general

All 96 passengers of the Philippine Air Force plane that crashed on Sunday killing 47 people have been accounted for, military chief Cirilito Sobejana said on Monday. Forty nine military personnel were injured in the crash, Sobejana said. The Department of National Defence said on Sunday three civilians on the ground were also killed, and four civilians were injured. The Lockheed C-130 transport aircraft, carrying troops bound for counter-insurgency operations, overshot the runway after it touched down at Jolo airport in southern Sulu province, according to a military spokesman, Colonel Edgard Arevalo. Defence Secretary Delfin Lorenzana said he had ordered an investigation of the incident, which would begin after rescue and recovery operations had been completed. The military has not seen any sign of an attack on the plane.<br/>

Two pilots forced to land a Boeing 737 cargo plane in the ocean off Hawaii early on Friday morning were rescued by the US Coast Guard, according to the federal officials. The pilots reported having engine trouble soon after they embarked on a 33-minute flight from Honolulu to Kahului Airport, a regional airport on the island of Maui, the authorities said. The pilots were trying to return to Daniel K. Inouye International Airport in Honolulu when they were forced to make the emergency landing off the coast at about 1:30 a.m. local time, Crystal Essiaw, a spokeswoman for the FAA, said. The U.S. Coast Guard sent a helicopter, a rescue plane, a cutter and a 45-foot boat to search for the pilots. At 2:30 a.m., the helicopter spotted the debris and the two pilots in the water, about two miles south of Kalaeloa, Oahu. The pilots, who were not identified, were rescued by the Coast Guard and the Honolulu Fire Department. At the time, the Coast Guard reported winds of about 17 miles per hour and the seas up to five feet. Both pilots were in “good condition,” Lt. Cmdr. Karin Evelyn, a spokeswoman for the Coast Guard, said in an email. They were both sent to a hospital and are in stable condition, the Coast Guard said in a statement. The Coast Guard released a grainy video of the early morning rescue, in which boats could be seen approaching two forms in the ocean as a helicopter hovered above. “The plane debris remains,” Commander Evelyn said. “The U.S.C.G. will evaluate the pollution at first light.”<br/>

Southwest customers have struggled with thousands of delays and hundreds of canceled flights this month because of computer problems, staffing shortages and bad weather. American Airlines is also grappling with a surge in delays, and it has trimmed its schedule through mid-July at least in part because it doesn’t have enough pilots, according to the pilots’ union. Travelers are posting photos of long airport lines and describing painful flights. Airlines have seen a surge in unruly passengers, and some experts predict it will get worse this summer as planes become even more crowded. There have been 10 days in June when more than 2 million travelers went through US airports, according to figures from the Transportation Security Administration. Airlines say that domestic leisure travel is nearly back to 2019 levels, although the lack of business travelers means that overall, the number of passengers over the past week is still down about 20% compared with the same days in 2019. The airlines were expecting a blockbuster July Fourth weekend, scheduling more than 100,000 US flights between July 1 and July 5. That was nearly twice the 58,000 that they offered over the same days last year, according to data from aviation researcher Cirium. July 1 was first time the TSA screened more people than on the same day in 2019.<br/>

The DoT will propose that airlines be required to refund fees on checked baggage if the bags aren't delivered to passengers quickly enough. The proposal, if made final after a lengthy regulation-writing process, would also require prompt refunds for fees on extras such as internet access if the airline fails to provide the service during the flight. A department official said the agency will issue the proposal in the next several days, and it could take effect by next summer. The proposal will require refunds if airlines fail to deliver a bag within 12 hours of the passenger's US flight touching down or within 25 hours after an international flight. Current regulations require refunds only if bags are lost, although airlines must compensate passengers for “reasonable” incidental expenses incurred while their bags are delayed. The government does not know how often airlines keep fees even when bags are significantly delayed.<br/>

The US House of Representatives has voted to approve an infrastructure bill that also addresses hazards in the air transportation of lithium batteries. The Invest in America Act, passed by the US House on 1 July, authorises the government to allocate $715 million for safety measures on roads, bridges, public transit, freight rail, drinking water and wastewater infrastructure, according to a public fact sheet. But deep in the text, the bill also repeals Section 828 of the FAA Modernization and Reform Act of 2012. ”That section prohibits [the Department of Transportation] from issuing any regulation ensuring the safety of transporting lithium batteries in air cargo compartments of passenger and cargo planes if the regulations are more stringent than the lowest common denominator of international standards,” a summary of the bill’s text reads. “Repealing this provision helps protect the safety of all passengers flying in the US from safety risks associated with lithium batteries.”<br/>

American vacationers are finding just about everything significantly more expensive this summer. Hotel rooms? Up about 44% at the end of June compared to a year earlier, according to data from hotel research firm STR. Air fares? They were 24% higher in May than in the same month last year, according to the Consumer Price Index. Even so, many of the prices are still below where they stood in the summer of 2019, six months before the outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic brought demand for travel to a near halt and sent prices plunging. "Most of what people are seeing in price inflation is due to how cheap things were last year," said Adam Sacks, president of Tourism Economics. Most in the industry avoid making the year-over-year comparisons in the CPI. Instead they're looking at the contrast with the 2019 price and booking levels. But even some of those prices are back to near or even above 2019 levels, thanks to the strong rebound in demand. For example, STR shows the national average for US hotel rates in the week ending June 26 back to 99.5% of where they were at the same time in 2019. "That's an incredible run," said Sacks. Only two weeks ago they stood at 93% of 2019 levels, he added. The national average disguises some even bigger increases in vacation destinations. "The price differences are pretty disparate," Sacks said. "The national prices don't really mean anything when you're looking to travel to a specific location at a specific time."<br/>

