Airline passengers became so frustrated with their bags getting lost and flights being canceled last year, that they sent a near-record amount of gripes to the federal government. The number of complaints passengers sent to the US Department of Transportation, travel agents and third-party booking sites like Expedia and Priceline grew from 15,342 in 2019 to at least 60,732 in 2022, according to a report from the U.S. Public Interest Research Group. Complaints quadrupled in the past three years even though the number of flight passengers has fallen from 886m in 2019 to 799m last year, PIRG said in its report. Passengers complained about flight cancellations and delays getting ticket refunds more than any other issue, the consumer advocacy group said. About 60,000-plus complaints mark the second-highest tally since DOT started keeping tabs in 1997, Teresa Murray, a consumer watchdog for PIRG, told CBS MoneyWatch. The record is 102,550 complaints filed in 2020. Murray noted that the 2022 figure does not include complaints passengers filed in December because DOT officials haven't released that data yet. "We're expecting at least 10,000, maybe 15,000 or 20,000," she said. "I'd be a little surprised, though, but not gobsmacked, if the December number pushed us into six figures for the year." Murray also noted that the 2022 total does not include complaints that passengers may have sent directly to an airline. <br/>
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The federal government is spending more money on improvements at Dallas-Fort Worth International and other airports that officials say will increase safety by reducing the number of times that planes on the ground must taxi across active runways. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg stood before a bulldozer and mountain of dirt Thursday as he announced that DFW, the nation’s second busiest airport behind Atlanta, will get $29m more for a new “end-around taxiway.” DFW officials say that when work is completed in 2025, it will eliminate the need for planes to taxi across two of the airport’s main runways. “Every time a plane has to cross an active runway to get to where it’s going, that’s a source of risk,” Buttigieg told reporters. Buttigieg said the most serious runway incursions — when planes or ground vehicles are too close together — are happening twice a month now instead of once a month. “We want to get that to zero, and so there is also a paradigm shift of treating the close calls with the same level of seriousness that we treat actual incidents,” he said — declining to even utter the word “accidents.” Plans for the new taxiway were in the works before the recent spate of close calls between planes at airports around the country. And it won’t prevent incidents like the one in January at John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York, when an American Airlines crew took two wrong turns and crossed a runway in front of a departing Delta Air Lines jet. But Buttigieg and the FAA are eager to show the public they are responding to increasing concern about air safety. The FAA’s acting administrator, Billy Nolen, held a “safety summit” of airline-industry groups two weeks ago and called for more data about the recent close calls. Nolen followed that with an alert to pilots and everyone else in aviation — in effect, telling them to pay more attention to safety procedures.<br/>
The US FAA said on Thursday it awarded Verizon Communications' (VZ.N) business networking unit a contract worth up to $2.4b over 15 years as the agency looks to modernize its systems. Verizon will design, build and operate the FAA’s new next-generation communications platform. The telecom company said it will "build the FAA a dynamic, highly available and secure enterprise network to support all of the agency's mission critical applications across the National Airspace System." Verizon said the new infrastructure will support all of the agency's mission critical applications across the National Airspace System, which includes providing Air Traffic Management to more than 45,000 daily flights and 2.9m airline passengers traveling across 29m square miles that make up the US national airspace system. Verizon Business CEO Kyle Malady said the project would help lead the FAA through "a telecommunications infrastructure transformation that utilizes the latest advances in technology and networking solutions." He added the it would provide "dynamic services and bandwidth provisioning, to improved insight and visibility into network service configuration and operation." The FAA has said it needs to spend modernize many outdated systems. In January, the outage of a key pilot messaging database prompted a nationwide groundstop of US passenger traffic, the first since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.<br/>
Aviation stakeholders have urged the European Commission to improve its sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) incentives in light of the measures included in the US Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), which one airline CE described as a global “game-changer”. The act was signed into law in August last year and includes significant incentives and subsidies for SAF production in the USA, at a time when the global airline sector is desperate to see more – affordable – SAF on the open market. Speaking during a panel session at the Airlines for Europe (A4E) Aviation Summit on 29 March, the CE of decarbonisation solutions provider Topsoe, Roeland Baan, described the IRA as “the elephant in the room” when it comes to discussing the EU’s SAF polices. “There is absolutely no doubt that a year ago Europe was far ahead when it came to synthetic fuels, green fuels, technologies, etcetera compared to the rest of the world,” Baan says. “The IRA has changed that in one go.”His view is that because of the nascent nature of the global SAF industry, “as the money flows to the US, with it goes all the other limited resources”, including feedstocks, raw materials and knowledge covering a range of biofuels and synthetic fuels. As a consequence, while he does not doubt that the SAF sector will expand to meet global industry targets, Baan’s belief is “the development of SAF in Europe has been put back by a decade”. “It will happen but if I look at our own plans and those of our customers, with whom we were looking at building stuff in Europe, that is delayed and the focus is doing it in the US,” he says of the market dynamics since the IRA was introduced. “I’m not sure the Commission really understands what the moving parts are here,” he adds. Offering the Commission’s perspective, Filip Cornelis, director for aviation at the EU body, says that “generally speaking it is very good” to see other parts of the world pursuing sustainability objectives, but he questions the wisdom of the USA competing with Europe on SAF subsidies through the IRA measures.<br/>
