general

The TSA intercepted a record number of guns at airport security checkpoints this year, the agency said on Friday, prompting it to increase the maximum fine for firearm violations. The move comes amid surges in air travel and gun sales across the country. The agency said that it had stopped 6,301 guns — more than 88% of which were loaded — from passing beyond security checkpoints. By the end of the year the administration expects to have intercepted about 6,600 guns in carry-on bags, a 10% increase over the previous record of 5,972, set in 2021. Officials increased the maximum fine for a firearms violation by nearly $1,000, to $14,950, “in order to reduce the threat of firearms at checkpoints,” the agency said. “When a passenger brings a firearm to the checkpoint, this consumes significant security resources and poses a potential threat to transportation security, in addition to being very costly for the passenger,” said the TSA administrator, David Pekoske. The announcement came about three months after the agency said that it was on pace to break the record once again, as air travel in the United States neared prepandemic levels. Besides a drop in 2020, when travelers stayed home amid pandemic lockdowns, the number of firearm interceptions by the TSA has steadily increased each year since 2010. Passengers are allowed to bring guns in checked baggage, so long as the weapons are unloaded and locked in a hard-sided container. Passengers must also declare guns at the check-in counter. But guns are not allowed in carry-on bags at any TSA checkpoint, even if a passenger has a concealed weapon permit.<br/>

Mexican aviation authorities have proposed to hold a videoconference with the United States' FAA in early January to review progress on Mexico's plan to recover a coveted air safety rating. Mexico, whose US-issued safety rating was downgraded in 2021, proposed holding the conference between Jan. 6 and Jan. 9, ahead of FAA chief Billy Nolen's planned visit to the country on Jan. 12.<br/>

Latin America is drawing early investment for jet fuel produced from materials like forest residues and palm oil as emission-conscious airlines scour emerging markets for less-polluting fuel to power flights, industry executives say. While most sustainable aviation fuel, or SAF, is produced in the United States, Europe, and Singapore, Latin America is emerging as a budding market. That demand is driving early investments and reviving debate over palm oil, which has faced boycotts in southeast Asia over labor concerns and environmental grievances. The push comes as industry faces fresh pressure to curb pollution, with the United Nation's aviation agency targeting net zero emissions by 2050 and negotiators scrambling to reach an agreement on Monday at a Montreal summit to protect nature.<br/>While SAF is not currently produced in Latin America, Honeywell's Performance Materials and Technologies (PMT) unit is talking to companies about 12 proposed SAF projects in the region valued in the billions of dollars, up from three projects in 2018, an executive told Reuters. "We have two that we are going to announce ... in 2023," said Jose Fernandes, the region's president for Honeywell PMT, which supports companies in converting vegetable oil and fats into SAF. "Latin America right now is really a hot spot for Honeywell." The US company is working with Brazilian biodiesel producer ECB Group on an $800m to $1b plant in Paraguay featuring SAF expected to be operational in 2025.<br/>

Insurers may refuse to cover planes flying to Ukraine or ships sailing through the Black Sea as reinsurers - who insure the insurers - propose excluding the region from policies from next month, four industry sources said. Reinsurers typically renew their 12-month contracts with insurance clients on Jan. 1, meaning they have the first opportunity to scale back exposure since the war in Ukraine started, after being hit this year by losses related to the conflict and from Hurricane Ian in Florida. A proposed contract clause being circulated by reinsurers excludes war-related claims for planes or ships in Ukraine, Belarus and Russia, the four sources told Reuters. Without the backing of the reinsurers, insurers themselves may be unwilling to provide cover for the region, they added. Reinsurers are particularly concerned about the loss of planes owned by aircraft leasing companies which are stuck in Russia and have already generated $8b in legal claims. As they operate on an “aggregation” basis with marine and aviation war risk insurance, totting up the losses as one, claims in one area make reinsurers wary about the whole war risk sector, David Smith, head of hull and marine liabilities at broker McGill and Partners said. “They don’t care if it’s a ship or a plane, it’s all dragged along in the aggregation.” While major reinsurers Hannover Re, Munich Re and Swiss Re declined to comment, Chris McGill, head of cargo at insurer Ascot, said the issue extends to the whole sector. Around 90% of the war risk market for marine and aviation is insured in Lloyd’s and the wider London commercial insurance market, the sources noted.<br/>

