Southwest Airlines received a "thumbs up'' from the FAA on its Hawaii test flights and is now awaiting formal approval, CE Gary Kelly told employees Monday. Southwest did not release any details on the timing of ticket sales, when the flights will begin or where it will launch the first flights but Kelly said the airline will as soon as it receives its final "report card'' from the FAA. Kelly has previously said Southwest would start selling tickets within days of receiving FAA certification for long overwater flights, with the first flights within weeks of that. Southwest initially dangled the prospect of flights beginning in late 2018 but that date slipped as the year went on. <br/>
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Armenia Airlines, remains in the red, but insists it will become financially successful in 3 years’ time. In 2018 it carried 75,000 passengers, a 1% improvement on 2017, a modest growth which the airline’s management attributes primarily to political events within the country, especially the May 2018 Armenian Velvet revolution, which influenced many passengers to remain in the country. Last year, the number of flights increased by more than 10% to 542 compared with 2017’s 480 and the small airline added 7 people to its staff roster, which reached 51 by the end of the year. In the last 3 years, more than US$10m has been injected into Armenia Airlines, but it remains a loss-making enterprise. <br/>
A man who was killed while trying to hijack a Bangladesh Airlines flight was a 24-year-old passenger from a village near the capital who had been previously arrested in a kidnapping case, officials said Monday. Mufti Mahmud Khan, director of the law and media wing of Bangladesh's Rapid Action Battalion security agency, said the suspect was listed in its database as Md. Polash Ahmed, and had been arrested in 2012. Confusion remained over whether Ahmed was armed. Officials said Sunday that Ahmed was injured in an exchange of gunfire with special forces, that he had shot at them first. However Civil aviation authorities cast doubt on that account saying the pistol was a toy. <br/>
Swiss entrepreneur and Air Prishtina CE Leyla Ibrahimi Salahi has taken full ownership of Switzerland-based Germania Flug AG. The transaction, which makes Germania Flug a 100% Swiss-owned carrier, was confirmed by board member Urs Pelizzoni. The airline was a subsidiary of Berlin-based leisure carrier Germania, which filed for bankruptcy protection Feb 4 and halted operations. Germania had a 40% stake in Germania Flug. “We have taken an important step. And we have kept our promise to ensure that our flight operations will continue as planned,” Germania Flug CE Tobias Somandin said. The airline’s services from Berlin will eventually be integrated into the Swiss carrier’s own facilities or outsourced to selected providers, the airline said. <br/>
A man is being sued by a Chinese airline after throwing coins into the engine for “good luck”. The perpetrator, named only as Lu, admitted to tossing the coins when Lucky Air staff quizzed passengers after finding two Yuan coins on the ground near the left engine. The domestic flight, from the cities of Anqing to Kunming in China, was grounded due to safety concerns. The 162 passengers were flown the next day following a full engine check. The carrier claims the flight cancellation cost in the region of GBP16,000, and announced legal action would be taken against the passenger. It’s not the first time a passenger has attempted to toss coins into an aircraft engine for good luck. <br/>
Thailand's Asia Aviation, the majority owner of LCC Thai AirAsia, said Monday it was in talks to buy a stake in rival Nok Airlines, sending Nok's share price up as much as 13%. The announcement comes as a tourism boom in Thailand stokes competition among carriers. The country logged 38.27m arrivals last year, and is set to welcome 6.9% more this year, govt data showed. Nevertheless, competition pushed Asia Aviation into losses in the latter half of last year, while Nok Air has not had a profitable quarter since 2015. Joining forces to stem the decline is therefore seen as an attractive option. Asia Aviation did not specify how much of Nok Air it would buy. <br/>