80 days in 2014 as it underwent refurbishment. The closure cost Emirates Group an estimated $467m impact on revenue, according to its financial statement. The Dubai government-controlled airline said it’ll take delivery of six new Airbus A380s in its 2019-2020 financial year and retire seven Boeing 777s. Emirates took delivery of its last Boeing 777-300ER in November and will commence taking deliveries of the next generation Boeing 777Xs in 2020.<br/>
Vietnam’s start-up Bamboo Airways will launch its first commercial flight Wednesday, the company said. The airline, a unit of the property and leisure firm FLC Group will start selling tickets from Saturday, it said Saturday. The first flights will connect Vietnam’s major cities and tourist destinations. The company secured an Air Operator Certificate from the Civil Aviation Administration of Vietnam earlier this week, allowing it to start services after having postponed its launch date twice. In 2019, Bamboo Airways will also launch international air flights to Asian countries, starting with Japan, Korea and Singapore. Vietnam’s fifth airline signed a provisional deal in July to buy 20 Boeing 787-9 wide-body jets worth $5.6b at list prices, and a memorandum of understanding in March with Airbus for up to 24 A320neo narrow-bodied aircraft.<br/>
The former CEO of Stobart Group, Andrew Tinkler, bought about 10% of British airline Flybe Group on Friday, Sky News reported. Stobart is part of a consortium led by Virgin Atlantic Airways and including Cyrus Capital Partners that said on Friday it will buy Flybe for $2.8m, aiming to rebrand the struggling regional carrier. Tinkler has been involved in a lengthy legal battle with Stobart after he was ousted from the infrastructure and support services group last year for alleged breach of contract and breach of fiduciary duty. It was unclear how much he paid for the Flybe stake, who he had acquired it from and whether he planned to make any further purchases, according to the Sky News report. But a source close to Tinkler told Sky News he is not seeking to disrupt the proposed takeover.<br/>
Brazil’s largest airline, Gol Linhas Aereas Inteligentes, on Friday forecast 2018 losses at least 45% larger than previously forecast, adding that it expects to restore profitability this year by a wider-than-expected margin. Gol and its competitors struggled during the first three quarters of 2018 due to weak emerging market currencies and high oil prices. That trend, however, reversed in the fourth quarter of the year, for which results have yet to be officially posted. Gol now expects losses of between $1.60 and $1.80 per share, up from a prior forecast for a $1.10 per share loss, it said in a securities filing. Gol reported a net loss of more than $350m for the first nine months of 2018. For 2019, as prices of oil have fallen and Brazil’s real currency has appreciated, Gol is now forecasting profits of between $1.20 and $1.40 per share, compared to a previous projection of between $0.80 and $1.20 per share traded on the New York Stock Exchange. <br/>
The South African Civil Aviation Authority (SACAA) has grounded regional carrier CemAir for the second time in two months for what it says is the airline’s failure to provide proof of the airworthiness of its fleet. The SACAA suspended CemAir’s Part 121 and 135 air operator's certificates (AOCs) in December 2018 and recommended revoking them completely over what it described as Level One infractions that posed a serious safety risk to the public. CemAir strongly rejected the accusations and succeeded in a Dec. 18 appeal to the country’s High Court in having the suspensions lifted. However, after close of business Jan. 11, the SACAA issued a statement saying it had again suspended CemAir’s AOCs. It said the suspension was “necessitated by the SACAA’s concerns over the systemic failure of the airline’s maintenance controls. In a nutshell, the most recent annual renewal audit revealed CemAir’s inability to prove the continued airworthiness of its fleet.”<br/>
Russian investigators are probing an incident at Moscow Sheremetyevo airport during which a Smartwings Boeing 737 veered off the runway after commencing its take-off roll. The aircraft had been operating flight QS1003 to Prague when the incident occurred at 14:16 on 13 January. Runway 24C was temporarily closed and departing flights were transferred to the southern parallel runway 24L. None of the 40 passengers and seven crew members was injured, says Sheremetyevo airport's operator. It states that the Czech aircraft "rolled off the runway" as it accelerated. Normal operations at the airport have since been restored, it adds. While the airport had experienced snowfall, visibility and weather conditions at the time of the incident were good.<br/>
Malaysia Airlines Group subsidiary Firefly could lose up to US$4.9m a month after it was forced to stop 20 daily flights to/from Singapore from Dec. 1, 2018 after the Civil Aviation Authority of Malaysia (CAAM) rejected its move from Changi to Seletar airport. “The exposure, the revenue lost from the suspension is MYR15m, so we’re looking at MYR15 to MYR20m revenue lost on a monthly basis,” MAG CEO Izham Ismail said. He added that the incident would affect MAG’s overall financial performance as a group. Firefly had sought for approvals from CAAM as early as October 2018, but the authority protested the implementation of Seletar’s ILS procedures, which it said would hinder the development of tall buildings in Pasir Gudang, Malaysia. In retaliation, Malaysia issued a restricted airspace permanent notice to airmen (NOTAM) over Pasir Gudang that was in place from Jan. 2, 2019. The Changi slot that Firefly initially operated on has already been reassigned to another airline, forcing Firefly to cancel its service to Singapore and refund passengers.<br/>