Queues for security checks spill out beyond the barriers as a line snakes across one of Heathrow’s departure halls. Despite the relatively quiet period on a weekday afternoon, passengers are still facing long waits — an ominous sign as a surge in bookings over Christmas and the new year coincides with strikes, threatening to disrupt travel at one of the busiest times of the year. The walkout by passport control officials this Friday for more than a week raises fears of more flight delays and long queues at Britain’s busiest airport, only months after this summer’s travel chaos. Executives from the airport, airlines and government have been meeting to ensure the disruption is limited, and are optimistic most passengers will not be hit. But they have warned that some disruption — most likely in the form of long queues at arrivals for people who cannot pass through electronic passport gates — is inevitable. “We are doing everything we can to protect full operating schedules on Border Force strike days,” Heathrow CE John Holland-Kaye said. He added that departing passengers and “the vast majority” of arrivals should be unaffected by the walkout by passport controllers, who are in dispute with the government rather than the airport. Heathrow has forecast just under 6mn passengers will pass through the airport in December, down from 6.6mn in December 2019, just before the pandemic hit.<br/>

London’s Heathrow airport is asking airlines to halt ticket sales on inbound flights over Christmas in a bid to minimize disruption during walkouts by immigration officials. The plan was devised with the cooperation of British Airways and Virgin Atlantic Airways Ltd., which are based at the hub and intend to comply, Heathrow said Friday. Border Force earlier wrote to airports asking them to limit demand to no more than 80% of 2019 levels for arrivals during the protests, Heathrow said. It said the move to halt sales isn’t being unilaterally imposed, having been agreed with BA and Virgin, and remains a request for other operators. Officials represented by the PCS union are set to strike over pay at Heathrow and other major UK hubs from Dec. 23 to Dec. 31, hitting the first Christmas travel rush since the easing of Covid curbs. Heathrow says that while there’ll most likely be queues for people who don’t qualify to use electronic entry gates, no major disruption is expected. British workers in sectors spanning the heath service through the rail network to Royal Mail postal deliveries have staged walkouts as they seek pay hikes to match rising prices. The government says allowing steep raises would risk embedding inflation and making the cost of living crisis even worse. BA said anyone already booked to travel will be able to do so as planned, while customers who wish to change their flight dates should be able to do so. <br/>

The UK: home to tradition, cozy cottages and Christmas movies. What better place to spend the holiday period than in a thatched cottage like in "The Holiday," or have a romantic airport arrival channeling "Love Actually"? This year could be the perfect time for it, too -- the normally mild UK has seen snow even in southern England. A white Christmas could be on the cards for the first time in years. There's just one problem: getting there. Because although this is the first Christmas since 2019 that the UK has had no Covid-induced travel restrictions, whether it's a feasible destination this month is another question. Amid political chaos -- the country went through three prime ministers in seven weeks, earlier in the fall -- the UK is seeing industrial action on an unprecedented scale. Strikes have been called for nearly every day of December: for nurses (their first ever strike), health workers, ambulance drivers, postal workers, driving examiners, bus drivers, rail workers, highways workers, baggage handlers and Border Force. The last five, of course, impact travel. "This is really serious -- it's a massive issue," says Rhys Jones, aviation expert at travel site Head for Points. "There's nothing routine about the combination or the length of the strikes."<br/>

They are the rituals of modern travel: the frantic drinking of water bottles in airport security lines, the shampoos tossed into the trash, the fights over whether Bolognese sauce is a solid or a liquid. And, as far as the British government is concerned, those days should come to an end by June 2024. On Thursday, the British government said that new technology at its airports could let it substantially relax and speed up security checks, allowing liquid containers of up to two liters in hand luggage and doing away with a requirement to extract big electronics, like laptops or tablets, from carry-on bags. Some airports around the world have already started introducing similar technology and scrapping the requirements, but experts said that Britain was ahead of the game in making a countrywide announcement. “The UK are the pioneers,” said Jeffrey C. Price, a professor of aviation at the Metropolitan State University of Denver. “We’re not aware of similar announcements/initiatives by other countries,” Perry Flint, a spokesman for the IATA, a trade group for the world’s airlines, said in an email. It is not the first time that Britain has made such an announcement. In 2019, the prime minister at the time, Boris Johnson, announced plans for all major British airports to introduce the screening equipment that would lead to the relaxing of the liquids rule by this month. The investment in new technology was delayed by the coronavirus pandemic. Now, airports will have until June 2024 to upgrade their equipment and screening processes, the government said. All airports in Britain will be required to adopt the latest technology in screening carry-on bags, said Laura Wilson, a spokeswoman for the Department for Transport, but the technology could vary between airports and be put in place at different times. Mark Harper, the transport secretary, said he would ensure the use of the security technology at all “major” British airports by the June deadline.<br/>

