general

The FAA said Wednesday it is proposing to require new passenger airplanes have a second barrier to the flight deck. The proposed rule to protect flight decks from intrusion requires aircraft manufacturers to install a second physical barrier on planes produced after the rule goes into effect and used in commercial passenger service in the United States. "Each additional layer of safety matters. Protecting flight crews helps keep our system the safest in the world,” FAA Acting Administrator Billy Nolen said. The FAA was supposed to have adopted rules by 2019 under a 2018 federal law but the agency has said it was required to follow procedural rules before it could impose new regulations. The FAA says if finalized, the rule would apply to transport category airplanes manufactured two years after final rules are adopted. After the hijacking of four US airplanes on Sept. 11, 2001, the FAA adopted standards for flight deck security to make them resistant to forcible intrusion and unauthorized entry. Air Line Pilots Association President Joe DePete said Wednesday that several measures were put in place to prevent a tragedy like the Sept. 11 attacks "from ever happening again, except the most obvious: installing secondary barriers to secure the flight deck." He praised the FAA for "finally taken the first step toward addressing this vulnerability after years of delay — delays caused by airline opposition and that have resulted in thousands of planes coming into service since 2001 without this critical security enhancement."<br/>

Some airline passengers flying out of Vancouver International Airport could find themselves travelling on an empty stomach. Unionized workers with Gate Gourmet, the company that supplies meals, snacks and beverages to multiple airlines operating out of YVR, including Air Canada, Air France and KLM, have issued 72-hour strike notice. Unite Here Local 40, which represents the workers, said the strike vote came after a series of “fruitless bargaining sessions,” and amid chronic understaffing for a growing workload. The catering workers prepare and assemble meals for aircraft and load and unload beverage and snack carts before and after flights. The union says pandemic layoffs led to a “significant” reduction in staff, which has not been replaced amid a renewed surge in air travel.“Airline catering workers have been working day in and day out, serving travellers through the pandemic. As tourism came back this year and consumer prices hit 31-year highs, we are overworked and underpaid,” bargaining committee member and Gate Gourmet tray assembly worker Kiran Hundal said in a media release. “We’ve attempted to address these issues in good faith with the company, but they continue to propose low wage increases and cuts to our health benefits.”<br/>

Beijing is welcoming back direct inbound passenger flights from overseas for the first time in more than two years as China eases parts of what is still the toughest pandemic border regime in the world. Air China’s website shows it restarted a direct flight from Paris once a week, while ANA will resume weekly flights from Narita in August. Meanwhile, Etihad Airways resumed direct flights to the capital in late June after China halved the length of time incoming travelers must spend in a quarantine facility to seven days, state broadcaster China National Radio reported earlier this month. China’s Civil Aviation Administration banned direct flights into Beijing from overseas in early 2020, making travel difficult. Anyone heading to the capital was required to first land at one of a list of pre-approved cities, where they would need to quarantine, before traveling onward. The aviation regulator said earlier this month that it’s gradually resuming international commercial flights and will continue to ramp up negotiations with certain countries to increase services. A representative for the agency didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment. <br/>

Boeing reported a drop in profit and weaker revenue than analysts had expected for Q2, but said on Wednesday that it was close to restarting deliveries of its 787 Dreamliner plane and was on track to end the year with more cash coming into the business than out of it. The company said it had earned $160m in the quarter, down from $567m a year earlier, on nearly $16.7b in revenue, which was 2% lower than last year. The company’s free cash flow, a closely followed measure of financial health, was negative $182m in Q2, but Boeing said it was poised to report positive cash flow for the full year. The announcement followed a banner week in which Boeing announced sales of nearly 200 commercial planes during an international air show. Boeing’s share price was up 0.1% at the close of trading on Wednesday. The company is “building momentum in our turnaround,” said Dave Calhoun, Boeing’s CE. During Q2, Boeing reached its goal of increasing production of the 737 Max, its flagship commercial plane, to 31 jets per month. Boeing had been turning out as many as 52 Max models per month until the jet was involved in two fatal crashes in late 2018 and early 2019. Those crashes, which killed 346 people, led to a global ban of the plane from March 2019 through nearly all of 2020. The Max was allowed to fly again on the condition that Boeing made certain fixes to the plane. Since then, Boeing’s backlog of orders for the plane has recovered meaningfully, and the Max has carried out tens of thousands of flights and spent more than 1.5m hours in the air, according to the company. <br/>

Boeing executives on Wednesday cut estimates for 737 MAX deliveries this year and warned that supply-chain constraints have capped its ability to ramp up jet production despite "significant" demand. The comments on an earnings call underscored challenges the planemaker faces despite a dramatic improvement in cash flow in the quarter through June. Boeing said it aims to stabilize 737 production rate at 31 a month despite nagging supply chain problems. It expects supply issues and uncertainties in Chinawill keep MAX deliveries this year closer to the "low 400s" than an earlier estimate of about 500. "We continue to experience real constraints," Brian West, Boeing's CFO, told investors. West said the company has increased its presence at the facilities of suppliers and set up teams of experts to address supply crunch in a number of areas, including engines, raw materials and semiconductors. Some analysts were not sure if the measures would help fix the production issues. "While the worst is probably behind for Boeing, we still see better, less heart attack-inducing opportunities in the aerospace sector," analysts at Vertical Research Partners wrote in a note after Boeing's earnings call.<br/>

Airbus cut its jetliner-delivery goal and slowed a ramp-up in production of its best-selling narrow-body model as supply-chain issues afflicting everything from engines to microchips show no sign of easing. The world’s biggest planemaker now aims to hand over around 700 aircraft in 2022, compared with an earlier target of 720, it said in a statement Wednesday. A build rate of 65 a month for the A320 single-aisle family previously targeted for next summer won’t now be achieved until early 2024. The revisions shouldn’t hit Airbus’s financial performance in the short term, with the company reiterating full-year estimates for earnings and cash, but indicate significant challenges in boosting output in an economic environment beset by labor and materials shortages. A slower increase in A320 production also means a five-year order backlog may take longer to clear, impacting existing clients and potentially hurting the firm’s ability to win new business. Airbus posted adjusted earnings before interest and tax of E2.64b for the first half, 2% lower than a year earlier. Analysts had forecast a profit of E2.55b, based on data compiled by Bloomberg.<br/>

Spanish airport operator Aena (AENA.MC) has warned it does not expect a recent sharp recovery in passenger numbers to be sustained due to the tough economic environment, sending its shares to their lowest in nearly two years. The operator of airports serving Madrid, Ibiza and Tenerife among other destinations returned to profit in the first half after two years of losses due to pandemic-related travel restrictions, but foresaw traffic levels below 2019 this year. In a statement on Wednesday it posted a net profit of E164m in the six months through June compared with a net loss of E364m in the first half of last year, on revenue that doubled to E1.69b. Aena said that even though revenue soared thanks to rising aircraft traffic, its expenses rose 40% during the half year to 1 billion euros, largely due to higher energy bills. The company also said airlines had reduced their summer capacity in Spain to 200m passengers from a previously announced 216m. The number of passengers moving through Spain's airports in the first six months of the year increased to 104.9 million, 82% of the pre-pandemic level in the first half of 2019.<br/>