President Joe Biden said his administration will hold airlines accountable after nationwide flight cancellations following an extreme winter storm this past week. “Thousands of flights nationwide have been canceled around the holidays. Our Administration is working to ensure airlines are held accountable,” Biden wrote in a tweet on Tuesday. “If you’ve been affected by cancellations, go to @USDOT’s dashboard to see if you’re entitled to compensation.” Thousands of flights were canceled this week, with many being from Southwest Airlines. About 4,000 domestic US flights were canceled Monday, according to the tracking website FlightAware, which tracks flight status in real time. More than 2,900 Southwest flights were canceled Monday, more than 2,500 flights were canceled Tuesday, and nearly 2,500 are canceled for Wednesday, according to FlightAware. The Department of Transportation said Tuesday that it would look into the flight cancellations that left thousands stranded at airports. "USDOT is concerned by Southwest’s unacceptable rate of cancellations and delays & reports of lack of prompt customer service," the department wrote in a tweet. "The Department will examine whether cancellations were controllable and if Southwest is complying with its customer service plan." A Senate committee also said that it will investigate the causes of the cancellations at Southwest Airlines. “The Committee will be looking into the causes of these disruptions and its impact to consumers,” Sen. Maria Cantwell, D-Wash., chair of the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation said. “Many airlines fail to adequately communicate with consumers during flight cancellations. Consumers deserve strong protections, including an updated consumer refund rule,” Cantwell added.<br/>
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US airline passengers are facing continued disruption following a deadly blizzard that swept across the country over the Christmas period, with thousands of flights still being cancelled on Tuesday. According to the flight tracking site FlightAware, more than 3,000 US flights had been cancelled by Tuesday evening, and over 5,000 had been delayed. The majority of axed flights were operated by Southwest Airlines, which accounted for 64% of Tuesday’s cancellations, according to FlightAware. Southwest said it would operate just one-third of its flight schedule “for the next several days” due to “continuing challenges impacting our customers and employees in a significant way that is unacceptable”. On Monday, the US Department of Transportation wrote on Twitter: “USDOT is concerned by Southwest’s unacceptable rate of cancellations and delays & reports of lack of prompt customer service.” The travel chaos comes in the aftermath of a blizzard that left more than two dozen people dead and thousands without power, in what local officials described as the area’s deadliest snowstorm in decades. States across the US were struck by the storm, with the hardest-hit area being New York’s Erie County, which includes the city of Buffalo, the state’s second-largest city. Speaking on Monday, New York governor Kathy Hochul said visiting the area was like “going to a war zone”. The blizzard, which meteorologists have described as a “bomb cyclone”, denoting a storm that intensifies rapidly, has caused temperatures across the US to plummet to as low as minus 40C over the Christmas period. The national weather service had warned last week that more than 200mn people, or roughly 60% of the US population, were under some form of winter weather warning or advisory.<br/>
Thousands of people in Canada were still without electricity or facing travel headaches on Tuesday, days after fierce winter storms struck right before Christmas. The storms have wreaked havoc with electricity grids and travel plans for the last four days. Hundreds of Canadians have been stranded for days in Mexico after Sunwing cancelled their flights home, with many accusing the airline of "abandoning" them by not rebooking them on new flights or failing to make it clear where they will stay while they wait to leave. "A number of return flights continue to be impacted by delays due to displaced crew and aircraft, resulting from the aftermath of severe weather disruptions across Canada," the company said Tuesday. Sunwing said it's working "around the clock" to get passengers home. "We have completed two recovery flights so far this week, have planned another eight recovery flights, which are scheduled to depart up to and including Dec. 30, 2022, and are currently finalizing recovery plans for our remaining passengers in destination," the company said. For southbound flights, Sunwing announced on Monday afternoon, via Twitter, that the baggage belt at Pearson International Airport's Terminal 3 in Toronto was not working, and as a result, it couldn't guarantee that customers' checked baggage would accompany them on departing aircraft. Early Tuesday, the airport posted on Twitter that the baggage belt in question was operational again. However, due to a high volume of passengers and staffing issues, the airport is still dealing with delays in getting arriving passengers their baggage, Tori Gass, a Greater Toronto Airports Authority spokesperson, said Tuesday.<br/>
