Wow Air to launch new routes from the USA to India via Iceland

Wow Air announced it will launch new connecting routes from the U.S. to Indira Gandhi International Airport (DEL) in Delhi, India via Iceland. The routes will provide millions of Americans in nine major cities across the country affordable access to the bustling Indian metropolis. The Delhi route will launch on December 5, 2018.

WOW air flight attendant visits the Taj Mahal, one of the seven wonders of the worldlocated just a short distance from Delhi. (CNW Group/WOW air)

Service to DEL will be available from Newark Liberty International Airport (EWR), Boston Logan International Airport (BOS), Baltimore/Washington International Airport (BWI), Chicago O’Hare International Airport (ORD), Pittsburgh International Airport (PIT), Detroit Metropolitan Airport (DTW), San Francisco International Airport (SFO), Los Angeles International Airport (LAX) and St. Louis Lambert International Airport (STL).

WOW air will use its brand new Airbus A330neo aircraft on the Delhi route with its new Wow Premium seats.

* From Boston (BOS), New York (EWR), Washington D.C. (BWI), Chicago (ORD), Pittsburgh (PIT), Detroit (DTW), San Francisco (SFO), Los Angeles (LAX) and St. Louis(STL) to Dehli (DEL) via Iceland.

Top Copyright Photo (all others by Wow Air): Wow Air Airbus A330-343 TF-LUV (msn 1607) AMS (Ton Jochems). Image: 941069.

Wow Air aircraft slide show:

Video:

Finnair extends its network in Norway by deepening its cooperation with Widerøe

Finnair is extending its cooperation with Widerøe and will add nine new destinations to its network in Norway. Widerøe (WF) is based in Norway and is Northern Europe’s largest regional carrier.

Within the codeshare agreement, Finnair’s AY code will be added to several routes operated by Widerøe from Finnair’s current destinations in Norway – Oslo, Bergen and Tromsø. The codeshare agreement extends Finnair’s reach in Norway, and offers new connections for Finnair’s customers traveling to and from Norway.

From May 25, 2018 onwards Finnair customers can connect with Widerøe’s flights from

Oslo to Florø, Ørsta-Volda, Svolvær, Leknes and Stokmarknes
Bergen to Tromsø, Bodø, Kristiansund, Molde, Florø and to Billund in Denmark
Tromsø to Kirkenes and to Stokmarknes.

The codeshare agreement expands Finnair’s current cooperation with Widerøe. As of May 15, Widerøe operates Finnair’s flights from Helsinki to Bergen and Tromsø on Finnair’s behalf.

Photo: Embraer. Widerøe’s first Embraer E190-E2, registered as LN-WEA (msn 190) was handed over on April 4, 2018 and entered service on April 24, 2018.

airBaltic launches flights from Riga to Sochi

airBaltic on May 14, 2018, launched a new route from Riga International Airport to Sochi International Airport. The new route offers new travel options for travellers from the Baltics and Russia with convenient connections via Riga.

In addition, this summer Sochi will be one of the host cities for 2018 FIFA World Cup and the new connection via Riga will offer convenient flight options to all who are planning to attend the championship.

Route	Flight frequency	Start date	*Price, Basic**	*Price, Premium**	*Price, Business**
Riga – Sochi	2 flights weekly	May 14, 2018	99 EUR	159 EUR	599 EUR

*Lowest fare, including taxes, fees and service charges, on www.airBaltic.com, subject to availability

airBaltic flies from Riga to Sochi two times a week on a Boeing 737 aircraft, and the flight is scheduled to last 3 hours and 10 minutes.

airBaltic serves over 70 routes from Riga, Tallinn and Vilnius, offering the largest variety of destinations and convenient connections via Riga to its network spanning Europe, Scandinavia, the CIS and the Middle East. For summer 2018, airBaltic has introduced eight new destinations from Riga to Malaga, Lisbon, Split, Bordeaux, Gdansk, Almaty as well as Sochi and Kaliningrad. In addition, airBaltic launched a new direct route connecting Tallinn and London.

Top Copyright Photo (all others by airBaltic): airBaltic Boeing 737-36Q WL YL-BBX (msn 30334) ZRH (Andi Hiltl). Image: 939039.

airBaltic aircraft slide show:

The United Arab Emirates and the United States conclude civil aviation discussions

The United Arab Emirates issued this statement:

The UAE General Civil Aviation Authority welcomed the announcement on May 14 on civil aviation in Washington that strongly reaffirmed and maintained all the provisions of the 2002 bilateral Air Transport Agreement between the United Arab Emirates and the United States.

