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Southwest’s operations appeared to return to normal on Thursday after three days of widespread flight delays and cancellations caused by technological problems. As of midmorning, the airline had canceled only about 1% of its scheduled flights for the day, though 10% of its flights were delayed, according to FlightAware, a flight tracking service. About half of Southwest’s scheduled flights on Tuesday and Wednesday were delayed. On Monday, more than 1,500 Southwest flights ran late, accounting for about a quarter of all flight delays within the United States. The disruptions infuriated thousands of passengers, many of whom complained on social media. The turmoil began on Monday night when a problem with a weather data provider prevented Southwest from safely flying its planes temporarily. The issue was resolved, but the airline faced a technological issue of its own on Tuesday. That was fixed within hours, but nevertheless had a cascading effect on flights that day and the next. The airline said it was investigating the outages, but had no reason to believe they were caused by a breach. The flight delays and cancellations took place during a generally slow part of the week, but they come as overall travel is picking up. Southwest’s troubles seemed to be subsiding, but Thursday wasn’t without problems. Southwest and Delta were among many companies whose websites were briefly inaccessible early in the day because of problems at an internet firm that provides services to many businesses.<br/>

Alaska Airlines debuted its Pride plane on Tuesday, truly nailing its colors to the mast -- or decals to the fuselage. The Airbus A320's new livery has "Fly with Pride" written on the side and the design features brightly colored silhouettes of planes and stripes on the main body and engines. The design choice, says Alaska Airlines on Twitter, is "iconic rainbow stripes & inclusive colors such as brown, black, light blue, white & pink to represent BIPOC & Transgender communities. Without those groups of people & their activism, we would not have Pride today." Accompanying "Fly with Pride" pins are available for $4 on the company's online store. The airline is also celebrating via its in-flight entertainment, with its Pride Month movie and TV selection including classics such as "Milk" and "Cabaret" and series "Pose" and "Little Fires Everywhere." The airline tells CNN Travel that it began the design process for the plane back in April, and it will be flying with their network for a whole year -- not just Pride Month. "To the best of our knowledge, this is the first time a US airline has introduced a Pride-inspired plane," says the Alaska Airlines spokesperson.<br/>

Aer Lingus and BA CityFlyer will take over a total of 10 routes hit when Stobart Air folded at the weekend, the Irish carrier confirmed on Thursday. Stobart, which flew regional services for Aer Lingus, ceased trading with the loss of 480 jobs when its owner, British group Esken, ended financial support for the Irish airline. Aer Lingus said that it would fly six routes previously operated by its partner until at least August 31st, while BA CityFlyer, part of British Airways, will take over four routes for the rest of the summer. Aer Lingus added that it was transferring affected customers to replacement flights, or was booking them on to alternatives where there were no replacements scheduled. However, services on other Stobart routes, including from Dublin to Donegal and Kerry, and from Belfast to Cardiff and England’s East Midlands Airport, are cancelled until at least June 27th. Aer Lingus said affected customers can seek refunds or vouchers for future travel, and the airline is offering alternative flights to passengers due to fly from Belfast City to East Midlands before June 27th. Aer Lingus will take over the services from Belfast to Birmingham, Edinburgh and Manchester, and the routes from Dublin to Edinburgh, Glasgow and Manchester. BA CityFlyer meanwhile will travel from Belfast to Exeter, Glasgow, Leeds Bradford and Newquay.<br/>

Eurowings Discover has received its own air operator’s certificate and will fly leisure routes as a wholly-owned subsidiary of Lufthansa from late July. The Lufthansa Group unit was awarded its AOC by the German Federal Aviation Authority on 16 June. It will operate its inaugural flight, from Frankfurt to Mombasa with an onward connection to Zanzibar, on 24 July. In August, it will add service to Punta Cana in the Dominican Republic and Windhoek in Namibia, followed by flights to Las Vegas and Mauritius in October. Lufthansa Group had previously announced that Eurowings would begin operating a raft of long-haul routes in summer 2022 using “Eurowings Discover” branding. Now that it has its own AOC, Eurowings Discover will operate short-, medium- and long-haul flights under “its own commercial and operational responsibility”, says Lufthansa Group. The new leisure unit’s fleet will consist of 11 aircraft this year, growing to 21 by mid-2022. The aircraft will be a mixture of 10 Airbus A320s and 11 A330s sourced from “the Lufthansa Group fleet pool”.<br/>

Norwegian start-up Flyr has received its air operator’s certificate and will initiate service between Oslo and Tromso on 30 June. The airline says it will begin with domestic routes and flights to European leisure destinations, before expanding its network in response to demand. “We at Flyr would like to thank the Civil Aviation Authority for a constructive and professional process. Now all formalities are in place and we look forward to welcoming our guests on board,” says the airline’s CE, Tonje Wikstrøm Frislid, in a stock-exchange filing. <br/>

