Airlines have axed more flights and demanded urgent government action to help offset the financial impact they are facing from the coronavirus outbreak, as they struggled to digest the impact of Donald Trump’s travel ban to the US from Europe. Shares in the crisis-hit sector tumbled further after the US said it would block foreign nationals arriving from the EU Schengen zone. Many lost about 15% of their value, and are now down more than 50% in the last three weeks. The US’s unilateral decision will affect 13,500 flights and 4 million passengers in the next four weeks, according to data from the aviation analysts OAG. The IATA warned that the move could see airlines go under and many would need emergency measures to survive. Norwegian, one of the carriers most exposed to the US ban, said it would ground 40% of its long-haul fleet and cancel 25% of short-haul flights until the end of May. It is also temporarily laying off half of its staff, across all departments. The airline employs 1,200 people in the UK alone. Lufthansa, the biggest EU-Schengen carrier to North America, said it would still fly some services to New York, Chicago and Washington, but would cut flights to all other US destinations from Europe from 14 March. Airlines for America said it commended the president’s decision from a public health perspective, but added: “This action will hit US airlines, their employees, travellers and the shipping public extremely hard.” Story has more details.<br/>
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Airlines demanded immediate action from governments to alleviate the deepening crisis engulfing the industry after Donald Trump banned non-American citizens from travelling to the US from most European nations to limit the outbreak of coronavirus. Share prices across the aviation sector tumbled on Thursday in response to the ban, which mirrors restrictions the US already has in place on travel from China and Iran. “The new restrictions imposed further pressure on an already difficult situation,” said Jacob Schram, CE of Norwegian. “We urge international governments to act now to ensure that the aviation industry can protect jobs and continue to be a vital part of the global economic recovery.” Shares in Air France-KLM and Lufthansa both dropped more than 10% as the US ban darkened an outlook for an airline sector estimated to be facing a hit of at least $100b from the pandemic. One airline CE said this was now “the worst crisis in the history of aviation”. <br/>
IATA has warned governments must be ready to provide support to counter the impact of travel bans implemented to counter the coronavirus outbreak, warning measures such as the ban imposed by the USA were not included in its recent worse-case scenario for the financial hit to the industry. US President Donald Trump in an 11 March Oval Office address announced his government will halt all passenger travel and cargo transport from Europe for 30 days, beginning on 13 March. It follows similar travel restricting measures introduced in Israel, Kuwait and Spain. “These are extraordinary times and governments are taking unprecedented measures,” says IATA DG Alexandre de Juniac. ”Safety—including public health—is always a top priority. Airlines are complying with these requirements. Governments must also recognise that airlines—employing some 2.7 million people—are under extreme financial and operational pressures. They need support.” The association is urging government to weigh up the financial implications of such action as well as whether it is in line with the World Health Organisation (WHO) guidance - which it notes continues to advise against the application of travel or trade restrictions to countries experiencing outbreaks.<br/>
American Airlines, United and Delta Thursday said they were capping fares for US-bound flights from Europe as US citizens flock to European airports trying to return home after new air travel restrictions ordered by U.S. President Donald Trump. Delta also said it would suspend eight US flights to Europe on Friday and “continues to evaluate additional schedule adjustments based on customer demand.” Additional Delta flights were likely to be cut after Sunday, airline officials said. Trump on Wednesday night said he was “suspending all travel from Europe” at midnight Friday, prompting panic among some Americans and reports of some people paying exorbitant air fares to get on crowded planes. Delta, United and American are waiving charges for changes in European travel as a result of the US announcement. US airlines made clear they will not suspend service to Europe.<br/>
Governments should roll back or refrain from using travel restrictions as the coronavirus is mainly being spread through local transmission rather than imported cases, a trade group of Asian airlines said. “Given that the Covid-19 outbreak is now progressing across the globe, it is time for a fundamental rethink on travel restrictions,” the Association of Asia Pacific Airlines said in a statement, shortly before US President Donald Trump announced a 30-day suspension of travel from continental Europe to the US. The WHO has now declared the outbreak a pandemic, with cases worldwide rising beyond 125,000 and deaths exceeding 4,600. The virus has spread rapidly in Europe, where fatalities in Italy alone jumped 31% in a day to 827 on Wednesday. The airline industry has been plunged deep into crisis as travel demand dries up and countries tighten borders. Nearly half a million flights have been canceled this year for China alone, according to travel data company Cirium. “The proliferation of travel restrictions worldwide, and insufficient adherence to the IHR (International Health Regulations) are imposing enormous costs on society with little or no public health benefits,” AAPA’s Director General Andrew Herdman said. More than 90 countries have imposed travel restrictions, but only 45 states have informed the WHO and provided public health rationale for the measures, AAPA said, citing a WHO report from March 10. AAPA said the airline industry has been strictly adhering to WHO and IATA guidelines on hygiene, including for cleaning aircraft and lounges, and that it isn’t aware of any infections attributed to inflight transmission.<br/>
New US restrictions on Europeans entering the US are fueling additional bookings for business jet flights, which were already in higher demand this year because of coronavirus, executives said Thursday. Travellers are rushing to return to the US before a 30-day US ban starts on Friday on foreign citizens entering the country if they have travelled to Europe in recent weeks. The US order, announced Wednesday to curtail the coronavirus outbreak, applies to citizens of 26 European countries but excludes Britain and Ireland as well as American citizens. “We’re seeing a significant number of requests in the past few hours from Americans currently in Europe, looking to fly back to the US,” said Adam Twidell, CE of Private Fly, a global booking service for charter flights. While airlines hit by the outbreak are bracing for a further blow from the new restrictions, Private Fly and others have seen higher demand this year from affluent customers keen to avoid commercial flights and potential coronavirus exposure. Given market turmoil, it is not yet clear whether demand for private flights will translate into new orders for planes from jet makers like France’s Dassault Aviation, Canada’s Bombardier and Gulfstream.<br/>
The American Civil Liberties Union is suing federal agencies for records about the use of facial recognition at airports and other places where travelers enter the US, the latest salvo in a nationwide activist campaign to halt use of the technology. The suit, filed Thursday in US District Court for the Southern District of New York, seeks to compel the Department of Homeland Security and other agencies to release documents regarding the policy’s use, including government contracts with airports and airlines. The group asked for the records in January under the Freedom of Information Act. The department has been expanding the use of facial recognition to identify people entering the country at airports, and in August 2019 told Congress it had processed 20m travellers using the technology. Airlines have also partnered with the government to scan faces to identify travellers in place of boarding passes. “If this technology is normalized at the airport, it’s only a matter of time before the government cites its use at airports as a basis for deploying it elsewhere,” said ACLU staff attorney Ashley Gorski in a blog post Thursday. <br/>
New Zealand’s Auckland International Airport on Friday cut its full-year profit outlook due to the coronavirus-led plunge in demand and flagged “significant reduction” in flights and passengers. The country’s biggest airport operator revised down its 2020 underlying profit after tax to between NZ$210m and NZ$235m from the prior range of NZ$260m and NZ$270m announced last month.“We’ve seen an immediate impact on business travel, and we are now anticipating a rapid downturn in leisure travel in the coming months, as cancellations flow through and demand for bookings continues to soften,” the company said. It said total passengers going through its terminals fell 8.6% in February and international passengers for the first 10 days of March slumped 18% compared with the corresponding period.<br/>