The Trump administration has begun firing hundreds of employees at the FAA, including some who maintain critical air traffic control infrastructure, despite four deadly crashes since inauguration day. According to the Professional Aviation Safety Specialists (Pass) union, “several hundred” workers received termination notices on Friday. Many of the workers were probationary employees, those employed for less than a year and lacking job protections, which makes them low-hanging fruit for the Trump administration’s streamlining efforts. According to the US office of personnel management, there are about 200,000 probationary employees within the federal government. The firings at the FAA do not include air traffic controllers, but did appear to include engineers and technicians. A spokesman for the union said non-probationary technicians had been fired, citing a figure of less than 300 roles so far. The positions terminated include maintenance mechanics, aeronautical information specialists, environmental protection specialists, aviation safety assistants and management administration personnel. Former FAA air traffic controller Dylan Sullivan claimed on social media that agency personnel who were terminated “maintain every piece of equipment that keeps flying safe, from the radars to the ILS, to ATC automation”. Job cuts at the FAA are likely to raise concerns. The agency has struggled to recruit air traffic controllers in recent years. An increase in recruitment during the previous two administrations was hobbled by budget cuts that limited training and certification. The move also comes less than three weeks since a midair collision between an army helicopter and a civilian jet over Washington DC that killed 67 people. Initial reports suggested there was just one air traffic controller working both civilian and military flights in the notoriously busy airspace at the time of the collision.<br/>
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Frankfurt’s Hahn airport has recorded a 12% increase in passenger numbers in its first full year under new management, following rescue of the facility from insolvency administration. The airport’s operator, investment firm Triwo, says 1.9m passengers used Hahn over the course of 2024. This follows a 21% rise in the previous year. Triwo set up the new Hahn operator in February 2023 and took over the airport’s operation at the beginning of May the same year. The airport’s previous operator, Flughagen Frankfurt Hahn, had filed for insolvency in 2021. Triwo has yet to release Hahn’s financial data for 2024. Under a European Commission ruling last year the German government was instructed to recover some E1.25m in state aid granted to Hahn. The airport operator’s previous financial statement, covering the shortened financial period from 8 February to 31 December 2023 showed a net loss of E3.1m on revenues of E11.6m. It attributed this partly to a “significantly reduced” freight volume, as a result of “more restrictive” regulatory approval practices. The company has been focusing on strengthening the freight business and working towards raising passenger numbers to around 2.7m by the end of this year.<br/>
What is believed to be the largest ever seizure of cocaine at a New Zealand airport was made by Customs at Auckland International Airport over the weekend. Customs seized an estimated 101kg of cocaine after officers identified a number of bags arriving on the Hawaiian Airlines flight on Saturday night. Once they opened the bags, officers found 85 bricks of a substance that had been wrapped in black film and clear plastic wrapping. Initial testing indicated it was cocaine with investigations still ongoing. This amount of cocaine would have had a street value of up to $35.4m, Customs said. “Customs officers are highly trained and cognisant of how transnational organised criminal groups operate,” Group Manager Border Operations Dana McDonald said. “We work hard to stop the supply of illegal drugs, with an aim to hit criminal profits, reduce the ability to cultivate user demand, and disrupt their goal to exploit New Zealand communities. While this seizure is a fantastic result that has stopped a significant amount of drugs from reaching and harming our communities, what is of Customs concern is that seizures at Auckland Airport have increased steadily in recent years. We have adapted accordingly to this threat.”<br/>
Airbus is delaying the arrival of a freighter version of its A350 jet by up to a year and faces hurdles in increasing output of its wider A350 aircraft family in coming months as it wrestles with supply problems, industry sources told Reuters. The delay in the industry's latest dedicated cargo aircraft could be announced as early as Thursday when the European planemaker posts annual results, they said, asking not to be named because the discussions remain confidential. Airbus declined to comment on the schedule for the freighter, which is currently due to enter service in 2026. The setback to the A350F comes as Airbus also struggles to increase output of existing A350 passenger jets, particularly due to ongoing delays in the arrival of fuselage parts from Spirit AeroSystems, industry sources said. Those delays could effectively place an informal cap on A350 production through the rest of this year, with Airbus struggling to increase A350-family production above current rates of around six jets a month, the sources said. However, Airbus is still expected to stick to a published target of hitting 12 A350s a month during 2028, including both passenger and freighter models, they added. An Airbus spokesperson declined comment on production but referred back to comments given with its nine-month results in October, when Airbus said it was keeping the 2028 target while "actively managing specific supply chain challenges" in 2025. Spirit AeroSystems declined comment.<br/>
Airbus, Collins Aerospace, Pratt & Whitney, and Rolls-Royce are expanding parts sourcing from India, driving growth in the country's emerging aerospace sector and pushing local firms to elevate their games, industry insiders say. Bengaluru-based Hical Technologies and JJG Aero are among those riding the wave. Hical, a supplier to Raytheon Technology and Boeing among others, aims to double revenue to 5b rupees ($57.57m) from its aerospace division in three years, said Yashas Jaiveer Shashikiran, joint managing director. JJG Aero, also in Bengaluru’s industrial hub, took 12 years to hit $2m in revenue but soared to $20m in the last six, said CEO Anuj Jhunjhunwala. The growth is part of an Asia-Pacific aerospace surge, with 2024 revenue projected to be 54% above 2019 levels, while North America and Europe remain 3% and 4% lower, according to Accenture Research. “Earlier, we were chasing customers. Now, they are equally interested in evaluating Indian machine shops,” Jhunjhunwala said, adding that contracts were being signed more quickly and onboarding processes being done much faster than ever before. The companies produce parts for landing gear, wings, fuselage, electrical switches and motion control systems essential for flight safety and performance. Leading Western plane and engine manufacturers, whose output has been constrained by strikes, production caps, and parts and labour shortages since the pandemic, say they want to source more from India to meet rising demand for air travel. "India is the best solution to supply chain challenges,” Huw Morgan, senior vice president for aerospace procurement at Rolls-Royce, said last week at an industry event.<br/>