More than 1,000 WestJet pilots across Canada are preparing for the picket lines this month as a union claims the employees have been overworked and underpaid, while the airline argues they're being fairly compensated. The potential strike has thousands of travellers on edge amid what has already been a year of delays and flight cancellations from several Canadian airlines, including WestJet. Complaints to the Canadian Transportation Agency have sky-rocketed recently, with more than 42,000 filed in the last year, nearly 2,000 of which involved WestJet in December alone. Many of the complaints came after passengers were denied compensation for cancelled flights due to a major snowstorm. With the threat of a strike looming, president of the non-profit Air Passenger Rights organization Gabor Lukacs says the need for improved passenger protection rules has increased. He says a labour dispute should be considered a situation within the airline's control, prompting questions about the strike’s impact and whether passengers will be compensated in the event of cancellations and delays. "Ultimately, this is really troubling. It's a wake-up call for Canadians that our system of passenger protection is inadequate," Lukacs told CTVNews.ca in a phone interview on Tuesday. On Monday, the union representing WestJet pilots, Air Line Pilots Association (ALPA), said in a news release that employees in Calgary, Vancouver and Toronto are calling for a pay increase and noting the airline’s high turnover rate. The union says WestJet has been losing 30 pilots per month and on average, and that a pilot will seek different employment every 18 hours. “It is well known that WestJet currently has a pilot attraction and retention problem. Those of us here today are fighting to change that,” ALPA president Capt. Jason Ambrosi said in a news release. “Our goal is to secure a contract that will help make this airline a career destination for pilots once again.”<br/>
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Ryanair, the European low-cost airline, said on Tuesday that it had agreed to buy 150 737 Max 10 airplanes, its largest-ever Boeing order. The deal includes an option that would allow the company to buy another 150 jets. At list prices, 150 planes would sell for more than $20b, though Boeing and other manufacturers typically agree to deep discounts for such large orders. Ryanair plans to equip the plane, the largest Max model, with 228 seats, just shy of its maximum capacity. The jets are expected to replace older, smaller and less efficient Boeing planes and be delivered between 2027 and 2033. Negotiations had previously fallen apart over a disagreement on price, but Ryanair’s CE, Michael O’Leary, said that he was willing to pay more after taking into account the benefits of the new plane. “If you look at the fuel performance of this aircraft, we’ll be carrying 21% more passengers but burning 20% less fuel,” he said in an interview on Tuesday. “So we have a huge revenue upside, a huge cost upside.” O’Leary said that the most recent round of talks began with a meeting in January between him and Boeing’s CE, Dave Calhoun. “We kind of agreed the outline terms of the deal in about an hour in Dublin,” O’Leary said. “Once we both decided we want to get this done, it moved pretty quickly — much faster, I think, than our previous aircraft orders.” By the time the planes are delivered, Ryanair expects to fly about 300m passengers annually, more than double the number it flew before the pandemic. In the fiscal year that ended in March 2022, the airline flew 97m passengers.<br/>
US regional carrier Mesa Airlines reported a loss of $35.1m during its fiscal second quarter of 2023, as the airline worked to cut ties with longtime partner American Airlines in favour of a new deal with United Airlines. Mesa lost $42.8m during the same three months ending 31 March of last year. The Phoenix-based carrier said during its 9 May quarterly earnings call that revenue was $121.8m, down slightly from $123.2m last year. The decreased revenue was due to “deferred revenue and lower block hours”, the airline says. The carrier flew nearly 27% fewer block-hours compared with its Q2 2022. “This is obviously a tough quarter,” says CE Jonathan Ornstein. ”We have a ways to go. United has been extremely supportive in terms of helping us through this.” Last year, Ornstein said that Mesa has been losing $5m a month operating for American Airlines, which penalised its regional partner for not flying enough block hours, and also poached Mesa’s pilots. Mesa severed its contract with the Fort Worth-based carrier in December and then finalised a five-year capacity purchase agreement with United shortly afterwards. Previously, the regional carrier had operated on behalf of American and United as American Eagle and United Express, respectively. Mesa began transitioning its Bombardier CRJ-900s to United in March and stopped operating for American Airlines on 3 April. The fleet transition has been “a major project for the company”, says Michael Lotz, the company’s president and CFO. He is assuming expanded duties following the recent retirement of COO Brad Rich. “United has never operated the CRJ-900 in their regional fleet,” Lotz says. ”So everything from seat maps to jetway staging, ground handling procedures and fuelling are all new to the United operation.” To date, 24 CRJ-900s have been transitioned to United. The total fleet contracted to fly for United will include 80 large regional jets – a mix of Embraer 175s and CRJ-900s, Lotz says. The carrier will also continue operating four Boeing 737s on behalf of DHL. <br/>
