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A “biohazard” on a United Airlines flight is the latest midair incident to trigger an unplanned, early landing of a commercial plane. United Airlines says one passenger’s “medical issue” caused flight 2477 to land in Virginia, where the plane had to be “deep cleaned.” FlightAware shows the flight departing Houston on Sunday morning, then diverting to Washington Dulles International Airport about two hours into the trip. The flight was bound for Boston Logan International Airport. Audio posted on X by Thenewarea51 captured a flight crew member describing a “biohazard” on board the flight. “It sounds like it’s quite bad back there,” the recording captured. “The crew is vomiting and passengers all around are asking for masks.” In a statement, United says “we deep cleaned the aircraft and it departed for Boston later that afternoon.”<br/>

Ryanair Holdings Plc lost its European Union court challenge over a E150m Covid-19 bailout for rival carrier Austrian Airlines AG. The EU’s top court in Luxembourg said Monday that a 2020 loan by Austrian authorities didn’t violate the bloc’s tough state-aid rulebook, backing an earlier ruling from its lower tribunal. EU judges said that Lufthansa AG’s Austrian unit had been hit hard by national coronavirus restrictions and that the airline’s size warranted significant support from the state. Ryanair — Europe’s biggest discount airline — has filed more than two dozen challenges over the billions of state aid doled out by EU nations to carriers — winning some cases in the bloc’s lower court over subsidies for the likes of Lufthansa and Air France-KLM. The EU recently defeated a top court challenge against regulators’ approval of a E10b Spanish bailout fund. Ryanair has argued that the subsidies shouldn’t have been waved through by the EU because they distorted competition in the industry.<br/>

Croatia Airlines (OU) has taken delivery of its first A220-300 at Airbus Atlantic Canada in Mirabel, Laurentides (Quebec), as part of the renewal of OU's entire fleet with new-generation aircraft. This is the first aircraft delivered to the Croatian flag carrier and member of the Star Alliance from the committed 13 A220-300 and two A220-100. According to Airbus, OU's fleet revamp is "the biggest project in the history of the company which is celebrating its 35th anniversary this year." The Airbus A220 is built for the 100-150 seat market. The type can fly nonstop up to 3,600 nautical miles or 6,700 kilometers making it the ideal solution to facilitate OU's gradual expansion of its flight network. In addition, the A220 has a 50% reduced noise footprint when compared to previous generation aircraft and around 40% lower NOx emissions than industry standards. The type also is already able to operate with up to 50% Sustainable Aviation Fuel (SAF). State-of-the-art aerodynamics, advanced materials and Pratt & Whitney’s latest-generation GTF™ engines also allow for the A220 to reduce OU's operating costs and environmental footprint.<br/>

Ethiopian Airlines posted revenue of $7b for its 2023/24 financial year, up from $6.1b a year earlier, helped by higher passenger numbers, state-owned Ethiopian Broadcasting Corporation (EBC) reported on Monday. The airline carried 17.1m passengers in the same period, up 23%, the broadcaster quoted Ethiopian Airlines CE Mesfin Tasew as saying at a results press conference. Mesfin said the airline expects to carry 20m passengers in the financial year that started in July and plans to add five new routes, the EBC reported. Africa's biggest airline has also ordered 125 more planes, he said without disclosing further detail. Last May Mesfin said he expected the airline to transport 30% more passengers in the 2023/24 year, buoyed by new routes and a rebound in global travel.<br/>

Singapore Airlines revised its rate of in-flight waste recycling upward ahead of its annual general meeting Monday after receiving new data from its local catering company. The city-state’s national carrier said it recycled 11% of waste generated in flight, or 393 metric tons, in the 2023/24 financial year, much higher than the 1.7% it stated last week. The upward revision came after queries from Bloomberg News about the airline’s recycling stance. “After your queries, we conducted further checks with our Singapore in-flight caterer and received an updated figure on the amount of glass waste collected on board our aircraft in the 2023/24 financial year,” the airline said in a statement. Recycling and a broader focus on the environment, including sustainable aviation fuel, has become a much bigger focus for airlines and investors as the aviation industry attempts to reach a challenging goal of net zero by 2050. To do that, carriers and planemakers will need to invest trillions of dollars, both in cleaner fuels and less polluting aircraft. While things like making planes lighter by removing heavier items such as bulky blankets and magazines and reducing single-use plastics are important, bigger gains will come from using sustainable aviation fuel and deploying more environmentally friendly jets.<br/>

Air New Zealand abandoned on Tuesday a 2030 emissions reduction target, citing delivery delays of fuel-efficient aircraft and high green fuel prices, in a move signalling the difficulty aviation is having meeting de-carbonisation goals. This is the first major airline to row back on climate aspirations but the carrier said it was still committed to an industry-wide target of net zero emissions by 2050 and was working on a new near-term goal. Aviation is deemed responsible for about 2% of the world's emissions but is considered one of the hardest sectors to decarbonise as fuel for flights cannot be easily replaced with other kinds of power. "Many of the levers needed to meet the target, including the availability of new aircraft, the affordability and availability of alternative jet fuels, and global and domestic regulatory and policy support, are outside the airline's direct control and remain challenging," New Zealand's flag carrier said in a statement. Airlines are banking on plant-based Sustainable Aviation Fuels (SAF) and more efficient aircraft to reduce emissions in the near-term, but SAF production is expensive and challenging to ramp-up, and plane manufacturers are struggling to deliver new-generation aircraft on time. Many environmental advocates say the growth of the aviation industry is fundamentally incompatible with sustainability. Air New Zealand in 2022 said it wanted to reduce carbon intensity 28.9% by 2030 compared with 2019 levels, in a methodology validated by the Science-based Targets initiative (SBTi), a U.N.-backed corporate climate action group.<br/>