Canadian regional carrier PAL Airlines will expand its network this summer to include 11 new destinations in eastern Canada. The expansion comes as Canada’s airlines eye a potential summer rebound in air travel demand. PAL, which operates De Havilland Canada Dash 8 turboprops, will this summer add flights to Halifax and Sydney in Nova Scotia, and to Saint John, Fredericton and Bathurst in New Brunswick, the airline tells FlightGlobal. The expansion will also see PAL add service to Ottawa in Ontario and Charlottetown on Prince Edward Island. Additionally, it will begin flying to four cities in Quebec: Les Iles de la Madeleine, Gaspe, Baie-Comeau and Val-d’Or.<br/>
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Ryanair has warned it will carry fewer passengers than expected over the next year and struggle to turn a profit because of the slow rollout of vaccinations across much of Europe. The low-cost carrier said lockdowns and travel restrictions had hit travel during the Easter period, and it expected a delayed recovery in traffic into the summer season. It now forecasts passenger numbers in the year ending March 2022 towards the lower end of a previously guided range of between 80m and 120m. The warning came as new figures revealed the depth of the crisis facing the industry, with bookings for this summer on airlines across Europe at under a fifth of normal levels. Although several airlines have trumpeted an increase in summer business, the International Air Transport Association on Wednesday said passenger bookings for travel across Europe between May and September had reached just 15 per cent of 2019 levels by March 20. Ryanair warned that some analyst forecasts predicting the carrier would return to profit over the next year were too optimistic. “While it is not possible at this time to provide meaningful full-year 2022 profit guidance, we do not share the recent optimism of certain analysts,” Ryanair said, adding that it expected to approximately break even. Analysts had forecast profit after tax of E277m, according to Bloomberg.<br/>
El Al Israel Airlines said on Wednesday it plans to raise at least $105m through an offering of shares, options or both to meet a key condition to receive a government bailout package. Israel’s flag carrier said in a regulatory filing in Tel Aviv that the offering would be held by the end of July, though it added that not all conditions in the bailout arrangement had been met, including a final government approval. It said it had signed a collective bargaining agreement with its labour unions for state-mandated job reductions. Israel’s government agreed to a $210m bailout of El Al, which changed hands in late 2020 and was forced to slash one-third of its staff, or 2,000 workers, and other costs. The state also required new owner Eli Rozenberg to inject more cash into the airline. Under the aid plan, the government will buy $210m-worth of flight tickets in advance at El Al and its low fare subsidiary Sun Dor. The bailout is contingent upon El Al issuing capital of $105 million.<br/>
A multi-million-euro rescue of a tiny airline with just four planes has sparked controversy in Spain, with its leftwing government under fire for extending special treatment to the Venezuela-linked firm. The row is over a E53m government bailout extended in early March to Ultra Plus, an obscure airline that links Spain with Ecuador, Peru and Venezuela. The money came from a E10b rescue fund created by the government of Socialist Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez to help strategically important firms hit hardest by the pandemic. But the move drew a sharp rebuke from Spain's right-wing opposition, which regularly attacks the government over its stance on Venezuela, notably accusing hard-left coalition partner Podemos of being funded by Caracas. "It's a scandal that's growing by the day and the government is offering no explanation," said Antonio Gonzalez Terol, a lawmaker with the right-wing Popular Party which wants a parliamentary inquiry into the matter. The liberal Ciudadanos has also urged the EC to open an inquiry, while the far-right Vox has filed a complaint with the Supreme Court.<br/>
South African carrier Comair is delisting from the Johannesburg stock exchange in a move which will allow it to access government-backed financial support. In an update, the airline’s administrators say it can now apply for funding in the sum of R100m ($6.9mi) under a Covid-19 loan guarantee scheme put in place by the South African Reserve Bank and private commercial banks. Such funding is a “fundamental element” of its debt restructuring, say the administrators. Comair is seeking to put in place a total of R600m of new debt under its business plan published in September 2020. It had entered restructuring in May. A consortium comprised of seven individuals plus an investment vehicle, Luthier Capital, is seeking to take full control of the airline, which resumed flights in December. Comair operates the Kulula low-cost brand and as a British Airways franchisee.<br/>
Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) has passed the IATA Operational Safety Audit (IOSA) for the resumption of flights to the EU, the UK and the US. However, the carrier is waiting for the Pakistan Civil Aviation Authority (PCAA) to get its audit done by the International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO). In late June 2020, PIA came under pressure when Minister for Aviation Ghulam Sarwar Khan declared during a session of parliament that 30% of pilots were working on fake licences out of 860 active pilots in the country. The minister unveiled a report in this regard one month after a plane crash on May 22 in Karachi, which claimed lives of 98 people. After a series of incidents, Pakistani airlines, especially PIA, came under scrutiny of international organisations, which demanded safety audits. Until then, PIA flights were banned to the EU and the UK while the US slashed its category.<br/>