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Forty-one people on board a Russian Aeroflot passenger plane were killed on Sunday, including two children, after the aircraft caught fire as it made a bumpy emergency landing at a Moscow airport, Russian investigators said. Television footage showed the Sukhoi Superjet 100 crash bouncing along the tarmac at Moscow's Sheremetyevo airport before the rear part of the plane suddenly burst into flames. Many passengers on board SU 1492 then escaped via the plane's emergency slides that inflated after the hard landing. The plane, which had been flying from Moscow to the northern Russian city of Murmansk, had been carrying 73 passengers and five crew members, Russia's aviation watchdog said. A spokeswoman for Russia's Investigative Committee said that only 37 out of 78 people on board had survived, meaning 41 people had lost their lives. No official cause has been given for the disaster. The Investigative Committee said it had opened an investigation and was looking into whether the pilots had breached air safety rules. Some passengers blamed bad weather and lightning.<br/>

Pre-tax losses widened at Air France-KLM in Q1, with the Franco-Dutch airline joining its competitors in blaming higher fuel prices and an oversupply of seats. The airline’s pre-tax loss grew to E450m, from E257m in the same period a year ago. With the effect of currency fluctuations stripped out, earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation fell 32% to E424m, far below the analyst consensus of E606m. CE Benjamin Smith said Q1 had been challenging for the sector across Europe, as “substantial” capacity growth put pressure on revenues. Revenue per available seat kilometre fell 1.9% in the period, while the company’s fuel bill increased 13% to E1.2b. Meanwhile Easter, traditionally a profitable travel period, fell after the end of the quarter. Total revenue rose 2% to E6b. Smith said that Air France-KLM’s summer outlook appeared “more benign” and he confirmed the company’s full-year guidance, which included flat, or a slight reduction in unit costs. The airline projected that this summer “long-haul industry capacity to and from Europe” would increase at a slower pace than last year, especially for the Middle East, North America and Asia. The KLM part of the business, which has tended to perform better than Air France, fell 4.5 percentage points into a negative operating margin of -2.3%. Air France’s negative operating margin worsened 1.9 percentage points to -6.9%.<br/>

Air France-KLM will propose a voluntary redundancy scheme that would affect nearly 400 ground staff at French airports, La Tribune said on Saturday, a day after the airline posted a deeper Q1 loss. The Franco-Dutch company, which blamed higher fuel costs and price competition for its operating loss of E303m, will present the redundancy plan to a union and management meeting on May 13, La Tribune said. Another 200 departing staff would not be replaced, it added. An Air France spokesman confirmed that a voluntary plan to cut short-haul ground staff would be presented on May 13 but declined to give details on the proposals ahead of the meeting. He also said that a company review had pointed to a need to hire more than 1,000 people across the company’s business this year. <br/>