Passenger flights in China might rebound over the Lunar New Year holidays and hit 88% of the pre-pandemic level by the end of January, based on a timetable rolled out by the national civil aviation regulator. The Civil Aviation Administration of China (CAAC) issued the plan following China's shift last week away from its zero-tolerance approach to COVID-19. Demand for flights climbed quickly as the country abandoned most restrictions. Air travel is expected to surge substantially during the Lunar New Year holidays, from Jan. 7 to Jan. 21, as hundreds of millions of migrant workers return to their hometowns. On Dec. 12, days after new policies were issued to remove most travel curbs, domestic flight activity jumped to around 65% of pre-pandemic levels from just 22% as of Nov. 29, numbers from Chinese aviation data company VariFlight show. But the wanderlust could be short-lived: The easing of COVID rules has unleashed a rapidly spreading virus, prompting some people to stay home. According to the CAAC plan, air services will be restored in three phases. In the first step, daily passenger flights will increase by Jan. 6 to as many as 11,280, equivalent to 70% of the 2019 daily average. Among the total, up to 9,280 could be domestic flights, the CAAC said. In the second phase, from Jan. 7 to Jan. 31, encompassing the Lunar New Year travel surge, daily passenger flights would rise to a maximum of 13,667, including up to 11,667 for domestic trips. That would be about 88% of the 2019 level. Lunar New Year bookings are expected to hit the highest level in three years, reaching 80% of pre-pandemic levels, Guo Lechun, an analyst with travel booking platform Qunar's data research arm, was quoted as saying. In the final phase, through March 25, the industry will continue a stable recovery, according to the CACC.<br/>

Up to 150,000 passengers are passing through Changi Airport daily, with about a million each week, or about 75% of the average number of weekly passengers pre-pandemic, said Transport Minister S. Iswaran on Sunday. This is more than twice the number who passed through the airport when Singapore reopened its borders to vaccinated travellers in April. Despite the uptick, the airport is well equipped to handle the higher volume, Iswaran said on Facebook, citing the reopenings of Terminal 4, on Sept 13, and the southern wing of Terminal 2, on Oct 11. He added that Singapore’s aviation workforce is now at about 90% of pre-pandemic levels. Last Wednesday, Changi Airport Group (CAG) said 2022 has been a year of strong recovery, as the number of passengers and flight movements has climbed steadily over the months. It handled 23.6m passengers in the first 10 months of the year, representing 42% of its pre-pandemic traffic. Of those 23.6m people, 3.69m passed through Changi Airport’s terminals in October, or about 65% of its traffic in October 2019.<br/>

Gulfstream has flown a G650 business jet fuelled with 100% sustainable aviation fuel (SAF), a feat the Savannah company calls a first among business jet manufactures. The company flew the jet from Savannah as part of a project with Rolls-Royce, which makes the G650’s 16,900lb- (75.2kN)-thrust BR725 engines, Gulfstream says on 16 December. “Gulfstream… is the business-jet industry’s first original equipment manufacturer to fly on 100% sustainable aviation fuel,” the company says. “Leading our industry closer to decarbonisation is a long-standing priority, and testing, evaluating and promoting new developments in SAF takes us another step closer to that goal,” adds Gulfstream president Mark Burns. The aircraft was fuelled with two types of SAF. Those included fuel from World Energy in California derived from “hydro-processed esters and fatty acids… from waste fat and plant oils”. The other was synthesised aromatic kerosene made from plant-based sugars and supplied by Wisconsin fuel company Virent, Gulfstream says. ”Demonstrating that current Rolls-Royce engines for business jet and large civil applications can operate with 100% SAF as a full drop-in option, this test lays the groundwork for moving this type of fuel towards certification,” says engine maker R-R. Current certifications only allow for R-R engines to be powered with fuel composed of no more than 50% SAF, R-R adds. <br/>