Massive numbers of infections and unaccounted fatalities following China's loosening of "zero-COVID" restrictions mean that any recovery in international travel to and from the country is likely to be gradual. China's planned ending of travel restrictions lifted financial markets in the region Tuesday with the Shenzhen Stock Exchange Composite Index rising more than 1% in midday trading. Chinese online travel platforms, including Trip.com and Qunar, reported a sharp surge in airfare searches with Hong Kong, Japan and South Korea among the popular destinations. China said Monday that inbound visitors will no longer be subject to hotel quarantine and on-arrival PCR testing requirements. The move is part of the government's sudden shift to a strategy of living with the virus, as other countries have been doing, reasoning that less-lethal omicron variants are in circulation. Health authorities have stopped recording all daily cases since Sunday, even as Chinese social media circulated video of a long line of corpses awaiting cremation at a mortuary. Highlighting the difficulties facing the travel industry, Japan on Tuesday introduced new measures on travelers from China, such as requiring them to undergo COVID testing on arrival. The Japanese government will not allow airlines to increase the number of flights to and from China. A spokesperson for All Nippon Airways told Nikkei Asia that the company is "assessing the situation," and will "carefully monitor the developments" regarding restrictions on the number of flights between Japan and China. Japan Airlines declined to comment on the matter. "The inbound market has been completely shut and as we have seen in other countries, it will take time for inbound demand to recover," said independent analyst Brendan Sobie of Sobie Aviation. China could see some 300,000 COVID-related deaths by April 1, according to an estimate by Washington-based Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation, with the figure rising to a million by the end of 2023.<br/>
China's relaxation of COVID-19 rules for international arrivals has raised hopes that its multi-billion dollar travel business will soon flourish again but countries longing for the return of Chinese tourists will likely face more of a wait. China's National Health Commission announced on Monday that inbound travellers would no longer have to go into quarantine from Jan. 8. There are no official restrictions on Chinese people going abroad but the new rule will make it much easier for them to return home. China was the world's largest outbound tourism market before COVID shut down global travel, with its overseas visitors spending $127.5b on travel in 2019. Airlines are drawing up plans to expand their services but ordinary Chinese and travel agencies suggest that a return to anything like normal will take some time. German airline Lufthansa was examining whether to change its flight schedule to China following the changes. "This will contribute to the recovery of international air traffic between Mainland China and Europe," a spokesperson said. TUI expects a positive impact on its currently limited flights to China, a spokesperson said. Duty free retailer Dufry expects the changes to have a "positive effect at the airports that the Chinese use and where we have a presence," a spokesperson said.<br/>
Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida said on Tuesday that his government will tighten restrictions on travelers entering Japan from China, in response to the rapid increase in cases following China's decision to loosen its harsh zero-COVID policy. Japan will require all travelers from China to be tested upon arrival from Friday. If a person tests positive, a seven-day quarantine will be needed at a designated facility. The government will also impose mandatory testing on travelers who have been in China in the last seven days. Currently, if a traveler to Japan has proof of having received three doses of coronavirus vaccines or a negative test within 72 hours before departure, no mandatory testing upon entry is needed. All positive test results will be subjected to genome analysis to determine if any new variants have been detected. The government will not allow airlines to increase the number of flights from and to China. "In order to avoid a sharp increase in the influx of new cases into the country, we are focusing efforts on entry inspections and airports," the prime minister told reporters. "There is a large discrepancy in infection information between the central and local governments and between the government and the private sector, making it difficult to obtain a detailed understanding of the situation." He also added, "We will do everything possible not to stop the smooth international travel."<br/>
