A bipartisan group of U.S. senators harshly criticized rising airline fees for luggage and seat assignments on Wednesday, calling the fees unfair and citing how different customers are charged differently. "Airlines these days view their customers as little more than walking piggy banks to be shaken down for every possible dime," Senator Richard Blumenthal, a Democrat who chairs the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, said at the hearing. Executives of American Airlines, United Airlines, Delta Air Lines, Spirit Airlines and Frontier testified at the two-hour hearing. Carriers are working on customer-specific pricing "to discriminate against passengers, and to raise fares and fees for consumers the airline believes will pay more," Blumenthal said in the hearing. Republican Senator Josh Hawley questioned why some airlines charge passengers different fees for baggage on the same flight. "This is Russian roulette," Hawley said. "Nobody enjoys flying on your airlines. It's a disaster. ... It's absolutely terrible." A report released by Blumenthal last week disclosed that the five airlines collectively earned $12.4b in revenue from seat fees between 2018 and 2023. Airlines say the fees, for both checked luggage and carry-on bags and seat assignments, are about customer choice, saying they let customers pay for what they need. The airlines do acknowledge that the fees are a key part of their revenue structure as they face rising costs.<br/>
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Planners could give Dublin Airport the green light to handle 40m passengers a-year in coming months, raising a controversial cap at the country’s biggest gateway, Kenny Jacobs, CE of DAA, predicts. State airports company DAA recently answered questions posed by Fingal County Council on the firm’s application to raise the current passenger limit from 32m a-year to 40m. DAA now hopes that the council will approve the proposal some time in the first three months of next year, as Fingal’s own development plan provides for 40m passengers using the airport every year, according to Jacobs. However, he believes that any decision will face appeals, making the timing of a final decision uncertain. “It would be great if we had definite timelines for planning in Ireland,” he said, dubbing the current system was “too open-ended”. Jacobs was speaking on Wednesday as airlines kicked off a legal challenge to the passenger cap in a move expected to end up before the European courts. He also confirmed that DAA is likely to lodge a second application seeking to have the cap raised to 36m within the next eight weeks.<br/>
Starting Thursday, passengers departing through Incheon International Airport wearing shoes with heels taller than 3.5 centimeters will be required to remove their shoes during the security screening process. Previously, such a rule was only enforced in "suspicious" cases, but the updated regulation now applies it uniformly. The enhanced shoe screening measures are being implemented at both Terminal 1 and Terminal 2 and apply to all passengers using the cylindrical security scanners. "This isn't seen as a major change to the security team, but rather a clarification of previously unclear guidelines about shoe removal during screenings," an Incheon Airport official explained. "It is unrelated to the country's current political climate and was planned for implementation well in advance," the official added. On the first day of enforcement, airport authorities analyzed the number of shoe screenings conducted across all departure zones between 7 a.m. and 9 a.m., to minimize passenger inconvenience in the future. The cylindrical security scanner was first introduced at Terminal 2 in 2017, and Incheon Airport now operates 41 of these scanners, which make up 70% of its 58 security screening units. The remaining 17 units are traditional walk-through door-style scanners. One of the advantages of the cylindrical scanner is its speed, with an average scanning time of under 25 seconds per passenger. Door scanner screening takes longer overall because it requires a separate check by staff afterward.<br/>
Airbus announced just over 2,000 job cuts in Defence and Space, or about 5% of its second-largest division, as it reels from U.S. competition in the satellites sector but the cuts were not as severe as the European group had first warned. More than half of the 2,043 total job reductions, affecting 1,128 positions, will fall in the Space Systems business following heavy losses on satellites, Europe's largest aerospace group said, adding there would be no compulsory redundancies. Airbus builds satellites and transporters and has key shares in European missile, fighter and space-launch programmes. It brought forward a statement confirming the figures after Reuters reported the cuts, following the first of two days of closed-door briefings for the aerospace company's unions on the results of a lengthy efficiency review. In October, Airbus announced plans to cut up to 2,500 jobs in Defence and Space, or 7% of the workforce, after E1.5b euros of writedowns in satellites led by troubled OneSat. In the plans outlined to unions to Wednesday, and later confirmed by the company, Airbus is cutting 250 jobs in its Air Power or combat aircraft sub-division and 47 in Connected Intelligence. The divisional headquarters will shed 618 posts. Europe's top satellite makers have traditionally focused on complex spacecraft in geostationary orbit but have been hit by the arrival of cheap tiny satellites in low Earth orbit, led by the runaway growth of Elon Musk's Starlink constellation.<br/>