general

Boeing has told airlines to check the cockpit seats of its 787 Dreamliner plane, the company said on Friday, after a Latam Airlines plane suddenly plunged on a flight to Auckland, New Zealand, on Monday, injuring passengers. The drop in altitude appears to have been caused when a flight attendant hit a switch on a seat that sent a pilot into the plane’s controls, The Wall Street Journal reported this week, citing unnamed U.S. industry officials. Aviation regulators are investigating the incident and have not released any findings. Boeing said it had reminded airlines of a safety memo from 2017 that instructed them on how to inspect and maintain switches on flight deck seats. “The investigation of Flight LA800 is ongoing and we defer to the investigation authorities on any potential findings,” the company said. “We are recommending operators perform an inspection at the next maintenance opportunity,” it added. The Latam plane’s harrowing drop was documented in video footage captured by passengers. The plane fell abruptly and then quickly recovered, one passenger, Brian Jokat, said, likening it to “coming over the top of a roller coaster and heading down.” The drop left at least one passenger in critical condition; 11 other people were also transported to hospitals in Auckland after the plane landed there. All told, dozens of passengers suffered injuries, most of them minor. Regulators, airlines and travelers have been intensely focused on the quality and safety of Boeing planes since a panel sheared off an Alaska Airlines 737 Max 9 plane on Jan. 5, forcing an emergency landing. In 2018 and 2019, two 737 Max 8 planes crashed in Indonesia and Ethiopia, killing nearly 350 people. In a message to 787 jet operators that was sent late Thursday, Boeing said it was advising of a “known condition related to a loose/detached rocker switch cap” located on the seat back of the captain’s and first officer’s seats but did not say whether the switch covers had played a role in the incident on the Latam plane. “Closing the spring-loaded seat back switch guard onto a loose/detached rocker switch cap can potentially jam the rocker switch, resulting in unintended seat movement,” Boeing said.<br/>

The Justice Department is sending subpoenas and using a recently convened grand jury in Seattle as it widens a criminal investigation into the door plug that blew off a Boeing 737 Max 9 jetliner in January, a person familiar with the matter said on Friday. The detachment of the panel from the fuselage of an Alaska Airlines flight shortly after takeoff terrified passengers at 16,000 feet and required an emergency landing back at Portland International Airport in Oregon. A preliminary report by the NTSB said four bolts meant to secure the door plug in place were missing before the panel blew off. This month, it was reported that the Justice Department had opened a criminal investigation of Boeing, which had reinstalled the door plug during maintenance in Renton, Wash., before delivering the plane to Alaska Airlines in October. The subpoenas and use of the grand jury were reported earlier Friday by Bloomberg. The midair incident on Jan. 5 led the Federal Aviation Administration to ground more than 170 Max 9 planes, which were then inspected for construction flaws. Boeing said it agreed with the F.A.A.’s decision and pledged to cooperate. The company has said safety is its top priority. The Max 9s have since restarted flights, but questions remain about the malfunction. A grand jury could be asked to decide whether a criminal prosecution is warranted. A likely focus would be repairs to the Alaska Airlines plane’s rivets, which are often used to join and secure parts on planes, by workers at the Boeing plant in Renton. The episode has brought a fresh round of scrutiny to Boeing. The company made grim headlines in 2018 and 2019 when two crashes of another 737 model, the Max 8, killed 346 people. Max 8 jets were grounded for almost two years. The company subsequently spent more than $2.5b to settle a criminal charge that Boeing had defrauded the FAA, and the company’s CE, Dennis Muilenburg, was fired. Under his replacement, Dave Calhoun, Boeing’s stock has risen, though the company has struggled to meet airlines’ demands. <br/>