All-business operator La Compagnie is to add New York connections to Tel Aviv and Milan after resuming transatlantic flights from France after a break of more than a year. La Compagnie had last month indicated plans to resume flights to New York Newark from both Paris Orly and Nice, having suspended the flights in March 2020 when travel restrictions to counter the Covid outbreak were implemented. The carrier resumed its Paris-Newark flights on 12 June, initialy operating the route twice-weekly. It plans to gradually increase frequency to daily by September. It will resume thrice-weekly flights from Nice to Newark from 2 July, operating through until the end of September. France in early June cleared the path for Americans to fly to the European country without having to quarantine upon arrival. La Compagnie has now also detailed plans to also offer a Newark summer connection to Tel Aviv, operating vIa Paris thrice-weekly from 21 July.<br/>

EasyJet launched 12 new domestic UK flying routes on Thursday, a decision criticised by green campaigners as likely to increase greenhouse gas emissions. The airline said the routes, which will include Birmingham to Newquay for GBP22.99 – less than 200 miles – as well as Liverpool to Bournemouth at GBP22.99 and Manchester to Edinburgh at GBP30.00, as well as to Belfast and the Channel Islands, were in response to passenger demand following restrictions on travel during the Covid-19 pandemic. Some of the new routes were served by other airlines, including Stobart Air, which recently went bust. Most of them are viable by train, but rail operators charge far higher prices. The government is to make reductions in air passenger duty on domestic flights, which will make flying even cheaper compared with train journeys. The UK government’s stance is in sharp contrast with France, which is banning flights where a train journey is available that takes less than 2.5 hours. John Sauven, executive director of Greenpeace UK, said the move showed that the government was not taking seriously its targets to cut greenhouse gas emissions by 68% by 2030, and 78% by 2035, which have been key commitments in the runup to the Cop26 UN climate talks in Glasgow this November.<br/>

Emirates airline will operate close to 90% of its pre-pandemic network by the end of July as it restores more destinations and increases flights on other routes over the summer, it said on Thursday. The Dubai state carrier, which reported a record $5.5b loss this week, said it was encouraged by countries reopening to visitors, forecasting strong demand during the peak summer travel season. Emirates will operate 880 weekly services to 124 passenger destinations by the end of July, up from 115 today and compared to a pre-pandemic passenger network of 143 destinations, it said. Next month, flights will resume to Venice, Phuket, Nice, Orlando, Mexico City, Lyon and Malta and a new service to Miami will commence. “Emirates is committed to keeping Dubai, businesses and communities around the world connected and we are working hard to rebuild our network and secure access to more destinations in partnership with various authorities and stakeholders,” Chairman Sheikh Ahmed bin Saeed al-Maktoum said.<br/>

Congolese government officials have identified a Let L-410 turboprop involved in a fatal accident during take-off as being operated by local carrier Kin Avia. The aircraft had been conducting a 16 June freight flight from Kavumu, in the far east of the Democratic Republic of Congo, near the Rwandan border, to Shabunda about 165km to the west. According to the country’s minister of transport, Cherubin Okende Senga, the accident occurred about 11:15. The twin-turboprop was transporting 1.6t of cargo. “During the take-off phase the aircraft departed from its initial trajectory [and struck the ground] three minutes later,” the minister states. Three occupants of the aircraft – including the captain and first officer – did not survive the accident.<br/>

AirAsia X has been granted by the High Court of Malaya a nine-month extension of a restraining order on creditors. The order was initially granted for three months from 17 March. It is now valid for another nine months from 17 June, the company said in a same-day disclosure to Bursa Malaysia.In a 17 March disclosure, AirAsia X said it proactively applied for the restraining order to help address its debt obligations in an orderly manner via its proposal for debt restructuring. It added that the restraining order allows creditors “an opportunity for amicable deliberation on the proposed debt restructuring without extraneous considerations so that a decision can be reached on the same”. The order was not expected to have any material financial and operational impact on the company.<br/>

Eastar Jet, whose revenue once reached KRW500b won (US$440m), is expected to be sold to local real estate firm Sungjeong, also known as SJ, whose revenue last year was around KRW40b (US$35m). A property rental company and golf course manager, Sungjeong confirmed on June 17 that it intended to carry out its preferential right as the “stalking horse” bidder to buy the indebted budget carrier. Sales advisor Deloitte submitted an official letter expressing this objective to Seoul Bankruptcy Court, a Sungjeong representative told local media. The only other contender, the bigger-budget clothing and underwear firm Ssang Bang Wool, submitted a bidding price of KRW110b (US$97.1m), which was about KRW10b (US$8.8m) higher than the price Sungjeong proposed in its earlier provisional contract. But Sungjeong decided to match the price, giving it the right as the preferential bidder to go ahead with the acquisition. However, the court must still confirm it as the final buyer.<br/>