Residents of Hong Kong reacted swiftly to news China will no longer subject inbound travelers to quarantine as of early next year, flooding the internet to search for flights to key mainland cities. Outbound searches for flights from Hong Kong to the mainland on Trip.com and Ctrip, the two sub-brands of Trip.com Group Ltd., jumped around 521% late on Monday evening versus the same time a week ago on Dec. 19. The top five destinations were Shanghai, Beijing, Hangzhou, Chengdu, and Nanjing, with search traffic up 1,039% and 718% respectively for China’s financial hub and the nation’s capital. Searches for Hangzhou, Chengdu, and Nanjing rose 662%, 399% and 411% respectively. China’s National Health Commission said on Monday that from Jan. 8, people arriving in China will only be required to obtain a negative Covid test result within 48 hours of departure and won’t have to quarantine, doing away with one of the last remaining pandemic prevention measures. “Travel from abroad to China can only go up,” Mike Arnot, an airline industry commentator and spokesman for aviation analytics company Cirium, said. “Flights to China by the world’s major airlines are down more than 92% in December compared to December 2019.” Carriers including British Airways, United and Qantas stopped flying to China entirely during the pandemic and it “will take some time to rebuild their schedules,” Arnot said. Those airlines that have restarted services to Hong Kong should benefit from higher load factors on their existing flights to the city, which is a major hub for connections to China, he added.<br/>
Low temperatures and fog in New Delhi hit air and rail movement on Tuesday morning as a cold wave gripped the Indian capital with minimum temperatures dipping as low as 5.6 degrees Celsius (42 F). With visibility of just 50 metres in some areas, Delhi Airport took to Twitter to alert passengers that flights not equipped to operate in such conditions "may get affected". Local media reported that 15 trains to Delhi were also running late because of fog. The India Meteorological Department (IMD) said in a bulletin that "dense and very dense fog" was likely to continue over some parts of the city over the next 24 hours due to light wind and high moisture levels. "Its intensity and spread (is) likely to reduce thereafter," the IMD said. The IMD also forecast cold wave conditions in some areas over the northwest states of Punjab, Haryana and Delhi during the next two days.<br/>
Aircraft lessor BOC Aviation Ltd said on Wednesday it had ordered 40 Boeing 737 MAX planes to be delivered in 2027 and 2028, in a year-end boost to the US manufacturer’s order book. The Singapore-based lessor said it also amended its existing purchase agreement with Boeing as part of the deal, resulting in it having 80 737 MAX jets on order in total, to be delivered from 2023 to 2028. Boeing’s total aircraft orders net of cancellations for the year reached 571 in the 11 months ended November, while rival Airbus SE reported 825 net orders in the same period. Both manufacturers are expected to receive large orders soon from Air India, which is negotiating a major fleet renewal and expansion under new owner Tata Group that industry sources said could involve nearly 500 aircraft.<br/>
Australian-made satellites will soon be launched on a SpaceX rocket in a move designed to close gaps in the country’s air traffic management. The project, created by Canberra-based Skykraft and backed by Airservices Australia, will see a constellation of 200 satellites launched over the next two years to improve flight safety and communication. The initiative could also have unexpected benefits, in helping to limit turbulence for travellers and ensure planes take the most efficient routes. Skykraft CE, Michael Frater, said the company developed its satellite plan over 12 months in a project that would cost “something under $200m”. As it stands, aircraft can only be monitored up to 400km away from land and within sight of a radar. Moving air traffic management into space could deliver more comprehensive coverage, particularly over oceans and in regional and rural locations. “At the moment, there are holes in the coverage over Australia,” Frater said. “By putting it in space, we can cover a much larger area from the satellite than it’s possible to cover from a ground-based system. For the first time, Airservices Australia will have full coverage for their surveillance service, they’ll know where every aircraft is in Australia.” The satellites would also be used to replace “radar and radios” used to communicate with pilots, which could eliminate long waits for approval to change course. “So if you’re flying from Sydney to Los Angeles and your aircraft hits turbulence, the pilot will now be able to get a clearance to change altitude much more quickly,” he said.<br/>