Lufthansa sees a need for significant restructuring at Alitalia before the group would be prepared to buy the airline, Lufthansa's CE said in a letter seen by Reuters, tempering expectations for a quick deal. "While recognising the valuable measures that have been undertaken to date... we strongly believe that there remains a considerable amount of work to be achieved before Lufthansa would be in the position to enter comprehensively into the next phase of the process," Carsten Spohr said in the letter to Italian Industry minister Carlo Calenda Thursday. He said a restructured "NewAlitalia" would be smaller in terms of both staff and its fleet. Alitalia has around 9,200 full-time staff, plus a further 1,600 in temporary layoff. Any permanent job cuts would be particularly sensitive ahead of a national election in March. <br/>
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The Indian govt has approved several amendments to the country's Foreign Direct Investment policy, including one that allows foreign airlines to control up to a 49% stake in Air India. New Delhi says its intention is "to liberalise and simplify the FDI policy so as to improve ease of doing business in the country." Meanwhile, substantial ownership and effective control of Air India shall continue to remain with Indian nationals. This format is followed by both Tata Sons' joint venture airlines, where SIA has a 49% stake in Vistara and AirAsia a 49% stake in AirAsia India. The move could increase Air India's attractiveness to foreign airlines, as New Delhi undergoes a process to divest the carrier. IndiGo has stated its intention to acquire Air India's international operations, while Vistara's interest has been widely reported. <br/>
The pilot of an Air Canada plane that landed at San Francisco International despite repeated orders to abort the touchdown told US investigators the crew could not hear the commands because the cockpit radio's frequency had been changed The Airbus 320 from Montreal was within 2.1 kilometres of touching down Oct 22 when an air-traffic controller ordered the plane to abandon the landing because another passenger jet had not cleared the runway. When the Air Canada crew failed to respond, the controller repeated the "go around" command 6 times. The tower then took the unusual step of flashing a red light at the cockpit in a final attempt to wave it off, the FAA said. The orders went unheeded. After the pilot landed safely, he told the tower he had radio trouble. <br/>
A LOT Polish Airlines Bombardier Dash 8 Q400 nose undercarriage failure led to the closure of Warsaw’s main airport the evening of Jan 10. The aircraft was inbound from Krakow with 59 passengers and 1 crew when the incident unfolded. On lowering the undercarriage as they approached Warsaw Chopin Airport, the pilots received an indication that the aircraft’s nose undercarriage leg might not be locked down. Uncertain whether there was a problem with the landing gear or they were receiving a false warning, they prepared for an emergency landing. On contact with the ground, the nose gear collapsed and the aircraft came to a halt on the main runway. A LOT spokesman said there were no injuries to crew or passengers who disembarked on the runway without the need for emergency chutes. <br/>
Aegean Airlines Group carried 13.2m passengers in 2017, up 6% on 2016’s figure and a new record. The group said the new record had been achieved through better utilisation of its network, as the number of flights over the year had remained stable. Load factor for the group throughout 2017 was 83.2%, up from 77.4% in 2016. The main growth driver was international traffic, which rose 9% to 7.3m, while domestic routes carried 3% more passengers, at 5.9m. Athens was the focus of the group’s activities, with 10.3m passengers passing through the Greek capital, compared to 9.4m in 2016. “We concluded 2017 with positive results, achieving the main quantitative and qualitative targets that we had set out for the year,” Aegean MD, Dimitris Gerogiannis said. <br/>