United CE Scott Kirby on Wednesday defended a decision to mandate COVID-19 vaccines for workers amid criticism from some Republican senators. "We did this for safety. We believe it saved lives," Kirby said at a Senate Commerce hearing on aviation issues. "We don't compromise on safety." Republican Senator Ted Cruz criticized United's vaccine mandate, calling it "disturbing" and was "disregarding the rights of your employees." Cruz noted American Airlines and Southwest both have said they do not plan to fire any employee over the vaccine requirements. Kirby said about 200 employees did not comply with United's mandate and were fired of its 67,000 employees. He added about 6 pilots were fired and 80 on unpaid leave out of about 13,000.<br/>
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United Airlines Chief Executive Scott Kirby said that plans by AT&T and Verizon Communications to use spectrum for 5G wireless services starting Jan. 5 could prompt thousands of daily flight cancellations. Kirby told reporters after a Senate hearing the wireless carriers must delay the use of the spectrum. He said the issue could result in 4% of daily industry flights delayed, canceled or diverted. He said the Federal Aviation Administration and Federal Communications Commission need “to get in a room and talk to each other and solve the problem.” Kirby added the issue “cannot be solved on the back of airlines.”<br/>
The CE of Scandinavian carrier SAS has described his ‘optimism’ over demand in summer 2022, despite the near-term uncertainty created by the Omicron variant of Covid-19. Anko van der Werff said he was waiting to see whether there was “a new trend” in demand as a result of the variant, following months of positive capacity and traffic data. “Clearly there is some softness, clearly there are more government restrictions in place than there were a few months ago, so we really have to see now what that means for the winter,” he states. But van der Werff insists he remains “quite optimistic for summer 2022”, citing recent experience that “when there are no restrictions in place, demand is really back – both leisure and business”. “So I’m still very much looking forward to next summer,” he says. Pre-Omicron, 2021 had seen a “steady rise back up” in terms of capacity and traffic at SAS, van der Werff explains. “Every single month from roughly March, April, we’ve put capacity back,” he says, adding that Summer 2021 was “okayish”. Then, the “big question” was what would happen to demand after summer, van der Werff continues, with the answer being a positive one, as traffic– including in key corporate markets – came back. “Our countries – Denmark, Sweden and Norway – opened up in September, and throughout August, September, October, November, every month, you saw demand go up,” he states.<br/>
Lufthansa is to begin the first direct transatlantic flights from St Louis for almost 19 years after unveiling plans to launch a service to the US city from Frankfurt next summer. The carrier will serve the Missouri city with three weekly flights from June 2022 using Airbus A330 aircraft featuring a three-class cabin configuration. The new route is the most eye-catching part of a summer schedule which also includes new Frankfurt flights to Liverpool in the UK, to Norwegian city Stavanger, and to Rennes in France. Lufthansa also confirmed the four additional Airbus A350-900s it signed for in October would be based at Munich, taking its fleet of the type to 21. This will support a network from the German city including new nonstop flights to Rio de Janeiro and San Diego. The airline again plans to operate five Airbus A340-600s over the summer from Munich, enabling it to offer a first-class cabin option. St Louis has been without a nonstop European service since American Airlines dropped its London Gatwick flights in October 2003. Two years earlier TWA ended its Paris Charles de Gaulle flights, the last time continental Europe had been served directly from St Louis.<br/>
Singapore Airlines will replace its fleet of Boeing 747-400F freighters with the newly launched, more fuel-efficient Airbus A350F freighter aircraft. The national carrier has signed a letter of intent with the French planemaker to purchase 7 A350F freighters, with options for another 5, the mainboard-listed airline group said in a bourse filing on Wednesday. It added that the deliveries are scheduled to begin in Q4 2025, making SIA the first airline to operate this new generation widebody freighter aircraft. The freighters, under the agreement, will be delivered in place of 15 A320neo and 2 A350-900 passenger aircraft that are in its order book. This allows, SIA noted, the airline group to manage its capital expenditure, while continuing with the essential freighter renewal. The A350F can carry a similar volume of freight as the Boeing 747-400F, but burns up to 40% less fuel and features a longer range. The renewal comes as the group reported a record cargo-flown revenue of over S$1.8b for the first half of financial year 2022 or up 51.2%, amid capacity crunch in air and ocean freight.<br/>
Air New Zealand's latest ATR72-600 turboprop plane has arrived in Aotearoa just in time for Christmas. The 15 day journey included stops in Greece, Saudi Arabia, Oman, Maldives, Malaysia, Indonesia and Australia, before ZK-MZF landed at Auckland Airport on Wednesday afternoon. Its flights covered a distance of 20,414km. The aircraft, which can seat 68 passengers, will be used to service regional routes and travel to the likes of New Plymouth, Tauranga and Nelson. It wasn't on the ground in Auckland for long, departing for Christchurch shortly after arriving in the country, where it's going through the process of getting ready for service. Air NZ's Chief Pilot Captain David Morgan says he's excited to be adding the the latest ATR72-600 to the airline's domestic fleet.<br/>