Boeing says it will resume production in its Puget Sound-area factories after shutting them down in March due to the coronavirus pandemic. The move puts 27,000 employees of the company’s commercial airplanes production lines in the region around Seattle, Washington, back to work. The 737, 747, 767, 777 and 787 programmes, as well as transportation infrastructure, cargo services and national defence missions will be starting up again, the manufacturer said Thursday. The company says it will bring workers back in stages, beginning April 20 through April 24. By that time, production will have been halted for about a month since Boeing’s initial announcement of the closures March 23, after several employees had tested positive for coronavirus, with reports surfacing that 1 had died of the virus. <br/>
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The US Treasury Department is in talks with some airlines about accepting their loyalty programs as collateral against govt loans to help them weather the coronavirus crisis. Other assets are also in play, including some international flight routes, planes, engines, airport gates and spare parts, according to people familiar with the negotiations. Applications are due Friday for the US$25b loan program, the second round of US funds made available to airlines. The people didn’t name the airlines. Airlines are among the industries hardest hit by the spread of the coronavirus and related govt restrictions on travel. Passenger traffic in the US has dropped to 5% of what it was a year earlier, and carriers have slashed flying capacity by as much as 90%. <br/>
North American airline traffic this year is expected to be down more than one-third from 2019 levels, IATA’s projections for the impact of the coronavirus crisis on the sector show. The anticipated 36% drop in traffic is expected to translate into US$64b less in passenger revenue this year. While sizeable, that reduction in passenger traffic is less than IATA predicts for other global regions. IATA estimates each other region – Asia-Pacific, Europe, the Middle East, Africa and Latin America – will see traffic decline roughly by half. A key factor in the lower impact in passenger traffic is the scale of the still-operating US air travel market. IATA figures for 2019 show the US domestic market was largest in the world, accounting for around 14% of global airline traffic. <br/>
Struggling passenger airlines can turn planes into cargo-only aircraft provided they take steps to prevent fires and keep weight balanced, US aviation regulators said in new guidance. With passenger demand plunging, some airlines have begun carrying more cargo to provide revenue. The FAA’s guidance will allow them to carry it in what had been the passenger areas of the plane. Transforming aircraft in that way is permitted, the FAA said Wednesday. “It is an extraordinary situation, however, for an entire passenger cabin to be loaded with cargo,” the FAA said. “Passenger cabins are not designed for an all-cargo configuration.” Cargo compartments have specialised fire-detection systems that typically aren’t installed in passenger cabins, so airlines must take extra steps to ensure the crew can detect and fight fires. <br/>
The FAA says it will extend slot relief at 7 major US airports through the summer travel season so that airlines will not be penalised as a result of reduced flying schedules caused by the coronavirus pandemic. The FAA says that its coronavirus-related limited waiver of the minimum slot usage requirement will be in effect until Oct 24, 2020. Previously, the FAA had suspended the slot requirements until the end of May. “The FAA finds that the benefits to the airline industry of providing relief through the end of the Summer 2020 scheduling season significantly outweigh the risks identified in comments opposing that relief,” the FAA writes. The airports affected include JFK International, LaGuardia, Ronald Reagan Washington National, Chicago O’Hare International, San Francisco International, Newark Liberty International, and LAX. <br/>
If the relative financial success of the European airline industry had always seemed paradoxical given the glut of carrier failures over the past 3 winters, the coronavirus outbreak has to some extent been a leveller. “Not every airline is in the same boat – because there are differences [in business model],” observed IATA at the end of the March. “But even the solvent ones with good business models and strong balance sheets are in trouble in this kind of environment, so it is a leveller.” Europe is perhaps the clearest example of “the long tail” in the airline industry that Pearce has flagged in observing that much of the industry’s record profits in recent years has been in the hands of relatively few carriers. IATA’s latest projections are for European carriers to take the second largest hit in passenger revenues from the crisis. <br/>
While some capacity has been restored for Mainland China flights, it is likely to remain low for the foreseeable future. In its monthly update, CAAC states that “the volume of flights…may continue to operate at low levels in the future”, as the coronavirus outbreak still holds significant risk levels. After bottoming out in February, when the outbreak hit China badly, Chinese carriers have been steadily adding domestic capacity from March into April and May. These, however, are still lower compared to the same period a year ago. To this end, CAAC director of aviation safety Xiong Jie says the administration will focus first on establishing pandemic risk prevention, “to create a safe operating environment”. For the month of March, airlines in China carried 15.1m passengers, nearly 72% lower year-on-year. <br/>
IATA is calling on Latin American govts to harmonise plans to eventually restart air service and reopen borders, saying an uncoordinated effort will hinder the sector’s recovery. IATA says it has reached out to govts across the continent, appealing for support and for synchronised measures for reopening widespread air travel in the coming months. “We are working with the govts to ensure that the restarts are well-coordinated, and aligned, and that the communications are clear,” says Peter Cerda, IATA’s regional VP for the Americas Thursday. “This will be fundamental if we are to encourage consumers to come back to flying, which will be a challenge at the beginning.” Aviation has basically come to a standstill, he adds, saying about 80% of air traffic has come to a stop in the region. <br/>