Tag Archives: Airbus A319

Volaris to expand into Costa Rica

Volaris (Mexico City) has announced their expansion into the Costa Rica market with the launch of two new flights from Cancun, Quintana Roo and Guadalajara, Jalisco to Costa Rica’s capital city, San Jose, starting on September 10 with two flights per week.

Volaris is expanding its presence to Costa Rica as part of the carrier’s international growth plans, seeking to increase the country’s connectivity to Mexico’s most important cities as well the US market. Volaris CEO, Enrique Beltranena said: “We are extremely proud to announce flights to Costa Rica, a destination special not only as a natural and adventure tourism location, but also for their history and cultural heritage”.

“Two new services plus our innovative business framework make visiting Costa Rica easier than ever for our Customers in Mexico”, Beltranena added.

Separately, Costa Rica Minister of Tourism, Mauricio Ventura said, “Mexico is Latin America’s top issuing market for tourism by air, which is why Volaris’ bet strengthens the work we’ve done towards attracting more airlines and opening our markets by increasing the number of seats available to the destination and becoming a complement to traditional offerings with an option that provides good service at an affordable price,” the official said. “This also introduces an element of competitiveness in terms of fares to Costa Rica.”

To date, Volaris is the airline with the widest route network servicing Mexico and the US. The carrier has transported nearly 50 million passengers since it started operating in 2006, and this number continues on the rise as a result of more than 240 daily flights operated to 61 leading destinations, including 38 in Mexico and 23 internationally.

For those interested in the new service, flight schedules, including dates and times of operation, are announced as follows:

San Jose, Costa Rica – Guadalajara, Jalisco
(Effective September 10. Thursday and Sunday)

Departing Guadalajara, Jalisco at 7:20 hrs., arriving San Jose, Costa Rica at 9:55 hrs.
Departing San Jose, Costa Rica at 19:05 hrs., arriving Guadalajara, Jalisco at 23:30 hrs.
San Jose, Costa Rica- Cancun, Quintana Roo
(Effective September 10. Thursday and Sunday)

Departing San Jose, Costa Rica at 11:25 hrs., arriving Cancun, Quintana Roo at 14:40 hrs.
Departing Cancun, Quintana Roo at 16:15 hrs., arriving San Jose, Costa Rica at 17:35 hrs.

Copyright Photo: Eddie Maloney/AirlinersGallery.com. Volaris Airbus A319-133 XA-VOE (msn 3069) (Erick) arrives in Las Vegas.

Volaris aircraft slide show:

EasyJet swings to a six-month profit

EasyJet (easyJet.com) (UK) (London-Luton) reversed its financial fortunes and produced a six-month profit (before taxies) (ending on March 31) of £7 million ($7.8 million). This compares favorably with a loss of £53 million ($59.6 million) in the same period a year ago.

The airline issued these additional details:

Strategic Progress:

Drive demand, conversion and yields across Europe

• Total revenue per seat increased by 2.6% year-on-year on a constant currency basis, and by 0.2% per seat on a reported basis, to £54.91 driven, in part, by the disciplined allocation of capacity, improvement in load factor, strong October trading, timing of Easter and performance of allocated seating.
• Average load factors increased by 0.7 percentage points to 89.7% whilst capacity grew by 3.6% to 32.2 million seats.

Maintain cost advantage

• Cost per seat excluding fuel grew by 2.9% on a constant currency basis and decreased by 1.4% on a reported basis to £38.66. The increase in cost per seat was driven by anticipated increases in charges at regulated airports mainly in Germany and Italy, increased disruption costs in the second quarter and costs associated with building a resilient operation ahead of new crew base openings.
• easyJet lean delivered £21 million of sustainable savings in the six months to March 31, 2015.
• From May 2016 all future deliveries of A320 aircraft to have 186 seats; existing A320 180 seat fleet to be retrofitted starting in winter 2016. 186 seat A320 expected to deliver a cost per seat saving of 2% vs. a 180 seat A320.
• Component support contract signed with AJW Group to drive savings in maintenance costs from October 2015.

