More plane orders flowed in at the Farnborough Airshow on Tuesday despite supply chain pressures on jetmakers and complaints from airlines about delivery delays. Boeing announced deals with Qatar Airways and Macquarie Airfinance, while Airbus secured orders from Japan Airlines and Virgin Atlantic - although much of the business had already been flagged. Qatar Airways also held out the prospect of a "sizeable" order for wide-body jets around the turn of the year, and flydubai told Reuters it was in early stage talks with Airbus and Boeing for its largest ever order. Delegates have been expecting limited deal-making at this year's showcase aviation industry event, with Airbus and Boeing both sold out for several years of production and struggling to ramp up output amid supply chain problems. Delays in plane deliveries have limited some airlines' ability to take advantage of a post-pandemic travel boom which some say is starting to fade. Boeing in particular had to scale back production as it came under legal and regulatory scrutiny after a panel blew off mid-air on a near-new 737 MAX 9 in January. That has left some airlines deeply frustrated. "So in March, we were told your 12 aircraft is now going to be eight. So now in July, just last week, we were told, out of the eight, we've already received four and we're not going to receive anything more," said Ghaith al-Ghaith, the CEO of flydubai, which complained on Monday about delays at Boeing. "From our point of view, this is where there is frustration, and we felt like we had to say something."<br/>
general
Boeing said on Tuesday it has resumed deliveries of its best-selling 737 Max airplane to China after a lengthy delay stemming from regulatory issues. Reuters reported on May 22 that Boeing’s plane deliveries to China had been delayed in recent weeks due to a Chinese regulatory review of batteries powering the cockpit voice recorder. The resumption is a boost to the U.S. planemaker, which had flagged Chinese delivery delays to investors, and which is engulfed in a separate safety and quality crisis. New Boeing deliveries to China have been off and on since 2019 after two fatal crashes of Max 8 jets and amid intensifying tensions over issues ranging from technology to national security between Washington and Beijing. Boeing said on July 9 it had delivered two 777 freighters, to Air China, confirming Reuters reports that widebody deliveries to China had resumed. But Chinese carriers had not yet begun taking single-aisle MAX deliveries. Reuters had reported in June that 737 Max deliveries were set to resume as early as July. China suspended most orders and deliveries of Boeing planes in 2019 after the 737 Max was grounded worldwide. Deliveries of widebodies restarted in December and narrow-body Max jets in January.<br/>
A top Boeing supply chain executive said on Tuesday suppliers and airlines had the right to be sceptical about company jet output forecasts, following a recent decline in the planemaker's production. “It’s a fair sentiment on the part of the supply base and the airlines to say that we failed our commitments to them in terms of the timeline,” Ihssane Mounir, SVP global supply chain and fabrication for Boeing, told a discussion panel with other executives at the Farnborough Airshow. The U.S. planemaker, which has plans to increase output of its strong-selling 737 MAX, has reduced production significantly this year after coming under legal and regulatory scrutiny following a Jan. 5 panel blowout on a near-new 737 MAX 9. Supply chain snags and shortages of skilled labor are being blamed more broadly at the air show for holding back aircraft production at a time of soaring airline demand for planes. Both Boeing and Airbus secured orders at the show despite delivery delays. "We’re fighting for the same type of capacity as the commercial side," added Matthew Milas, president, defense and space for Honeywell Aerospace. Planemakers also need to invest more time and money to train new entrants to aerospace following mass retirements of more experienced workers during the pandemic, executives said at a McKinsey & Co panel on supply chains.<br/>
Airbus has had to turn down some aircraft orders because of its huge backlog, highlighting the mismatch between the continued strong demand from airlines and manufacturers struggling to produce their planes fast enough. There is more demand in the market than Airbus’s ability to supply its narrowbody planes, CEO Guillaume Faury said on Tuesday in an interview at the Farnborough Air Show. “Today we have to refuse orders because we are not able to deliver in the time frame that is requested,” Faury said. “So if there’s a bit of softening of the market, that’s no problem for us.” Airbus is sold out on most of its aircraft and there are few slots opening up before the end of the decade. At the same time, efforts to ramp up output have been stymied by persistent supply-chain snags, meaning the company can’t accelerate production as quickly as it would like. Airbus delayed its planned production increase to 75 A320 family aircraft a month in June, and also said it would not deliver the number of jets this year originally envisioned. Faury said he expects the supply-chain issues to last for a few years, and the company is seeking to find the right balance between supply and demand. “We have thousands of suppliers, and when you have just a couple of them, a few of them that are late on the ramp up, that’s slowing down everybody,” Faury said. <br/>
