unaligned

Frontier Airlines briefly grounded all flights on Thursday amid a major outage in Microsoft networks, which also knocked out some computer systems at low-cost carriers Allegiant Air and Sun Country Airlines. Microsoft said on the status page for Azure, its flagship cloud computing platform, that the problem began at 5:56 p.m. and affected multiple systems for customers in the central United States. “Our systems are currently impacted by a Microsoft outage, which is also affecting other companies. During this time booking, check-in, access to your boarding pass, and some flights may be impacted,” Frontier said in a post on X. The airline issued a ground stop for all its flights, according to a notice posted on the Federal Aviation Administration’s website. The ground stop was lifted about 35 minutes later. Airlines sometimes issue these orders to temporarily halt flights because of technical issues. Frontier did not specify how many flights and passengers have been affected so far. The Denver-based airline operates a fleet of more than 100 planes, according to its website. The Microsoft outage hit at least two other airlines. “One of our information vendors is experiencing a global outage affecting multiple airlines. As a result, some of our services are temporarily unavailable,” Sun Country said. Allegiant said on X that customers may face problems with check-ins, bookings and issuing boarding passes.<br/>

The parent company of Allegiant Air said Thursday that its president will become CEO in September, replacing longtime CE Maurice Gallagher, who will remain chairman of the board. Allegiant Travel Co. said that Gregory C. Anderson will retain the president’s title and join the board of the Las Vegas company. Anderson had a background in accounting at Ernst & Young and US Airways before joining Allegiant in 2010. He rose to several executive jobs including CFO. “In many ways, he’s already doing the job” of CEO, Gallagher said in a prepared statement about Anderson. “It’s time to make it official.” Gallagher, 74, has led Allegiant for most of the last two decades, building it into one of the nation’s largest so-called ultra-low—cost carriers, which offer cheap fares but add more fees than more-conventional airlines. He is Allegiant’s largest shareholder, owning more than 13% of the company’s shares.<br/>

LATAM Airlines is preparing to list its shares on the New York Stock Exchange in a move that could fetch it a valuation of $8.5b, the company said on Thursday. The Santiago, Chile-based carrier could raise over $533m for its selling shareholders if it were to sell shares at a price near its last close on the Chilean stock exchanges, where they are already listed. Companies based outside the U.S. often seek a New York listing to command a richer valuation and access a deeper pool of capital. LATAM Airlines' listing, however, would come at a time when shares of some newly listed firms have stumbled, undermining the recovery in initial public offerings (IPOs) seen this year. The company traces its origins to as far back as 1929 and has a significant presence in South America, including in Santiago and Sao Paulo. It went bankrupt in 2020 as the COVID-19 pandemic hammered travel demand, but emerged from bankruptcy two years later. The company's shareholders plan to sell 19m American Depositary Shares (ADSs), which would be listed under the symbol "LTM." It would not receive any proceeds from the share sale.<br/>

Icelandair Group eked out a small profit during Q2 as it shifted more of its network towards lower-yielding transatlantic connections amid the impact of seismic activity on demand for travel to Iceland. While eruptions and earthquakes are commonplace in Iceland, seismic activity in the southwest of the country has attracted international attention in recent months, particularly coverage of evacuations from the town of Grindavik. Icelandair has previously suggested that the media was giving undue attention to those developments, denting demand for travel to the country. That lower demand continued into the April-June quarter, Icelandair said on 18 July, prompting it to pivot more towards transatlantic connecting traffic at its Keflavik hub. The airline therefore offset a 15% drop in passengers travelling to Iceland as a destination during the quarter with a 25% increase in connecting passengers. But the lower yields associated with the airline’s “via Iceland” traffic meant profitability was hit, even as the business cut unit costs by 2.4%. Furthermore, “from” traffic fell by 9%, with the carrier citing its unwillingness to compete with “unsustainable” low fares offered by local competition.<br/>

Romania’s civil aviation regulator is dismissing frustrations from two expanding carriers over delays to aircraft approval, insisting that the hold-ups result from incomplete documentation and findings from safety inspections. Both Dan Air and Fly Lili are seeking to expand their fleets. Dan Air is aiming to introduce a second Airbus A320 while Fly Lili, which also uses A320s, wants to add an A319. Each has referred to a lack of specialised personnel while remarking about delays in bringing the aircraft into operation. Dan Air stated in mid-July that registration of its second aircraft (YR-RAM) was being “abusively delayed” by civil aviation regulator AACR and causing daily financial losses. “Our entire flight programme, planned with two aircraft at Bacau, is turned upside-down,” the carrier said, claiming that it had followed all procedures and provided the necessary documentation. Fly Lili said in early July that the introduction of its additional aircraft was “taking longer than we had estimated”. “Our team has made great efforts to have the aircraft fit for flight, but it was not possible,” it added. “We have tried to lease other aircraft for regular operation until [air operator’s certificate] entry is complete, but there is no availability in Europe.”<br/>

Saudi Arabia’s national carrier will buy 50 electric aircraft from German manufacturer Lilium NV, with an option to double the purchase as the oil-rich kingdom looks for advanced modes of travel to tourist attractions. Saudia and Lilium signed the binding sales agreement on Thursday at an event in Gauting near Munich, where Lilium is based. The two sides already entered a looser memorandum of understanding in late 2022 for the electric vertical take-off and landing, or eVTOL, aircraft. Saudia plans to deploy the craft across different locations. These include Jeddah, where it will carry passengers between the city to hotels in Mecca for religious tourism. Others will be in the capital and the Red Sea, where the jet will transport people between airports and projects being turned into tourism sites. The purchase of the remaining aircraft depends on performance and support that Lilium will provide, Saudia said. Saudi Arabia plans to pour $800b into tourism over the next decade as it aims to host 150m tourists a year. Lilium said the deal is the largest reported firm order of eVTOL aircraft by an airline that plans to operate the plane. The $7m Lilium jet, which comes in configurations of four to six passengers and one pilot, looks more like a small aircraft than a helicopter, boasting two sets of wings and ducted electrically-powered turbines. <br/>

Travellers who fly between Singapore and Kuala Lumpur will have another flight option from Sept 1, with low-cost carrier Scoot set to launch a new daily service to Subang Airport. The budget arm of Singapore Airlines will operate its Airbus A320 aircraft, which each has about 180 seats, on the route. One-way economy class fares from Singapore start from S$83, while one-way fares from Subang start at RM108 (S$31), including taxes. Flight bookings are available from July 18 via Scoot’s website and its mobile app, and they will be made available progressively through other sales channels. With the addition of the new Subang service, Scoot will operate 110 weekly flights to a total of 10 points in Malaysia, increasing its overall route network to 70 destinations. “The new daily flights... aim to provide customers with an alternative option to conveniently travel between Kuala Lumpur and Singapore, and beyond to the rest of Scoot’s network,” the airline said in a statement on July 18. Scoot said the flight schedules are subject to government and regulatory approvals and changes.<br/>