United Airlines plans to break ground Wednesday on an expansion of its training center in Denver, an initiative aimed at getting thousands of pilots ready to fly passengers as the carrier goes on a hiring spree. The project will cost about $100m. The new four-story building at its training campus will allow United to add six new flight simulators. The airline plans to add an additional six simulators later on. It currently has space for 40 simulators. The new simulators will be to train pilots on the Boeing 737 Max and Airbus jetliners, after a massive order last year, as well as the Boeing 787 Dreamliner, said Marc Champion, managing director of the flight training center. The carrier expects the project to be completed before the end of next year. Champion said the training center expansion project has been in the works for about a year. Like other carriers, United is facing intense competition for pilots as the industry recovers from the Covid pandemic. The airline is planning to hire about 10,000 pilots between now and the end of the decade, Champion said. The Chicago-based carrier expects to add about 2,000 pilots this year. Last year, United started teaching the first students at its new flight school, the United Aviate Academy, in Goodyear, Arizona. It aims to train 5,000 pilots there by 2030. Fleet changes and idled pilots during the pandemic created massive training backlogs across airlines as many aviators switched to new aircraft or waited for slots to complete federally mandated recurrent training.<br/>
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United CE Scott Kirby on Wednesday said air fares are returning to normal levels following the pandemic lows and there is "not a hint of evidence" that rising ticket prices are hurting consumer demand. "We're just back to normal pricing," Kirby told the Bernstein Conference. "It feels like high pricing today because we're comparing to an artificial low coming off the pandemic."<br/>
United Airlines is becoming the first major airline carrier to donate flights to ship baby formula from abroad to the United States as the federal government works to address the ongoing shortage, the White House announced Wednesday. The flights will come as part of the White House's "Operation Fly Formula" efforts. "United Airlines has agreed to transport Kendamil formula free of charge from Heathrow Airport in London to multiple airports across the country over a three-week period. These are the first Operation Formula Flight to be donated by an airline carrier," the White House said in a statement Wednesday. Kendamil formula is manufactured by the United Kingdom-based Kendal Nutricare, which has announced plans to export 2m cans of its infant formula to the US to help alleviate shortages. United will fly more than 300,000 pounds of Kendamil infant formula starting June 9, per the White House, and they will be "be distributed and available for purchase at selected US retailers nationwide, as well as online." The first shipment, the White House said, will be available at Target stores across the country "in the coming weeks," but did not supply specific locations or timing.<br/>
Large airlines such as Lufthansa, Air France-KLM and Ryanair mainly rely on false and ineffective solutions to cut emissions, casting doubts over their commitment to slow climate change, a new report found. Europe’s seven-largest airline groups would need to reduce at least 2% of flights annually by 2040 to cut their greenhouse gas emissions in line with the Paris Agreement, according to a report by Observatorio RSC commissioned by Greenpeace. But the companies analyzed have not made goals to cut annual emissions, promised to reduce flights or pledged to fully decarbonize by 2040. “European airlines are putting up a smokescreen of false solutions that sound great, but in effect keep transport hooked on oil,” said Herwig Schuster, spokesperson for Greenpeace’s European Mobility For All campaign. “Even in the face of a climate emergency, airlines carry on polluting the air and hide their dirty business behind a wall of greenwashing.” The study focused mainly on airlines’ environmental performance from 2018 to 2020 — before the industry was hit by the global pandemic. However, the researchers also looked at whether bailout and stimulus funds distributed during the crisis encouraged any more sustainable business practices. Aviation was Europe’s second-largest contributor of transport emissions in 2017 and was one of the fastest growing sources of carbon pollution before the pandemic. In 2019, the airlines analyzed in the report were responsible for emissions equivalent to the annual carbon footprint of Norway, Sweden, Denmark and Finland combined, according to Greenpeace. While the coronavirus pandemic grounded flights and brought the sector to a halt, activity is picking up again. Researchers analyzed commitments by Lufthansa, Air France-KLM, IAG, Ryanair, easyJet, SAS and TAP Air Portugal on several environmental, social and governance fronts. Using publicly available information, they ranked them and gave them scores.<br/>
Lufthansa is set to take delivery of its first Boeing 787-9 this summer as it prepares to launch the Dreamliner on flights to Toronto. The German carrier today released images of its first 787, registration D-ABPA, which it says will be delivered following certification by the US Federal Aviation Administration this summer. The manufacturer has not delivered any 787s since May 2021 as it works to address manufacturing quality issues, but submitted a new certification plan to the regulator in April. Lufthansa says that following several weeks of cabin refurbishments at its maintenance facilities in Frankfurt, the aircraft will be deployed initially on domestic German routes for training purposes. The first intercontinental scheduled destination will be Toronto. Lufthansa Group has 32 Dreamliners on order, with deliveries running from this year to 2027. The airline earlier in May ordered seven more 787-9s to help offset the delay in delivery of the first 777-9s from 2023 to 2025.<br/>
New footage of flying taxis that will be active in New Zealand within "five to 10 years" has been released. Wisk Aero is creating pilotless flying taxis that "rise like a helicopter and fly like a plane". The aircraft has 12 independent electric rotors, redundant systems, and a parachute if anything goes seriously wrong. Testing took place in Canterbury over recent years, with Stuff Travel witnessing a test flight at Tekapo Airport in 2019. The company has partnered with the New Zealand Government to progress its trials, and with Air New Zealand – which may eventually introduce them to its fleet. More than 1500 test flights have so far taken place both in New Zealand and at its base in the United States.Fresh footage has been released of Wisk's progress, revealing the aircraft flying faster and higher. The company also recently announced a "6th generation" aircraft which has four seats, with the company saying "the day in which you'll be able to skip traffic by flying over it in an air taxi is approaching, and we want the world to be ready”. Flight testing in New Zealand has wrapped up for now, and the focus here has moved to an "Airspace Integration Trial Programme”. "We have been developing and testing procedures that will allow autonomous aircraft to fly in controlled airspace," explains Chris Brown, Wisk's Communications Lead. Air New Zealand's CEO Greg Foran was recently in California checking out the new four-seater aircraft.<br/>