The Dutch arm of Air France-KLM will press Amsterdam’s Schiphol Airport to drop a capacity cap in December rather than extend it through March as planned, CEO Marjan Rintel said. Schiphol needs to look at all options to address a labor shortage that prompted the curbs, including modifying a rostering system for security staff that’s efficient but unpopular, Rintel said in an interview Wednesday. “They need to take some tough decisions to solve these issues,” the CEO said at the World Aviation Festival in Amsterdam, adding that she will “push” outgoing Schiphol counterpart Dick Benschop and his successor to end the cap as soon as it comes up for review in December. KLM was forced to extend a 20% reduction in capacity into the winter schedule after Schiphol said last month that the cap on departing passengers may not be lifted until April. The carrier is already facing damages of more than 100m euros ($99.6m) linked to the impact of the restrictions over the summer months, when it was unable to fully tap rebounding demand. Benschop said that the airport has endured “severe operational issues” but that it’s seen improvement since putting an action plan into place. Rintel said Schiphol’s cap appears especially extreme after London Heathrow confirmed this week that its curbs will go at the end of this month as a labor shortage eases and people fly less during the low season for travel. The UK hub said ad hoc restrictions may be imposed at the very busiest periods.<br/>
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Korean Air and Airbus Helicopters plan to develop unmanned air vehicles (UAV) with a vertical take-off and landing capability for South Korea’s military. At a ceremony in Seoul, Jung-woo Park, head of a Korean Air’s Aerospace Business Division, and Bruno Even, CE of Airbus Helicopters, signed a memorandum of agreement for the work, says Korean Air. The MOA will see the two companies develop shipborne UAVs for the South Korean navy that can perform reconnaissance missions. The work will bring together KAL-ASD’s experience in developing UAVs, as well as Airbus Helicopters’ work on its VSR700 programme, adds Korean. The European company is developing the VSR700 as an intelligence, surveillance, target acquisition and reconnaissance (ISTAR) platform that is capable of operating autonomously from naval vessels. Korean Air gave no details of timelines for the programme, or subsequent steps. UAV development is a focus are Korean Air’s KAL-ASD division. In August, Seoul tapped Korean Air as the “preferred bidder” to develop low observable UAVs that can work with manned aircraft in combat. This followed Korean Air’s establishment of a “next-generation stealth drone research & development” centre in June. At the Seoul ADEX defence show in October 2021, Korean Air signed a memorandum of understanding to team up with Boeing unit Insitu to develop a lightweight tactical UAV with the ability to take-off and land vertically. At ADEX Korean Air also promoted its developmental KUS-VS UAV, which uses what the company calls “lift & cruise” technology, whereby independent rotors provide cruise and lift. Four horizontal rotors are used for take-off and landing, but these are switched off during flight, with a single vertical rotor providing forward thrust. In the 2010s KAL-ASD developed the 500MD, an unmanned helicopter based on the Hughes MD500, for which Boeing provided expertise derived from its H-6U Little Bird effort.<br/>