Bermudair has delayed its inaugural flights to the USA due to Hurricane Franklin and now plans to launch 1 September. The new “business-class short-haul airline” had initially planned to launch flights 31 August but cancelled its first day of flights “in the wake of weather conditions associated with Hurricane Franklin”, according to Skyport, the management company overseeing Bermuda’s LF Wade International airport. Bermudair had planned to fly from Bermuda to Boston and Westchester County airport near New York City. “Guests are being rebooked accordingly,” Bermudair says. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) said on 31 August that Franklin’s maximum sustained winds were 87kt (161km/h) and that the storm was some 230nm (426km) northeast of Bermuda. Franklin “continues moving away from Bermuda” and is forecast to become “extratropical in a couple of days”, the NOAA adds, referring to a tropical storm system that meets a cold front. Bermudair’s flights to Boston and New York will initially be operated once daily, six days weekly, with plans to step up frequencies to twice daily, six days weekly on 15 September. The regional carrier also plans to launch flights from Bermuda to Florida’s Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International airport on 22 September. Bermudair will operate a pair of mid-life, 88-seat Embraer 175s that will eventually be modified to have 30 all-premium seats in 1-and-1 configurations designed to give passengers a sense of privacy, the carrier says. The cabin configuration change is anticipated to be completed by 1 November but could be held up by supply chain-related delays. One aircraft will remain in service as the other’s cabin is retrofitted. Until then, the carrier is “selling 44 of the available 88 seats on our aircraft to maintain a premium, spacious experience”, it says. <br/>
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Scandinavian long-haul low-cost operator Norse Atlantic Airways is expecting to turn in its first quarterly profit over the summer months, having achieved full production of its fleet. Norse Atlantic generated an operating loss of $88.7m for the first half including a $26.2m loss for Q2. But it points out that the company was still in its start-up phase, and only began to increase production in late May. The airline says it will be “fully operational” over the second half of the year, with 15 Boeing 787s – of which 10 will be flying directly for the carrier, with the other five subleased. Revenues for the first half reached nearly $140m with over $100m achieved in Q2. CE Bjorn Tore Larsen says June marked the first month in which the carrier generated “bottom-line profits”. He expects the three months to 30 September to be the first profitable quarter for Norse. “The move to profitability is driven primarily by having all 15 aircraft generating revenue for the first time,” he says. “Norse will be the first truly low-cost profitable long-haul airline.” Over the second quarter the airline’s load factors improved from 67% in April to 82% in June, and this trend continued with 85% achieved in July.<br/>
An effort to revive UK leisure carrier Monarch Airlines has stalled, barely two weeks since its relaunch was announced. A statement published on 31 August says the business’s board has been “forced to put the brakes on” the relaunch process, citing “exhausted” start-up funding, which has been drawn down “far more rapidly than anticipated”. “At the current stage there is no practical option to move forward in the immediate future,” the statement continues, adding that the business is attempting to find “alternative routes, such as the partial divestment of share capital”. It was only in mid-August that a bid to revive the brand was announced, following the appointment of Daniel Ellingham as the sole director, effectively the board chair, of both Monarch Airlines and sister company Monarch Holidays. He outlined plans to have the airline operational by mid-2024 using a small fleet of Airbus A320-family jets. The stalling of the launch plan comes just days after the revived business unveiled new branding and a livery for its aircraft. Monarch Airlines collapsed in 2017, ending its long history of serving leisure markets from the UK. It spent the final two years of its existence focused on scheduled services, having shifted away from its historical charter market model. <br/>