general

Electronic warfare in the Middle East and Ukraine is affecting air travel far from the battlefields, unnerving pilots and exposing an unintended consequence of a tactic that experts say will become more common. Planes are losing satellite signals, flights have been diverted and pilots have received false location reports or inaccurate warnings that they were flying close to terrain, according to European Union safety regulators and an internal airline memo viewed by The New York Times. The Federal Aviation Administration has also warned pilots about GPS jamming in the Middle East. Radio frequency interference — intended to disrupt the satellite signals used by rockets, drones and other weaponry — spiked after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in early 2022 and has grown even more intense this fall in the Middle East. The interference can involve jamming satellite signals by drowning them out with noise, or spoofing them — mimicking real satellite signals to trick recipients with misleading information. The radio interference has so far not proven to be dangerous. But aircraft systems have proved largely unable to detect GPS spoofing and correct for it, according to Opsgroup, an organization that monitors changes and risks in the aviation industry. One Embraer jet bound for Dubai nearly veered into Iranian airspace in September before the pilots figured out the plane was chasing a false signal. “We only realized there was an issue because the autopilot started turning to the left and right, so it was obvious that something was wrong,” crew members reported to Opsgroup. Airplanes can typically fly safely without satellite signals, and large commercial aircraft have at least six alternative navigation systems, pilots said. Business jets such as Dassault Falcons, Gulfstreams and Bombardiers appear to be more susceptible to signal spoofing, the EASA said. The strain on aviation could be a harbinger of far-reaching economic and security problems as the weapons of electronic warfare proliferate. Financial markets, telecom companies, power providers, broadcasters and other industries around the world rely on satellite signals to keep accurate time. One study from Britain said that a five-day disruption of satellite signals could cost the country $6.3b.<br/>

Despite inflation and memories of past holiday travel meltdowns, millions of people are expected to hit airports and highways in record numbers over the Thanksgiving break. The busiest days to fly will be Tuesday and Wednesday as well as the Sunday after Thanksgiving. The Transportation Security Administration expects to screen 2.6m passengers on Tuesday and 2.7m passengers on Wednesday. Sunday will draw the largest crowds with an estimated 2.9m passengers, which would narrowly eclipse a record set on June 30. Meanwhile, AAA forecasts that 55.4m Americans will travel at least 50 miles (80 km) from home between next Wednesday and the Sunday after Thanksgiving, with roads likely to be the most clogged on Wednesday. The weather could snarl air and road traffic. A storm system was expected to move from the southern Plains to the Northeast on Tuesday and Wednesday. Parts of Maine, Vermont and northern New Hampshire are expected to get 3 to 7 inches of snow between Tuesday night and Wednesday. U.S. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg said during a news conference Monday that the government has tried to better prepare for holiday travel by hiring more air traffic controllers, opening new air routes along the East Coast and providing grants to airports for snowplows and deicing equipment. He warned travelers to check road conditions and flight times before leaving home.<br/>

Statistics Canada says airfares have plummeted over the past year, as airlines shore up capacity even while consumers think twice about travelling in a world of higher costs. In its consumer price index (CPI) Tuesday, the agency said the price of air transportation dropped 19.4% last month compared with October 2022. The figure follows a roughly 21% year-over-year drop in September and a 20% decrease in August, after rampant post-pandemic demand last year outstripped carriers' capacity to meet it, resulting in sky-high fares. The data also showed airfares declined 4% on a monthly basis in October, when they typically rise ahead of the holiday season. The travel sector continued to roar back this year, with seat capacity among big Canadian carriers at 92% of 2019 levels, according to figures from aviation data firm Cirium. But experts say customers are now curtailing travel plans in response to strained purse strings and nearly two years of high inflation, even as airlines ramp up flight volumes and try to lure Canadians back on board with lower prices. TD Cowen analyst Helane Becker said there's “too much capacity” in some markets, including sun destinations and major routes between big cities. Though bookings are up for American Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year's, they're worse than expected for off-peak periods as consumers scale back. Observers have cited less disposable income amid increased costs on everything from rent and mortgages to food, gas and student loans. “We are in a period of a general domestic slowdown. And I think I would point directly at this whole inflationary situation,” said aviation consultant Rick Erickson, even as the overall inflation rate slowed to 3.1% last month. “Travel tends to be one of the very first elements that gets cut. It's discretionary.” Nonetheless, ticket prices last month hovered 4.6% higher than pre-COVID-19 levels.<br/>

