Ethiopia plans to release an interim report into the Ethiopian Airlines flight 302 crash ahead of the first anniversary of the accident next month, according to an official Saturday. "We are not ready to release the final report and so we are releasing an interim one which will come out before the anniversary of the accident. We are finalising it," Amdye Ayalew, the country's chief crash investigator, said. He declined to give a precise date for the release of the final report. Under rules overseen by the ICAO, Ethiopia should publish a final report by March 10, the crash anniversary. ICAO is not participating in the investigations into the incident. A senior official at the ministry of transport, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said the final report was far from completion. <br/>
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South Africa’s auditor general’s office has testified to the chaotic condition of South African Airways’ organisation during a judicial commission examining allegations of corruption and fraud in state companies. The office participated for the first time in the audit of SAA’s full-year financial statement covering 2016-17. SAA was experiencing liquidity problems and could not provide the office with the financial statements until Oct 2017, 5 months behind schedule. Auditor general business executive Polani Sokombela described as “quite dire” some aspects of SAA’s organisation, and detailed multiple concerns picked up during its audit of the company’s financial state. Sokombela told the inquiry that the airline was experiencing “a lot of instability” at the time, with more than 40% of its executive committee positions filled in an acting capacity. <br/>
Air NZ has suspended services to Seoul as it flags a potential NZ$75m (US$47.4m) full-year earnings hit from the coronavirus outbreak. The airline announced Monday it would temporarily halt services to the South Korean capital following previously announced capacity reductions across its Asia routes, predominantly related to Shanghai and Hong Kong. Total Asia capacity will thereby reduce by 17% for the months of February through June. Weaker forward bookings for travel on the Tasman and domestic networks have also emerged as a result, the company said. The airline said its revenue outlook for the remainder of the financial year was expected to suffer as a result, with earnings net of significant items expected to be between $300m to $350m, down from the previous $350m to $450m guidance. <br/>
The US$35 bag fee is gaining traction as US airlines contend with the financial fallout of the grounding of the 737 Max jet and a viral pandemic that has decimated travel to China. United Continental will increase the charge for passengers’ first and second checked bags by $5, to $35 and $45, respectively. The fee changes apply to United tickets purchased as of Friday for domestic and short-haul international travel to Latin American and the Caribbean starting March 6. The higher bag fees match the increase that JetBlue imposed last month. United’s customers can avoid the $5 increase if they check no more than 2 bags and pay online at least 24 hours before departure. Neither United nor JetBlue offered a reason for the higher fees. <br/>