The understanding confirmed at a meeting between the Foreign Ministers of both countries reinforced the principles of Open Skies that advance competition and allow airlines to freely add or adjust services to best serve travelers.

Commenting from Washington after his meeting with US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, UAE Foreign Minister Sheikh Abdullah Bin Zayed Al Nahyan thanked the Secretary for working to achieve understandings on civil aviation and noted: “Aviation is at the center of a UAE-US trade and commercial relationship that generates enormous benefits for both countries. This announcement confirms business as usual by validating all of the rights and benefits –including ‘Fifth Freedom’ services — of the 2002 Air Transport Agreement between the two countries. UAE and US airlines will continue to have complete commercial flexibility to add or adjust service to meet travelers needs.”

“We are pleased that the discussions with the US have come to an end. They confirmed what was clear from the very beginning – that the UAE’s international airlines have operated in complete compliance with the 2002 Agreement,” said UAE Minister of Economy and Chairman of General Civil Aviation Authority His Excellency Sultan bin Saeed Al Mansoori. “Importantly, there is no freeze on or any change to operating rights. The UAE’s international airlines can plan and begin new service, including Fifth Freedom flights, without limits and consistent with the 2002 Agreement.”

UAE airlines currently serve 12 US gateways with 131 flights a week. These flights generate tens of billions of dollars into the US and UAE economies, supporting hundreds of thousands of jobs in both countries. The US has a $15 billion trade surplus with the UAE, largely driven by sales of Boeing aircraft with GE engines to UAE airlines, and the UAE also invests hundreds of billions of dollars into the US.

United Airlines expands East Coast schedule, maximizing Newark and Washington Dulles hubs

https://airlinersgallery.smugmug.com/Airlines-USA6/United-Airlines-NC-Boeing/i-4tbsCk4/A

United Airlines (UAL) today announced it is expanding its schedule at its East Coast hubs in Newark and Washington–Dulles. The network adjustments build on United’s leading route network at New York/Newark where the airline serves more destinations than any other carrier from the New York City metro area. Additionally, the changes to its Washington–Dulles schedule will offer more customers easy access to the nation’s capital and seamless connections to flights throughout the United States, Canada, Europe, Asia and the Caribbean.

Beginning in October, United will maximize the unique strengths of each hub by adding new destinations, additional frequencies and larger two-cabin aircraft. The schedule adjustments are designed to offer more nonstop flights to destinations popular with New York area customers while reallocating largely connecting passenger flights on short-haul routes to United’s hub at Washington–Dulles. United will transition service between New York/Newark and Chattanooga, Tennessee; Ithaca, New York, and Scranton, Pennsylvania to Washington-Dulles.

“We approached these schedule adjustments with our customers in mind, knowing that we wanted to create a schedule that offers customers beginning their travel in the New York City area convenient flights to many of the business and leisure destinations they frequent the most,” said Ankit Gupta, United’s Vice President of Domestic Network. “Since more of our customers begin their travel from New York/Newark than any other United hub city, we’ve created a more customer friendly schedule that removed connection times and provided convenient nonstop service to multiple U.S. destinations.”

Newark (EWR)

Offering customers more flights to more destinations than any other airline in the New York City region, United is increasing nonstop service between Newark and 15 destinations, beginning October 4, 2018.

Destination	Airport	Increase to	Aircraft
Burlington, VT	BTV	6 flights daily	Embraer E175
Charleston, SC	CHS	5 flights daily	Embraer 145
Ft. Lauderdale, FL	FLL	6 flights daily	Boeing 737-800
Fort Myers, FL	RSW	3 flights daily	Boeing 737-800
Greensboro, NC	GSO	5 flights daily	Embraer 145
Memphis, TN	MEM	4 flights daily	Embraer 145
Nashville, TN	BNA	7 flights daily	Embraer 145
New Orleans, LA	MSY	4 flights daily	Boeing 737-900
Norfolk, VA	ORF	6 flights daily	Embraer 145
Orlando, FL	MCO	9 flights daily	Boeing 737-900
Phoenix, AZ	PHX	3 flights daily	Boeing 737-900
Pittsburgh, PA	PIT	9 flights daily	Embraer E175
San Antonio, TX	SAT	2 flights daily	Embraer E175
Sarasota, FL	SRQ	2 flights daily	Airbus 319
West Palm Beach, FL	PBI	5 flights daily	Boeing 737-800

New service to Palm Springs and year round service to Key West

United will begin nonstop seasonal mainline service beginning December 19 through March 30, 2019, between New York/Newark and Palm Springs, Californiaand increase regional jet service between New York/Newark and Key West, Floridafrom seasonal to year round effective October 4, 2018.