Management at Amsterdam’s Schiphol airport should have been over the moon last week at news that the Dutch government was suspending plans for a substantial cut to flights from next summer on environmental grounds. The scheme was one of the most aggressive reductions to future growth faced by any airport in normal times; the government was proposing an 8% cut in capacity at the world’s third-busiest airport, in order to bring it into line with national laws on noise and pollution limits. But instead of celebrating with airlines, which had spent the past year challenging the plan in court, Schiphol’s interim CE Ruud Sondag worried that the victory would be shortlived. Speaking at the weekend just days before the national election, he warned that some parties were looking for far more drastic cuts. And, as local residents get “angrier and angrier…things could end up much worse for Schiphol and [we could] end up with far fewer flights”, he said. Sondag is right to be worried, and not just because of the ire of local residents. Dutch efforts to push ahead with the plan over the past year in the face of legal challenges have become a proxy for the debate over whether global aviation should continue to enjoy unfettered growth, even as its chances of achieving net zero emissions by 2050 recede. It may even herald a succession of trade rows as international aviation agreements collide with Europe’s environmental ambitions and national laws. The Netherlands plan was ill-advised from the start, seeking to fast-forward established procedures on noise reduction by introducing an “experimental law” alongside the usual EU oversight. To be fair, the government was under pressure from regulators, as for many years, Schiphol violated rules on noise and nitrogen levels. But in attempting to accelerate the procedures the Dutch opened the door to retaliation, from the US in particular.<br/>

Iceland watches on helplessly as rescue workers escorting locals back to the evacuated fishing town of Grindavik say it is “now a waiting game” before an eruption. Gripped viewers are glued to main TV News channel RUV.is as it plays a live stream of the glowing crater with modern Icelandic electronic music underneath as the countdown continued on Tuesday. It comes as 1,200 households scramble to grab as many “heartfelt” objects as they can under observation from rescue teams from the town above the volatile Reykjanes Peninsula. The police checkpoint lies 25km away from the town but only 12km from cracks starting to form across the roads and stretching far into the mountains. On Tuesday, families waved as they were allowed out with cars full of toys, photographs and one vehicle towing a jetski amid intense hail storms and heavy winds hampering accurate seismic readings. Britons were still boarding flights to Rejkavic with a nearly full plane on Monday morning unperturbed by reports of the possible eruption. Flights with airlines including Icelandair, Easyjet, Wizz Air and Transavia France have been cancelled due to the weather on Tuesday.<br/>

Although travel flows into China for Q3 were just 45% of the same period in pre-pandemic 2019, retailers should see more tourism revenue by next year as flights increase, Beijing-based investment bank China International Capital Corporation (CICC) said on Monday. “The number of inbound tourists and consumption has gradually recovered in 2023,” the partially state-owned firm said via WeChat. CICC forecasts an “improvement of economic activities” and a “resumption of international flights” next year, leading to a possible 2024 domestic retail sales growth of 0.2 percentage points and one to two percentage points more in exports. International tourism revenue for the July-September quarter in 2023 had regained about 59% of revenue for the same period in 2019, the firm said. “The slow recovery of inbound tourists and consumption is partly related to the slow recovery of the economy, and may also be related to the number of international flights,” the bank said. Visa obstacles and – for some businesspeople – fears of legal issues in China have held travel in check this year despite the reopening of borders in January after three years of strict anti-pandemic controls.<br/>An absence of international visitors has slowed the recovery of the multi-trillion yuan service industry linked to domestic travel.<br/>