The EC has drafted plans to set an EU-wide minimum tax rate for polluting aviation fuels, as it seeks to meet more ambitious targets to fight climate change, a document seen by Reuters shows. The EC is drafting an overhaul of EU energy taxation, as part of a package of measures it will propose on July 14, to meet a target to reduce EU greenhouse gas emissions by 55% by 2030, from 1990 levels. A draft of the Commission’s tax proposal takes aim at aviation, which escapes EU fuel taxes. That exemption “is not coherent with the present climate challenges and policies,” the document said, adding that EU tax rules promote fossil fuels over green energy sources and need rewriting to support the bloc’s climate goals. The proposal would impose an EU-wide minimum level of tax on energy products supplied as aircraft fuel for flights within the EU. From 2023, the minimum tax rate for aviation fuel would start at zero and increase gradually over a 10-year period, until the full rate is imposed. The draft proposal did not specify what the final rate would be.<br/>

Bjorn Tore Larsen knows just how hard the path he has chosen will be. Founder of a global maritime services business, the veteran investor announced earlier this year that he was moving into aviation after one of the worst years in the sector’s history. “Some people say that to start an airline, first of all you have to be crazy,” Larsen says. “I’m not sure if that is quite true. But the airline business is very risky. It is very volatile. It’s capital intensive; there is strong competition; and there are a lot of unfortunate casualties in terms of financial disasters.” Larsen’s Norse Atlantic Airways is just one of a clutch of new carriers that are taking wing in 2021 and 2022. Their founders are hoping to capitalise on resurgent interest in travel after Covid-19 pushed the global industry to a record $118bn loss last year as demand plunged by two-thirds. To succeed, these start-ups must carve out profitable niches within a crowded sector by differentiating themselves from existing competitors. By the time Andrew Levy struck out on his own to found Avelo, he had already been helping to differentiate airline brands for decades. The service, which started in late April, is trying in some ways to be an American version of European carrier easyJet: a reliable, low-cost — but not super cheap — alternative for cost-conscious leisure travellers. Levy selected that audience based on lessons learnt from nearly 30 years of experience at three other airlines. First up was Valujet, which he joined six months after its 1993 launch. The low-cost pioneer initially soared, allowing it to become profitable sooner than any US airline in history. Story has more.<br/>

International airlines claim they could be forced to suspend services to Australia from next week after national cabinet agreed to halve the number of people allowed to enter the country – and they say any suggestion of price gouging is “insulting and bizarre”. From 14 July, overseas arrivals will be slashed from 6,070 to 3,035 a week – crushing the hopes of thousands of Australians stuck overseas and looking to get home. Barry Abrams, the executive director of the Board of Airline Representatives of Australia, said on Sunday he sympathised with those caught overseas. But he said airlines still flying to Australia and struggling to break even would face tough choices. “It is going to be a very difficult situation for many airlines to maintain their frequency of flights to Australia,” Abrams said. “Many will be asking whether or not it makes more sense to suspend their passenger flights or just run cargo flights. I wouldn’t see it as cutting Australia off [but] I would see reduced connectivity and availability of flights to and from Australia.” The price of a flight is based on its length, the number of passengers and the capacity for air freight, with the direct cost of a flight running at $10,000 an hour, Abrams said. Story has more.<br/>

The spread in Europe of a more contagious form of Covid-19 is dashing hopes of recovery in air travel, with the head of a major airports operator warning that it could cut short any rebound. “The delta variant is creating such uncertainty that we can’t be sure what’s going to happen in three weeks,” said Augustin de Romanet, CEO of operator ADP, which also manages dozens of other hubs worldwide. “It’s making us very, very cautious, especially for September and October when the pandemic could come back strongly once again,” he said this weekend. European travel shares rallied in the spring on bets the continent’s traditional summer holiday season would mark at least some recovery from the pandemic, which has decimated the industry. The stocks have since hit a rocky patch amid a resurgence of travel rules. Portugal and Spain are among the latest to impose restrictions on visitors from the UK, a key source of tourism revenue, where the daily infection rate is climbing. In places like France, vacation-goers are overwhelmingly planning local jaunts.<br/>

A group of infrastructure investors has proposed a A$22.26b ($16.7b) buyout of Sydney Airport Holdings, the operator of Australia's biggest airport, taking a longer-term view on the pandemic-battered travel sector. Record-low interest rates have led pension funds and their investment managers to chase higher yields. The purchase, with an enterprise value of A$30 billion including debt, would allow them to reap financial benefits when borders reopen and travel demand rebounds. If successful, the deal would be Australia's biggest this year, eclipsing the $8.1b spin-off of Endeavour Group and Star Entertainment Group's $7.3b bid for Crown Resorts. The Sydney Aviation Alliance - a consortium comprising IFM Investors, QSuper and Global Infrastructure Partners - has offered A$8.25 per Sydney Airport share, a 42% premium to the stock's Friday close. Sydney Airport noted the offer was below its pre-pandemic share price and said it would review the proposal, which is contingent on granting due diligence and recommending it to shareholders in the absence of a superior offer. The company is Australia's only listed airport operator. A successful deal would bring its ownership in line with the country's other major airports which are owned by consortia of infrastructure investors, primarily pension funds.<br/>