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Grupo Aeromexico has wound up discussions with two labor unions but remains in talks with two more, it said on Tuesday in an update on negotiations that are a requirement for the airline to receive a second tranche of bankruptcy financing. Aeromexico filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in a US court in June, after the coronavirus pandemic slammed the global travel industry. The carrier was approved for up to $1b in debtor-in-possession (DIP) financing, and received an initial $100m payment in September. Aeromexico said it had wrapped up negotiations with the STIA and Independencia unions, which represent airline industry workers, while it remains in talks with the ASSA and ASPA unions, which represent flight crews and pilots respectively. It did not detail terms of the completed agreements. The airline is required to reach agreements with all four unions to access a second tranche of DIP funding. “The favorable outcome of the negotiations with the Independencia and STIA unions, as well as the progress with the flight attendants union ASSA, represents an extremely important milestone to have access to the next stages of DIP financing under our restructuring process,” Aeromexico CE Andres Conesa said. <br/>

A Boxing Day flight to Brazil from the Netherlands was forced to return to its departure point midway through the journey because of a cracked windshield in the cockpit. KLM flight KL705 departed from Amsterdam Schipol at 10.41am and was due to land in Rio de Janeiro at 18.20pm, both local time. The total journey time would have been just under 12 hours. However, around four hours and 40 minutes into the flight, the aircraft was forced to turn around over the Atlantic after the windshield’s outer pane cracked. The sound was loud enough to be audible in the passenger cabin. The pilots told air traffic controllers that the issue was “only the outer pane, so no very big damage of the window [sic]”, according to the report, and they decided to return to Amsterdam despite being closer to both the Azores and the Canary Islands. After a little over nine hours, the aircraft landed safely back in the Netherlands where passengers on board were moved to a replacement aircraft. They eventually made it to Rio de Janeiro with a delay of over 14 hours.<br/>

European competition regulators have cleared a second tranche of Italian aid to national carrier Alitaila as compensation for disruption to travel caused by the pandemic, though its existing state aid probes into Italy’s earlier support for the carrier continue. Italy notified the EC of a E73m grant it was providing Alitalia to compensate for further damages suffered on 19 routes between 16 June and the end of October due to the emergency measures implemented to counter the pandemic. European competition commissioner Margrethe Vestager says: ”This measure enables Italy to provide further compensation for direct damages suffered by Alitalia between June and October 2020 due to the travel restrictions necessary to limit the spread of the coronavirus.” The EC had previously cleared a package of almost E200m in Italian aid to Alitalia covering the initial period of the crisis from the start of March to the middle of June. The intervention has been approved under the temporary alleviation in state aid rules the Commission introduced when the pandemic hit. It has authorised a string of funding support packages for airlines by European states under this temporary framework. While this aid has been approved, two existing Commission probes into potential state aid breaches by Italy to Alitalia remain ongoing. <br/>

Vietnam Airlines said on Tuesday it would issue nearly $346m worth of shares for existing stakeholders to boost its recovery from the impacts of the coronavirus pandemic and return to profitability by 2023. The issuance will be completed by June next year after the carrier received approval from the authorities. All capital raised would pay off outstanding debts, its chairman Dang Ngoc Hoa said at a regular shareholder meeting. “We have suffered from the worst crisis ever in history due to restrictions of governments around the world to curb the spread of the virus,” Hoa added. With the uncertainty of the pandemic, Vietnam Airlines has set a target of full recovery and making profit from 2023. The national flag carrier, 86% owned by the government, expected to make losses of 14.445t dong ($624.65m), about 2.4t dong less than previously expected. To support the airline, the Vietnamese government last month approved a plan to buy new shares from the flag carrier through its State Capital Investment Corp (SCIC).<br/>