Washington–Dulles (IAD)

“As we set out to build this schedule for our customers, we considered Washington–Dulles’ more optimal schedule offering for connecting flights and conducted an in-depth analysis of some of the short-haul flights scheduled from our Newark hub,” said Gupta. “We determined that by shifting certain regional flights from Newark to Dulles, our customers will have more schedule flexibility and better options for connections on regional routes.”

Destination	Airport	Frequency	Aircraft
Chattanooga, TN	CHA	2 flights daily	CRJ-200
Ithaca, NY	ITH	2 flights daily	CRJ-200
Scranton, PA	AVP	2 flights daily	CRJ-200

United Airlines and United Express operate approximately 4,600 flights a day to 354 airports across five continents. In 2017, United and United Express operated more than 1.6 million flights carrying more than 148 million customers. United is proud to have the world’s most comprehensive route network, including U.S. mainland hubs in Chicago, Denver, Houston, Los Angeles, Newark/New York, San Francisco and Washington, D.C. United operates 750 mainline aircraft and the airline’s United Express carriers operate 545 regional aircraft.

United Airlines aircraft slide show (Boeing):

Nonstop Delta service from Boston to Philadelphia coming October 1

Delta Air Lines is adding another top destination to its growing nonstop options from Logan International Airport, with new daily nonstop service to Philadelphia, beginning on October 1.

The service will be flown four times daily on Bombardier CRJ900 aircraft operated by Delta Connection carrier Endeavor Air on the following schedule:

Boston Logan International Airport – Philadelphia International Airport

Departs	Arrives
BOS at 6:45 a.m.	PHL at 8:23 a.m.
BOS at 11:05 a.m.	PHL at 12:49 p.m.
BOS at 1:50 p.m.	PHL at 3:41 p.m.
BOS at 6:35 p.m.	PHL at 8:10 p.m.

Philadelphia International Airport – Boston Logan International Airport

Departs	Arrives
PHL at 9:00 a.m.	BOS at 10:30 a.m.
PHL at 1:25 p.m.	BOS at 2:53 p.m.
PHL at 4:20 p.m.	BOS at 5:54 p.m.
PHL at 8:45 p.m.	BOS at 10:29 p.m.

Delta’s leading global network in Boston

Philadelphia will be Delta’s 51^st nonstop destination from Boston Logan, following Las Vegas service that also begins on October 1. Additionally on October 1, Delta will offer a third daily nonstop to Tampa International Airport.

Delta’s new service to Philadelphia complements numerous Boston service enhancements made in 2018. This spring, Delta added new seasonal weekend service to New Orleans, Savannah and Charleston, with Charleston service increasing to daily beginning in summer. This leisure expansion continues with new Saturday service to Aruba as of June, marking Delta’s sixth destination in the Caribbean from Boston. Additional flights to top business markets begin this summer from Boston to Nashville, Atlanta, Seattle, Kansas City, Jacksonville and Pittsburgh.

Boston serves as an ideal gateway for Philadelphia customers traveling to Europe, with nonstop service to London, Dublin, Paris and Amsterdam. Customers can also fly nonstop from Boston to Rome on Delta partner Alitalia, and Manchester on Delta partner Virgin Atlantic.

Delta’s continued investment in Boston will reach 112 peak day departures by this summer, an increase of 19 departures compared with summer 2017 and 29 departures over summer 2016. Delta and its partners will serve 51 total destinations from Boston, including 17 international destinations and the largest trans-Atlantic network.

Copyright Photo: Delta Connection-Endeavor Air Bombardier CRJ900 (CL-600-2D24) N295PQ (msn 15295) FLL (Bruce Drum). Image: 104551.

Delta Connection-Endeavor Air aircraft slide show:

Brussels Airlines endures two days of strikes this week

Brussels Airlines is today being struck by its pilot’s union. The airline will endure another day of industrial action on Wednesday.

The airline issued this statement before the strikes started:

Brussels Airlines deeply regrets that strike actions triggered by its social partners representing the airline’s pilot community are causing massive disruptions in Monday’s and Wednesday’s flight operations.

The strike will impact Brussels Airlines flights to and from Brussels on May 14 and May 16, 2018. 278 flights to and from Brussels were scheduled on Monday and 279 flights on Wednesday, with respectively 34,000 and 29,000 passengers booked.