Heathrow airport has said that some passengers may face longer queues to get through security during the Easter holiday period after it was unable to strike a deal with security worker unions over pay. More than 1,400 security officers in the Unite union, who work for Heathrow Airport, are going ahead with a ten-day strike beginning on Friday. Eleventh-hour talks on Thursday broke down without a resolution. It threatens disruption at the UK's largest airport at the start of the Easter school holidays. The strike involves security guards at Terminal 5, which is only used by British Airways, and those who check cargo. Unite has accused the airport of a real-terms wage cut. Heathrow said it had offered a 10% pay increase back-dated to 1 January, plus a lump sum payment (of over £1000). The airport says contingency plans will keep the airport operating. But these next few days are expected to be very busy as people get away on Easter holidays. And with staffing stretched, getting through security could take longer.<br/>
Zimbabwe has attracted 10 new airline routes and frequencies over the past two years under the International Finance Corporation (IFC) funded program, as the country intensify efforts toward the recovery of the tourism industry post-COVID-19, an official said Thursday. The new routes put to 15, the total number of foreign airlines now flying into Zimbabwe, officials said at a stakeholder meeting. Theodius Chinyanga, the permanent secretary in Zimbabwe's Ministry of Transport and Infrastructural Development, said increased air connectivity and revitalization of air transport services were critical to the recovery of Zimbabwe's tourism sector. The two-year Zimbabwe Destination Development Program (ZDDP), implemented through technical support from the IFC, a member of the World Bank Group, had helped Zimbabwe to recover and gain new air routes and frequencies over the past two years, Chinyanga said. Among the program's objectives were to recover the country's pre-pandemic route network, develop new routes and frequencies for Robert Gabriel Mugabe International Airport in Harare, the capital of Zimbabwe, and the Victoria Falls International Airport, as well as to enhance the competitiveness of Harare and Victoria Falls as air transport gateways for the southern African region. "Through this strategic approach, we have achieved some significant milestones over the past two years. Most notably, we have secured 10 routes and frequencies, including a long-haul flight into Victoria Falls from Frankfurt by Eurowings Discover," said Chinyanga. "We have also strengthened connectivity with South Africa, which is one of our main tourism source markets."<br/>
Pakistan on Thursday kicked off outsourcing of operations and land assets at three major airports to be run through a public private partnership, a finance ministry statement said, a move to generate foreign exchange reserves for its ailing economy. Islamabad has engaged the World Bank's International Finance Corporation as an advisor for the outsourcing process, the ministry said. "The outsourcing of three airports has been initiated within the scope of public-private partnership .. to engage private investor/airport operator through a competitive and transparent process to run the airports, develop appertaining land assets and enhance avenues for commercial activities and to garner full revenue potential," the ministry said.<br/>
Boeing will increase 737 MAX production rates above the current rate of 31 jets per month "very soon," the head of its commercial airplanes business said on Thursday. The company is also making progress with the new 737 MAX 7 model and is in the process of completing final submissions for FAA certification, Stan Deal told reporters. "We've got a handful - less than a handful - left to go to the FAA," he said. "We're working a few issues around those submittals. I want them to be perfect, I want the FAA to feel comfortable, and then give them the time to go review." Last week, CFO Brian West reiterated Boeing's expectation that the MAX 7 will complete certification this year, paving the way for first delivery this year as well. Boeing continues to grapple with supply chain headaches as it pushes to ramp up production of the bestselling MAX narrowbody jet as well as its widebody 787 Dreamliner. On Thursday, Deal said the situation is "getting better" but that aerospace companies are still working to train fresh hires to handle the influx of post-pandemic aircraft orders. Boeing plans to increase monthly MAX production to 50 planes per month by the end of 2026, while ramping 787 production to 10 aircraft per month during the same period. In the near term, the company also intends to extend 787 Dreamliner production from its current low rate of less than three jets to five jets per month by the end of 2023.<br/>
A private jet aviation boom shows no signs of slowing. Analysis published Thursday by environmental campaign group Greenpeace showed the number of private jet flights in Europe last year rose by a whopping 64% to reach a record high of 572,806. Private jet emissions, which have a disproportionate impact on the environment, were found to have more than doubled in Europe in 2022, exceeding the annual per capita carbon emissions of 550,000 European Union residents. More than half (55%) of the private jet flights in Europe last year were ultra-short journeys below 750 km, Greenpeace said, noting that these were trips that could have been taken by train or ferry instead. It comes at a time when Europe is in the grip of a severe winter drought and shortly after the region’s driest summer in at least 500 years. Scientists warned in late January that a lack of groundwater across the continent meant the water situation was now “very precarious.” “The alarming growth of private jet flights is entirely at odds with all the climate science that tells us to bring down CO2 emissions immediately in order to avert total disaster,” said Klara Maria Schenk, transport campaigner for Greenpeace’s Mobility for All campaign. “Reducing oil-powered transport immediately is a no-brainer, starting with a ban on energy-wasting ultra-polluting private jets that provide no value for people, yet burden them with harmful emissions, toxic microparticles and noise, harming our climate, environment and health,” Schenk said.<br/>
Shell has decided not to go ahead with two projects it was studying to produce biofuels and base oils in Singapore, a company spokesperson said on Thursday. "We can confirm that we are stopping the exploration of two projects – a biofuels unit and a Group II base oil plant in Singapore," the company told Reuters in an emailed statement. "We will continue supplying base oil and lubricants, as well as biofuels, to our customers in Singapore and the region." Shell announced in late 2021 that it was studying a 550,000 tonnes per year project (tpy) at Singapore's Bukom Island to produce sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) to supply major Asian hubs such as Hong Kong International Airport and Singapore's Changi. The company had planned to make a final investment decision for the project, which would have the flexibility to produce renewable diesel and bionaphtha feedstock for petrochemicals, by early 2023. Unlike Europe and the United States, there is no mandate for airlines to use SAF in Asia, an industry source said, adding that customers were not willing to accept higher costs for the fuel. Shell is building a 820,000 tpy biofuels plant in Rotterdam, the Netherlands, and had targeted to make about 2m tpy of SAF by 2025.<br/>