The White House on Friday said federal regulators are doing everything they can to assuage Americans’ anxieties about flying after notable recent mishaps on Boeing planes. But asked directly whether President Joe Biden thinks it’s safe to fly, press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre sidestepped. “I think what he – I think what Americans should know is that (the FAA) is doing everything that it can to make sure that Americans feel safe,” Jean-Pierre told reporters during a press briefing Friday. She added that the FAA is taking actions “to make sure that there is increased safety oversight of Boeing and that’s what the American people should feel reassured by.” Her comments came after several scary incidents involving planes manufactured by Boeing, including the terrifying plunge earlier this week involving a Latam Airlines Boeing 787 Dreamliner flight from Australia to New Zealand. The Wall Street Journal reported on Friday that a flight attendant may have inadvertently hit a switch on the pilot’s seat while serving a meal, pushing the pilot into controls that altered the plane’s flight, injuring dozens of passengers. CNN has yet to be able to confirm the Journal’s report. “The investigation of Flight LA800 is ongoing and we defer to the investigation authorities on any potential findings,” Boeing said in a statement. “We have taken the precautionary measure of reminding 787 operators of a service bulletin issued in 2017 which included instructions for inspecting and maintaining switches on flight deck seats.”<br/>

Boeing’s disastrous start to 2024 is spilling over to airlines and their passengers as production delays exacerbate a shortage of single-aisle jets. United Airlines, Southwest and Ryanair are among the companies scrambling to respond to reduced deliveries from Boeing as the planemaker focuses on fixing quality lapses exposed by the Jan. 5 accident on an Alaska Airlines flight. With the busy summer travel season in view, carriers say they’re trimming schedules and looking for alternatives to 737s they’ve already ordered, while also contending with issues afflicting narrowbodies from Airbus. Even Boeing seems uncertain when the planes will be ready as an army of US inspectors sift through its factories, meaning the company can’t make any firm predictions when things might return to normal. “All they’re saying is as you’d expect: ‘We are working as hard as we can. We are sorry for your disruption. We’re doing the best we can,’” said John Plueger, CEO of aircraft leasing company Air Lease Corp. “‘As soon as we have certainty, we will advise you.’ They are saying that.” Airbus, Boeing’s main competitor, is largely sold out through the end of this decade, so there isn’t an obvious place for airlines to turn. Like Boeing, the European planemaker has been struggling to raise production back to pre-pandemic rates. A separate engine-wear issue has grounded hundreds of Airbus planes, further denting aircraft availability at a time when demand from airlines is particularly hot. <br/>

Oslo Airport has reopened for departures after closing earlier in the day due to heavy snow and wind, though arrivals at the country's main airport remain suspended for now, national airport operator Avinor said on Saturday. "We are planning for a soft start from 2:00 p.m. (1300 GMT) for departures only," an Avinor spokesperson said. The airport will handle arrivals again from 1440 GMT as Avinor continues to monitor the weather, the spokesperson said. Wet and heavy snow combined with intense wind and rain had created challenging conditions earlier in the day, leading to the closure.<br/>

Some 29.5m passengers went through Türkiye’s airports in January-February, pointing to a 16.2% increase from the same period of 2023. The international passenger tally rose 17% year-on-year to 15.2m in the first two months of the year, while domestic passengers increased by 15.5% to 14.3m, according to data from the General Directorate of State Airports Authority (DHMİ). Istanbul’s mega airport welcomed 11.8m passengers, up 9% from January-February last year, with international travelers rising 12% to 9.35m. Some 2.4m domestic passengers used Istanbul Airport during the same period, marking a 1% increase from a year earlier. Sabiha Gökçen Airport, also in Istanbul, saw a 22% increase in total passenger traffic to 6.3m. The number of international passengers grew 25% to 3.4m, while the annual increase in domestic passenger traffic at the airport was 18% to 2.93m.<br/>

