Three dozen people were hurt — 11 of them seriously — when a flight from Phoenix to Honolulu was rocked by severe turbulence on Sunday, the authorities said. The Hawaiian Airlines flight, which carried 238 passengers and 10 crew members, landed at the Daniel K. Inouye International Airport in Honolulu at about 11 a.m. local time, according to the airline. Medical personnel provided care to passengers and crew members who were injured, according to Honolulu Emergency Medical Services. Shayne Enright, a spokeswoman for the services, said that 36 people, including a 14-month old and three crew members, were injured. Of those, 11 people, including one teenager, were hospitalized with serious injuries. Nine others were hospitalized in stable condition, she added. The condition of the infant was not immediately available. “Injuries included a serious head injury, lacerations, bruising and loss of consciousness,” Enright said. None of the victims appeared to have life-threatening injuries, she said. Hawaiian Airlines said on Twitter that it was supporting all affected passengers and employees, and that it had provided medical care to those who were injured in the flight. At a news conference on Sunday, the COO for Hawaiian Airlines, Jon Snook, said that the seatbelt sign was on when flight HA35 experienced turbulence about 30 minutes outside of Honolulu. Turbulence, which is air movement that often occurs unexpectedly and cannot be seen, can be created by various conditions, including cold or warm weather fronts, thunderstorms and jet streams. About 58 people in the United States are injured each year by turbulence while not wearing their seatbelts, according to the FAA. <br/>
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Los Angeles International Airport is moving forward with two long anticipated terminal expansions aimed at boosting capacity ahead of the 2028 Olympics at one of the busiest airports in the U.S. The projects in question are the planned nine-gate Concourse 0, an eastern extension of Terminal 1, and an up to 18-gate Terminal 9 east of the existing Terminal 8 and attached via a bridge across Sepulveda Boulevard. The expansion projects are budgeted to cost a combined $6b, and scheduled to open by 2027. New documents, presented to the board of LAX operator Los Angeles World Airports on Thursday, show Southwest Airlines making big gains in terms of gates from the Concourse 0 project. However, United Airlines, which has long pushed for control of Terminal 9, went unmentioned in the latest description of the new facility. Progress on the LAX expansions come as air travel has surged back from the pandemic. US airlines have carried more travelers than they did in 2019 on several holiday weekends since Labor Day in September. However, average traffic numbers have hovered at around 95% of pre-pandemic levels for months, in part due to airlines flying fewer seats than they did three years ago. US passenger numbers were down 9% compared to 2019 during the week ending December 4, the latest Airlines for America data show.<br/>
Norway's environment ministry said on Friday it was demanding a payment of 400m Norwegian crowns ($40.7m) from budget airline Norwegian Air over unpaid 2020 fees for climate quotas. The company, which was under reconstruction at the time, said it would seek legal clarification on the matter.<br/>
The first aircraft to fly across the Atlantic powered only by sustainable aviation fuel will take off next year, a milestone the industry hopes will encourage greater investment in the new technology. The use of the fuel would mean that the Virgin Atlantic Boeing 787 test flight between Heathrow, London, and John F Kennedy airport, New York, would be the first transatlantic flight to achieve net zero emissions, the UK government said. Sustainable aviation fuels, or SAF, are not fossil fuel based and are largely made from forestry or agricultural waste. Use of these fuels can reduce carbon emissions by about 70%. For Virgin’s flight to achieve “net zero” status, the remaining 30% of the emissions would be offset by an investment in carbon removal technology, the UK government said. Safety regulators only allow a maximum of 50% SAF blended with kerosene to be used in commercial jet engines, but the UK’s transport minister Baroness Vere said the flight would demonstrate that it was safe to fully power a passenger aircraft with the new fuels. Aviation is relying almost entirely on SAFs to cut its carbon emissions to net zero by 2050, given that other cleaner technology such as electric or hydrogen powered aircraft are still unproven at scale. The fuels are significantly more expensive than traditional kerosene, however, and are still only produced in tiny amounts. The industry estimates that about 450b litres a year of SAF will be needed by 2050. Annual SAF production in 2021 was only 100m litres. The UK put a symbolic GBP1m towards supporting the Virgin flight, and has pledged GBP165m to accelerate the commercialisation of SAF plants. It has also set a mandate that 10% of jet fuel comes from sustainable sources by 2030, to help stimulate demand.<br/>
Budget carrier Wizz Air has “committed” to the UK’s aviation regulator to clear backlogs of outstanding passenger claims and payments after criticism of the high volume of alternative dispute resolution (ADR) complaints it incurred. The Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) says its latest quarterly data shows Wizz Air ranked “as clearly the worst airline” for complaints escalated to either ADR schemes or the regulator’s in-house complaints team in the third quarter of 2022. Wizz accrued 811 complaints per million passengers, with almost all other airlines having less than half as many, and many significantly less, according to the CAA. CAA head of consumer policy and enforcement Anna Bowles, says: ”The volume of complaints and claims received by ADR in respect of Wizz Air is far higher than those seen for other airlines. This, alongside the delays in processing and paying claims and the large number of County Court Judgements made against Wizz Air, has raised significant concerns for the CAA. “We have made it clear to Wizz Air that its behaviour is unacceptable and that we expect overdue complaints and claims to be resolved in advance of Christmas.” The CAA says Wizz Air has acknowledged and expressed regret over these problems and has committed to clear the backlogs of claims and outstanding ADR payments by Christmas. Wizz Air is also working to identify and conclude all outstanding County Court Judgements which have found against Wizz. <br/>
Israeli flag-carrier El Al has formally put forward an offer to purchase another Boeing 787-9, an aircraft which was originally manufactured for another customer. The airline has 15 787s in its fleet and already intends to take another – a delivery deferred during the pandemic – to complete its original order for 16 of the type. But El Al recently indicated that it would consider additional aircraft in order to address capacity needs. It has submitted an offer to Boeing for a 787-9, fitted with Rolls-Royce Trent 1000 engines, which was built for another operator. El Al has not disclosed the identity of this operator. But it states that the aircraft will be modified by Boeing to suit El Al’s requirement, and the carrier expects to take delivery of the twinjet in the second quarter of 2024. This would take the airline’s 787 fleet to 17, comprising 13 787-9s and four 787-8s.<br/>