Ten aviation unions have called on the US government to prevent SkyWest Airlines’ new charter unit, SkyWest Charter, from gaining Department of Transportation (DOT) approval. In a joint letter on 5 May, the group of unions, which includes Air Line Pilots, International (ALPA), Allied Pilots Association (APA), National Air Traffic Controllers Association (NATCA), Association of Flight Attendants-CWA (AFA), Transport Workers Union of America, and others, say that the SkyWest Charter model is intended to “skirt safety and security regulations”. The letter is addressed to the US Department of Labor, the Federal Aviation Administration, the Department of Transportation (DOT) and the Transportation Security Administration (TSA). “We write to express concern that a previously rare and limited business model for air service, once confined to private jet charters, is expanding so rapidly that it threatens to take over a large part of the air services in the United States,” the letter reads. “Approval of [Skywest’s] application will open the floodgates in aviation to compete in the same arena.” The unions say that Skywest Charter plans to “link small communities to the national airline network under a lesser standard of safety”. While SkyWest Airlines itself is a regular commercial operator, operating under standard regulations, SkyWest Charter is poised to operate under so-called Part 135 rules, which allow carriers some leeway that commercial airlines do not have. For example, Part 135 operators can employ pilots with less than the standard 1,500h minimum total aviation experience time, and allows pilots over the usually-mandatory retirement age of 65 to continue flying. SkyWest contracts with major US carriers Alaska Airlines, American Airlines, Delta Air Lines and United Airlines, operating a fleet of more than 500 regional jets. Its network connects secondary cities to these airlines major hubs across the country, and also serves numerous Essential Air Service (EAS) routes.<br/>
About 1,500 passengers at Copenhagen Airport experienced delays in Sunday evening the insufficient number of air traffic controllers hampered the regular procedures at the hub. According to local aviation news, several flights were subject to 45-minute delays on Sunday evening, while airport representatives remained optimistic that delays wouldn’t be as long as they were on the previous days, SchengenVisaInfo.com reports. “A great deal of uncertainty, as every morning we know what we have to do in relation to the operations at Copenhagen Airport. We had a few dreadful days in the past weeks, but today (Sunday) will probably be better than expected, which is positive,” Copenhagen Airport traffic manager Kristoffer Plenge-Brandt said. The shortage of air traffic controllers occurred after Naviair was forced to cut off 45 out of 300 of its air traffic controllers during the COVID-19 pandemic, and since then, air traffic has bounced faster than expected, leaving the executives unable to meet the demand. The solution to this problem was calling in air traffic controllers to work extra shifts – leading to major conflict.<br/>
Nigerian startup Rano Air (RAN, Kano) has launched with inaugural flights between Kano, Abuja and Lagos on May 7 using a 50-seater EMB-145LR, ADS-B data reveals. The 21-year-old 5N-BZU (msn 145562) is one of the five in-house Embraer jets of the type in the Rano Air fleet, according to the ch-aviation fleets advanced module. The airline will operate domestic services from Abuja to Lagos, Kano, Sokoto, and Maiduguri, according to its website. On May 8, it operated its maiden flight between Abuja and Maiduguri. It will also conduct direct services between Maiduguri and Kano, it said on its social media platforms. Rano Air is owned by oil mogul Auwalu Abdullahi Rano, known as AA Rano. The carrier received its air operator’s certificate (AOC) from the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority on April 14, 2023. Its certification process took about two-and-a-half years as the Covid-19 pandemic had delayed the procurement of aircraft by about a year.<br/>
Middle Eastern carrier Oman Air has equipped its training centre with a Boeing 737 Max 8 simulator. The airline says the system has been acquired from specialist CAE, and installed in the flight-training centre at Muscat. Oman Air has 13 Max 8s in its fleet of 45 aircraft. “The [Max 8] is a mainstay of our fleet, and the new simulator will enable us to optimise our operational efficiency and ensure significant cost savings,” says COO Capt Nasser Al Salmi. He says the training upgrade is an “important milestone” in the carrier’s growth, supporting its aims to enhance capacity and expand its network. Oman Air has been pursuing an ‘Omanisation’ programme to attract nationals of the sultanate to the carrier, and says this has reached a level of 81% for its pilots. According to the airline’s Q1 performance results, Oman Air generated 88% higher revenues in the three months to 31 March, compared with 2022, although it has not given specific figures. The airline also claims full-year net losses have been reducing since 2020 and are forecast to continue falling this year.<br/>