Ireland’s biggest airport has warned it will miss out on revenue growth of 10% because of a 16-year-old cap on passenger numbers that could push airlines to expand at UK and other European hubs instead. Although Ireland is a small island, its open economy makes it disproportionately dependent on air travel and the Dublin-London route is among the busiest in Europe. But since 2007, the main gateway to the country has been limited to 32mn passengers a year, not counting those in transit. Other European airports are facing pressure to reduce flights for environmental reasons — an international outcry forced the Dutch government to pause efforts to cut flights at Amsterdam’s Schiphol. Climate concerns have threatened projects at UK airports and led France to abandon plans for a new terminal at Paris Charles de Gaulle in 2021. But the state-owned Dublin Airport Authority is seeking to go the other way, and has applied for permission to raise the cap to 40mn. Last year, 31.9mn people passed through Dublin Airport, 1.1mn of whom were in transit, while turnover during the first six months of 2023 rose 55% on a year earlier to E459m. Increasing passenger numbers to 35mn — where DAA CE Kenny Jacobs predicts they could be by the end of next year, were it not for the cap — would mean “about 10% additional revenue . . . 10% growth out there that could be forgone because we’re stalled at 32mn because of the cap”, he told the Financial Times. Big airlines and the Irish prime minister have warned that maintaining the cap could hit an economy where multinationals such as Microsoft, Apple, Google and Pfizer pay billions of euros in corporation tax. Jacobs, a former Ryanair chief marketing officer who took over as DAA CE last year, said airlines want to expand in Dublin because they “make an absolute killing” thanks to regulated passenger charges that average less than half the level of European peers.<br/>

Philippine conglomerate San Miguel Corp said on Monday it has already secured financing from banks for its 170.6b pesos ($3b) operation and overhaul of the country's main airport. Banks have already committed to financing the project, on top of an equity share from the consortium, San Miguel President Ramon Ang told reporters after signing a 15-year concession agreement. In February, San Miguel and partners that include South Korea's Incheon International Airport Corp, won the government auction for the airport project, beating India's GMR Airports Consortium and a group of Philippine tycoons.<br/>

Canadian Airbus A220 jet assembly workers will initiate pressure tactics on Monday that would slow production, after voting on Sunday to reject a proposed contract and give strike authorization, a union official said. Around 99% of the estimated 1,000 members represented by the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers (IAM) who voted rejected the contract, and gave strike authorization, said Eric Rancourt, a union spokesperson for the negotiations. While the authorization mandate does not equate to an actual strike, the vote signals discontent among the estimated 1,300 Montreal-area workers who assemble Airbus's smallest commercial jet in Mirabel, Quebec. The negotiations have raised tensions at a time when Airbus is trying to grow A220 production while lowering the cost of the money-losing program, even as it rides a broader wave of orders from airlines coping with a rebound in travel demand from the COVID-19 pandemic. Union plans to return to bargaining on Monday will coincide with the start of pressure tactics that would slow production, Rancourt told Reuters after the vote, without giving further details. A second assembly line in Mobile, Alabama also produces the A220. Airbus's Canadian division said in an emailed statement that it recognized the vote results and remains committed to "reconciling the interests of our employees with the economic imperatives of the A220," to find an agreement that "suits both parties." <br/>

When China's answer to the Boeing 737 and the Airbus A320 debuted at the Singapore Airshow, it signaled that Southeast Asia would be the first stop for manufacturer COMAC on its journey to go global. The C919's appearance at Asia's biggest aerospace industry event last month marked the first time the narrow-body jet was shown to the public outside of mainland China or Hong Kong. COMAC, or Commercial Aircraft Corp. of China, signed two deals at the show with Chinese airlines for the C919 and the smaller ARJ21 regional jet. China Eastern Airlines put the C919 into service last year. But COMAC has ambitions beyond its home market. "Today, we gather at the Singapore Airshow to witness the C919 large passenger aircraft and ARJ21 regional aircraft going abroad and flying to the world," a COMAC representative said at the event. After the airshow, C919 and ARJ21 jets made multiple stops at Southeast Asian airports, including Kuala Lumpur, for demonstration flights, Malaysian and other media reported. GallopAir, a Brunei-based budget carrier that has yet to start flying, said last year that it had signed a letter of intent to buy 15 each of the C919 and the ARJ21 planes. There is little public information about GallopAir but it appears to have Chinese connections. CEO Cham Chi said the airline is owned by Chinese businessman Yang Qiang, Reuters reported. Last year, Sino-Indonesian joint venture TransNusa started flying the ARJ21, becoming the first foreign customer for the plane, which had its first commercial flight in 2016. <br/>