“Despite the fact that we do everything we can to reduce the inconveniences to our guests to a minimum, the strike severely impacts the travel plans of our customers, for which we wish to sincerely apologise. We have mobilized a maximum of staff and have increased the capacity of our Service Center to assist our guests as much as possible with rebooking”, explains Thibault Demoulin, Chief Operating Officer of Brussels Airlines. “From Brussels Airlines’ point of view, the strike is incomprehensible, since the company has submitted substantial offers to the cockpit union delegation”, continues Thibault Demoulin.

Priority is given to the stranded guests

Significant disruptions to the flight operations are to be expected during the days of the strike.

Passengers booked on a flight on Monday or Wednesday can rebook their flight free of charge or cancel their reservation at no extra charge with a full refund. Guests who are stranded at their destination will be offered maximum care, including hotel accommodation, alternative travel options on Brussels Airlines, Lufthansa Group airlines or other available carriers.

New conciliation process to start

A first proposal of a flexible benefit plan, that foresaw as of January 1, 2019 an increase of 3% of the pilot’s monthly gross salary and an additional 3% as of 2020 should there be no growth, had been refused by the pilots.

Today, in order to give a new chance to the negotiations, the management of Brussels Airlines had made a new proposal for its pilots. Indeed, following latest discussions among Brussels Airlines management, union representatives and pilots, all parties involved came to the conclusion that the past weeks and months the focus in the negotiations was too much on salary increase rather than on the improvement of work-life balance, which seems to be the predominant concern of the pilot community.

The purpose was now to reinforce the already established working group on flight-time/duty-time (workload) in order to come with concrete proposals. With the feedback received, the management has decided to put extra resources into this working group and re-allocate part of the foreseen funds to the improvement of rosters and holiday planning.

The management of Brussels Airlines proposed to finalize a concrete planning listing all the initiatives, to speed up the process. To cover the implementation period of a new to be agreed proposal, intermediate compensation measures are being worked on, which can be implemented in the short run.

“We deeply regret the refusal of our new offer that focuses on the main concern of our pilots – an improved work-life balance. We know that this is the most important to them”, explains Christina Foerster, CEO of Brussels Airlines. “We are also worried about the process as our social partners announced a strike even before the new conciliation process has started. It goes without saying that we remain open for transparent and constructive dialogue as we continue aiming at a solution that on the one hand responds to the concerns of our pilots and on the other hand doesn’t put the future of our company at stake. The union delegation continues to propose the same 12 points, which represent a total increase in cost of 25% for the company. It would be irresponsible for the future of our company and its 3900 employees to accept this.”

Top Copyright Photo: Brussels Airlines Airbus A330-223 OO-SFY (msn 229) YYZ (TMK Photography). Image: 941517.

Brussels Airlines aircraft slide show:

JTA introduces its “Amuro Jet” to honor Namie Amuro

Namie Amuro, born on September 20, 1977, is a Japanese recording artist, dancer, model, actress and entrepreneur. She is retiring. JTA is honoring her career will a Boeing 737-800 logo jet (JA07RK).

Namie Amuro who has been supported by her many fans both domestically and abroad for 25 years since her debut in 1992. Namie Amuro is from Okinawa.

All photos by JTA.

JAL to establish a new low-cost carrier

Japan Airlines (JAL) has announced the decision to establish a new low-cost carrier (LCC) business for the international market. As described in the FY2017-2020 JAL Group Medium Term Management Plan, the company looks to develop and cultivate new business opportunities. The new LCC business will specifically feature international routes with medium to long-haul flights and will aim to provide customers with new options when traveling to/from Japan.

The company will be a consolidated subsidiary of the JAL Group and plans to operate flights from Narita International Airport to select destinations in Asia, Europe, and the Americas. In the first stages of its establishment, the carrier will operate two Boeing 787-8 aircraft and is targeting to launch commercial flights from the summer of 2020 when Narita Airport plans to complete enhancements to its facilities.

To date, JAL has remained committed to refine its own full service carrier model while making key investments into Jetstar Japan. When JAL establishes the new LCC business, the company aims to create new demand, working along with the successful services provided by Jetstar Japan, which features domestic and short-haul international flights. Through these actions, the company will take on the challenge to deliver and meet the needs of diversified customer groups around the world.

In alignment with the company`s Medium Term Management Plan, the LCC business is part of JAL`s `10 Year Grand Design` strategy where the company will accelerate growth through innovation, while contributing toward the country`s target to welcome new inbound visitors in the next 3 years and beyond.