An Indian tribunal will decide on Wednesday on Go Airlines (India) Ltd's bankruptcy request, a notice on the tribunal's website showed, as leasing companies step up pressure to repossess planes following missed rental payments. The low-cost carrier filed for bankruptcy protection last week, blaming "faulty" Pratt & Whitney (P&W) engines for the grounding of about half its 54 Airbus A320neos. P&W, part of Raytheon Technologies, has called the airline's claims "astounding" and without evidence. Widely known as Go First, the Indian carrier has been flying for nearly two decades. If it collapses it would follow Jet Airways which went under in 2019. Go First has argued bankruptcy proceedings are critical to reviving the airline, which it says has suffered as it did not get spare engines from P&W in recent months. The airline leases its fleet of planes and leasing companies have stepped up pressure on Go First by filing requests with Indian aviation authorities to allow them to repossess 36 of Go First's 54 Airbus A320neo planes because the airline has not met rental payments. A bankruptcy protection for Go First could hurt lessors efforts as it would supersede and stall the repossession requests, according to aviation lawyers in India. The Indian government has said it is not inclined to save the airline, which is owned by India's Wadia Group. <br/>
An Indian government bailout of cash-strapped Go Airlines (India) Ltd was unlikely unless something could be done about the supply of engines to the airline, which sought bankruptcy protection last week, a minister has said. The low-cost carrier, widely known as Go First and which until recently was India’s fourth-largest airline by passengers flown, filed for bankruptcy protection, blaming “faulty” Pratt & Whitney engines for the grounding of about half its 54 Airbus A320neos. Deputy Aviation Minister V.K. Singh said the government has offered help to US-based Pratt & Whitney. “The problem with Go Air is that their flights are run on engines of Pratt & Whitney which is facing management issues since after COVID-19 ... So (engine) manufacturing is not happening at the pace that it should have,” Singh told news agency ANI on Monday. “What can be done about a bailout? Where will Pratt & Whitney get (engines)? Bailout can only happen when something can be done about this,” Singh said in response to a question about the possibility of a government bailout. Pratt & Whitney, part of Raytheon Technologies, did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the minister’s remarks outside of business hours. It has previously told an arbitrator that the airline’s claim of defective engines causing its demise was “astounding” and without evidence. Go First, which has been flying for nearly two decades, is the first major Indian airline to collapse since 2019, when Jet Airways went under. The loss-making airline’s fate underscores the fierce competition in a sector dominated by IndiGo and the recent merger of Air India and Vistara under the Tata conglomerate, even though India’s growing aviation industry has bounced back after the coronavirus pandemic and hit record passenger levels.<br/>
Jin Air, the budget carrier unit of Korean Air, said Tuesday it shifted to a net profit in the first quarter from a year earlier on improved travel demand amid eased COVID-19 virus curbs. Jin Air swung to a net profit of 60b won ($45m) in the three months ended in March from a net loss of 31b won during the same period of last year, the company said. Resumed flights on existing international routes to Southeast Asia and Japan, and new routes to Okinawa, Sapporo and Nha Trang helped the company make a turnaround in the first quarter, it said. The low-cost carrier also shifted to an operating profit of 84.9b won in the March quarter from an operating loss of 46.4b won a year ago. Sales more than quintupled to 352.5b won from 67.5b won. The company said it will focus on further diversifying routes and securing its workforce amid a global economic slowdown in the coming quarters.<br/>
Jeju Air, South Korea's biggest budget carrier, said Tuesday it shifted to a net profit in the first quarter from a year earlier on recovering travel demand amid eased COVID-19 curbs. In the three months ended in March, Jeju Air swung to a net profit of 48.19b won ($36m) from a net loss of 64.91b won during the same period last year, the company said. "Increased flights to Southeast Asian countries helped offset lackluster travel demand to China, while diversified routes and expanded cargo deals buoyed the bottom line," it said. Jeju Air also shifted to a record quarterly high operating profit of 70.73b won in the first quarter from an operating loss of 77.8b won a year ago. The operating profit margin was at a record 16.8%. Sales more than quintupled to another record quarterly high of 422.29b won from 80.79b won during the cited period. Jeju Air operated the same fleet of 37 B787-800 aircraft in the first quarter, down from 40 B787-800s a year earlier.<br/>
Philippine Airlines is close to a deal to order 10 Airbus A350-1000 wide-body jets in the latest sign of a recovery in wide-body jet markets, industry sources said on Tuesday. Both companies declined to comment. An airline source, speaking on condition of anonymity, said: “We are in talks with aircraft manufacturers to order new long-range aircraft, but not yet in a position to announce any specific type.” <br/>