A direct passenger flight route linking southwest China's Chongqing Municipality and the Nepali capital Kathmandu will resume on Dec. 12, according to the Chongqing Jiangbei International Airport. Operated by Himalaya Airlines, the air service will run twice a week using an Airbus A320 aircraft every Tuesday and Saturday. The inbound flight will leave Kathmandu at 9:25 a.m. local time and arrive in Chongqing at 3:15 p.m. Beijing Time. The outbound flight will depart Chongqing at 4:25 p.m. and arrive in Kathmandu at 6:35 p.m. local time. It will be the 11th international route to be resumed at the Chongqing Jiangbei International Airport this year. Since the beginning of 2023, the airport has resumed 10 international routes to destinations including London, Paris, Moscow and Sydney. It is expected that by the end of this year, the airport will offer 19 international routes, amounting to about 90 flights per week.<br/>

Many airlines are requesting a redistribution of slots as they expand flights into Thailand, according to a source at the Civil Aviation Authority of Thailand (CAAT). The source said the request was put to CAAT executives by various airlines at the 153rd Slot Conference held from Nov 14-17 in Dubai. The meeting, organised twice a year by the International Air Transport Association (IATA), provided an opportunity for airlines to negotiate and obtain the slots that will give them the best possible schedule to offer their customers at coordinated airports. The new slots for both passenger planes and cargo flights will kick off during the summer schedule next year. The flights will operate into and out of the country's main airports, namely, Suvarnabhumi, Don Mueang, Phuket and Chiang Mai. The conference was informed of Phuket airport's expansion in handling capacity, which has increased to 25 flights an hour. The growth is to accommodate efforts to promote tourism. Story has more.<br/>

Companies including Airbus, Deutsche Telekom AG and Orange have written to European Union officials to support a plan that would make it harder for US cloud providers to earn the highest cybersecurity certification. Nearly 20 companies said customers increasingly want their data stored in Europe, and want security standards to be harmonized across the bloc, according to a letter that was seen by Bloomberg. Getting the voluntary certification can be useful for landing contracts with large local customers and governments. ENISA, the EU’s cybersecurity regulator, has been working on plans for stricter rules that would prevent foreign governments from interfering with EU data. In practice, this would mean that some of the largest providers, including Amazon.com Inc., Microsoft Corp. and Alphabet Inc., would have to ensure the US government can’t access European cloud data in order to qualify for the label. The companies also argued against exempting NATO members or countries with so-called data adequacy agreements from the requirements and said it’s “aimed at improving the functioning of the EU internal market” and goes beyond NATO’s remit. <br/>

Jet fuel prices are the latest source of pressure for Petroleo Brasileiro as dissatisfaction with the Brazilian oil producer’s pricing strategy mount. Silvio Costa Filho, minister of Ports and Airports, and Tourism Minister Celso Sabino are particularly concerned about jet fuel costs, which have boosted air ticket prices. Airlines have been in the government’s sights due to increasing fares, but the companies allege they ultimately depend on fuel costs — which are in the hands of Petrobras. “We are working to combat abusive air ticket prices,” said Costa Filho, in a phone interview on Tuesday. “Aviation kerosene accounts for about 40% of the cost of flight in Brazil, while in the world, it’s about 20%.” The two ministers are joining a choir for Petrobras to align its strategy with government’s efforts to fight inflation and boost Brazil’s economy, some of President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva’s key election pledges. Dissatisfaction with the company’s CEO Jean Paul Prates is growing within the government, according to people familiar with the situation. Costa Filho and Sabino had a meeting with Mines and Energy Minister Alexandre Silveira on Monday to discuss jet fuel prices, following the lack of response from Petrobras to the ministers’ concerns, Costa Filho said. In October, airfares rose nearly 24% from previous month likely due to rising fuel costs and higher pricing related to Christmas holidays. Overall, more expensive transportation was the biggest driver of monthly inflation, according to Brazil’s statistics agency. Silveira has been vocal in calling for Petrobras to cut diesel and gasoline prices. During the weekend, Petrobras’ CEO rejected the minister’s plea, saying the oil producer will continue with its current price policy, making adjustments only when technical guidelines suggest the need for them. Lula scheduled for Tuesday afternoon a meeting with Prates and several administration officials, including the finance minister, mines and energy minister and chief of staff to discuss Petrobras’s pricing and investment strategy. <br/>