Southwest Airlines currently flies more than 3 dozen jets without being able to verify they comply with all mandatory federal safety standards, according to govt documents that also reveal US regulators recently considered grounding the planes. Congressional investigators and the US DoT’s inspector general’s office are stepping up scrutiny of such issues involving operation of used foreign aircraft Southwest introduced into its fleet over the years, according to the documents and people familiar with the details. In letters to the FAA over the past 2 weeks, the carrier indicated it previously found dozens of problematic repairs on other planes, done before it bought those aircraft. The problems included substandard or improper fixes. <br/>
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EasyJet is gearing up to reveal the details of its upcoming package holiday subsidiary, as the industry scrambles to fill the gap in the market left after the collapse of Thomas Cook. The carrier, which reports its full-year financial results next week, will relaunch the package holiday business, EasyJet Holidays, before Christmas, but has so far given few details. But it is said to be planning to give more away to the public next week as CE Johan Lundgren’s 2-year ambition to move into the package holiday business at the firm inches closer to becoming a reality. Lundgren, a former executive at Tui, which is a major player in the space, believes a package holiday business would bolster the airline’s otherwise underwhelming recent financial results. <br/>
The president of Philippines Airlines has died, reportedly from a brain injury 2 days after the founder of the country's largest airline passed away. Lucio Tan Junior, president of PAL, reportedly collapsed Saturday during a basketball game and had been hospitalised since. Tan, 53, had been named the carrier's president and CE late last month. He was also the president of Eton Properties Philippines and Tanduay Distilleries, as well as the director of LT Group and the Philippine National Bank. His death comes 2 days after news broke that John Gokongwei Junior, founder and former CE of Cebu Pacific Air, the largest carrier in the Philippines, died Sunday at 93 years of age. The billionaire was named the country's second-richest by Forbes magazine in 2017. <br/>
Gulf Air has added 3 new destinations to its routes portfolio that fit in with its “boutique carrier” strategy. In January, the carrier said it aims to reinforce its focus on product and customer experience, creating a personalised service that it hopes would allow it to stand out against much larger regional rivals such as Emirates Airline, Etihad and Qatar Airways. The airline has now added what it describes as 3 “premium leisure destinations” that it hopes will also appeal to business travellers. Gulf Air will start to fly daily to Milan from July 2020 on its new Airbus A321neo, while it will operate to Munich and Mykonos over the peak summer period from July to September with 4X-weekly and 3X-weekly flights, respectively. <br/>
Air Arabia reported Sunday a 57% jump in its net profit for Q3 of 2019, reaching Dh471m (US$128.23m) as passenger demand grew. The results put profits in the first 9 months of this year at Dh809m, up 53% from the Dh530m recorded in the same period last year. The growth came as the carrier carried over 3.4m passengers in Q3 from its 4 hubs in the UAE, Egypt, and Morocco. Passenger traffic was up 10% year-on-year. Air Arabia said its earnings for the quarter were backed by high customer demand, a growth strategy, and cost control measures. Revenues for Air Arabia were also higher year-on-year, reaching Dh1.4b in Q3, up 12%. In the first 9 months of this year, revenues rose by 17% to reach Dhh3.6b as the carrier served over 9.2m passengers in the period (an 11% increase). <br/>
AirAsia Group said Monday it would transfer 2 slots on its Kuala Lumpur-Singapore route, its most profitable, to long-haul sister airline AirAsia X, which has been struggling financially. The 2 daily return flights will help AirAsia X deploy its Airbus A330s for more hours of the day, allowing it to boost revenue, the carriers said. The services will also give passengers from China, India, Japan and Korea better connections from its Kuala Lumpur hub to Singapore. Using the widebodies rather than AirAsia's narrowbody Airbus A320s also doubles capacity in those slots on the Kuala Lumpur-Singapore route. AirAsia and AirAsia X said they would share the operating profits from the slots on a 50-50 basis. <br/>
Tui will keep faith with the Boeing 737 Max aircraft — if they are approved as safe, said its CE. Friedrich Joussen, who has headed the group since 2013, said Tui plans to add 2m more airline seats next summer to cater for extra demand following the collapse of major rival Thomas Cook this year. He said that the aircraft would be the 737 Max model 8: “If they are approved to be safe we would fly them. It will be potentially the most checked aircraft,” he said. Tui was the UK’s biggest operator of 737 Max with 15 in its fleet and a total of 72 ordered from Boeing. In March it said the grounding would cause a E300m hit to earnings in the year to the end of September 2019. The travel company has yet to provide guidance on the impact for next year as it said that it will depend on when the aircraft is declared fit to fly. <br/>