While Embraer has so far not announced any commercial jets orders at this year’s Farnborough air show, CE Arjan Meijer says there are numerous deals in the pipeline for at least 300 aircraft. “We feel extremely confident and positive about commercial aviation going forward,” Meijer said during a briefing at the show on 23 July. “I have never seen so much traction in the market as we see today.” So far, the company has had firm orders for 2,200 E-Jets, making the aircraft the third most successful in the industry behind the A320 family and the Boeing 737. The company has delivered to more than 90 airlines in 60-plus countries. Earlier this month the San Jose dos Campos-based company said it had delivered 26 commercial aircraft during the first half of this year. The main highlight of the first six months of 2024 was the order for 20 E2 jets by Mexicana de Aviacion – Mexico’s state-owned airline. The two E2 aircraft - the E190-E2 and E195-E2 - are in the market for some significant improvements, Meijer adds. Most prominent is what Embraer calls the E2TS – or E2 advanced take-off system, the first automated take-off system in commercial aviation, to be available on the aircraft by the end of 2025.<br/>
The supply chain strains hampering the aerospace industry could persist for another two years, the head of Rolls-Royce has warned, in one of the bleakest assessments yet of the challenges facing manufacturers. Tufan Erginbilgic, CE of the UK engineer whose engines power some of the world’s largest aircraft including the Airbus A350, said the industry was in the throes of “one of the worst supply chain environments it has ever experienced”. Companies were dealing with a range of issues, from shortages of skilled labour to parts. The supply crunch could last for another 18 to 24 months, he said at the Farnborough air show. The industry had been among the hardest hit by the Covid pandemic only to bounce back sharply amid resurgent demand from airlines for new aircraft. Manufacturers and their suppliers, said Erginbilgic, were also “recovering to a moving target because the industry is still growing”. Despite the supply chain problems, he said demand for air travel remained strong. The company is investing more than £1bn over the coming years to improve the durability and performance of its Trent family of engines which power widebody aircraft. It is also working on a smaller version of its UltraFan engine demonstrator to explore technology for the narrow-body jet market. Erginbilgic’s comments on the supply chain echo those of other industry executives at the air show, even as Airbus and Boeing notched up more orders from airlines. Airbus announced orders from Japan Airlines and Virgin Atlantic on Tuesday, while Boeing sealed a deal with Qatar Airways. GE Aerospace on Tuesday raised its profit outlook for the full year but warned that shortages of materials had hit shipments of its engines. The company said deliveries of its Leap engines, which power Airbus and Boeing narrow-body jets, were down 29% in the second quarter to the end of June from the same period a year ago. Campbell Wilson, CE of Air India, which placed one of the biggest aviation orders globally last year from both Boeing and Airbus, said “we are talking a good couple of years” before the supply chain challenges are under control.<br/>
Flights serving the eastern Sicilian city of Catania were halted for much of the day on Tuesday after an eruption from nearby Mount Etna, bringing fresh travel woe during the peak summer tourist season.<br/>Reduced volcanic activity meant that departures were able to resume from 6 p.m. (1600 GMT), with some arrivals to be allowed two hours later and the airport due to be fully operational by 10 p.m., the airport operator said on X. Etna, one of the world's most active volcanoes, has seen intense activity in recent days, spewing hot ash and lava. Some of the ash had drifted on to runways and aircraft. The airport had already been closed earlier this month due to ash in the sky. It acts as a hub for the east of Sicily and attracts more arrivals than the capital Palermo. The airline operator had earlier warned that the suspension of flights on Tuesday would cause cancellations or the rerouting of traffic to other airports.<br/>
Airlines may have to tell passengers the environmental impact of the flights they book under new proposals from the UK regulator. The Civil Aviation Authority said consumers should be able to make more informed travel choices when booking flights and package holidays. Passengers would need “accurate, understandable, and accessible” measures, and would probably be told the carbon impact of their individual flights in terms of the CO2 emitted, the CAA said, launching a consultation on the plans at the Farnborough airshow. The CAA director of policy, Tim Johnson, said: “Providing consumers with accessible, transparent and accurate environmental information is essential to making more informed travel choices. “Our new proposals aim to standardise this information across all platforms, enabling passengers to more easily compare the environmental impact of their flights. This initiative is a significant step towards greater transparency and improved sustainability in the aviation industry.” The policy could come into effect from early 2025. Some airlines, including Ryanair and Wizz, publish a monthly report of their average CO2 emissions per passenger journey, which is generally lowest on the newest, fuel-efficient planes that fly with the fullest occupancy. Future carbon calculations could also include the amount of sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) used. Airlines are expected to be required to incorporate at least 10% SAF in their fuel mix by 2030.<br/>