Build strong number 1 and 2 network positions

• easyJet opened new bases in Amsterdam and Porto bringing the total number of bases to 26.

Disciplined use of capital

•In the six months to March 31, 2015, easyJet returned £180 million or 45.4 pence per share to shareholders through the payment of an ordinary dividend at an increased payout ratio of 40% of profit after tax for the year ended September 30, 2014.

• easyJet ended the first half of the financial year with cash and money market deposits of £976 million, a decrease of £93 million against last year. Net cash as at 31 March 2015 was £416 million compared to £449 million at March 31, 2014.

Commenting on the results, Carolyn McCall, easyJet Chief Executive said:

“easyJet has delivered a record performance in the first half of the year by continuing to deliver its strategy of making travel easy and affordable for passengers. The profit in the half reflects the delivery of our customer focused revenue initiatives and a strong finish to the ski season as well as the benefit we received from the lower fuel price and favourable foreign exchange movements.

As we enter the important summer season forward bookings are in line with last year and as we predicted passengers are benefitting as fares fall to reflect a more competitive operating environment and lower fuel costs. easyJet continues to be well positioned to grow revenue and profit this year, delivering sustainable returns to shareholders due to its compelling network, low cost base and strong balance sheet.”

Analysis of the results and a comment from Ken Odeluga, a senior market analyst at www.cityindex.co.uk

EasyJet has swung to a net profit at the typically weak half-way stage of the airline financial year and I think this can only emphasise that its making solid progress against its only true rival, at the moment, Ryanair.

It has edged the bar slightly higher against RYA with a 7 basis point extension of its lead on load factor to 89.7% vs. RYA latterly on 88% (Dec.). EZJ has now having maintained an average passenger yield advantage for almost every interim period since 2012.

Naturally, landing in the black for the first half bodes especially well for the rest of EZJ’s financial year, although despite the airline saying the outlook is broadly in line for the rest of the year, it will not have the advantage of fuel prices quite as low as they were in the prior period, therefore there’s scope for full-year forecasts to be scaled back—though only moderately in my view.

However as the market opened this morning it decided to look past these strengths and focus on the disruption EZJ warned of a few days ago from French air traffic control industrial action.
I do believe that the airline has been suitably, but perhaps overly cautious on the magnitude of impact these will have on the third quarter, though of course further qualification may come in the call (0930BST)

Copyright Photo below: Antony J. Best/AirlinersGallery.com. Airbus A319-111 G-EZDA (msn 3413) prepares to land at London (Gatwick) painted in the new 2015 livery.

EasyJet aircraft slide show:

Allegiant launches new routes to Florida from Raleigh-Durham, Tulsa and Concord

Allegiant Air (Las Vegas) on May 6 launched nonstop service from Raleigh-Durham to St. Petersburg/Clearwater. Service to both Sanford (near Orlando) and Punta Gorda started yesterday (May 7). All flights will operate two days a week.

In addition, yesterday (May 7) Allegiant also launched twice-weekly seasonal service from Tulsa to St. Petersburg/Clearwater (near Tampa). The route will operate through August 16.

In addition, today (May 8) the company started twice-weekly service from Concord, North Carolina (near Charlotte) to Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport.

Finally, also today (May 8), the airline will start Cincinnati’s first low-cost service to Savannah-Hilton Head with summer seasonal service to Savannah-Hilton Head International Airport (SAV). Savannah-Hilton Head becomes the tenth destination Allegiant serves from CVG. The new flights operate twice weekly between the Cincinnati-Northern Kentucky International Airport (CVG) and Savannah-Hilton Head International Airport (SAV) through October 11, 2015.

Allegiant Air aircraft slide show:

Spirit Airlines launches Houston – Cancun flights, the first international service from Houston

Spirit Airlines (Fort Lauderdale/Hollywood) yesterday (May 7) launched its first of several new flights to Latin America from George Bush Intercontinental Airport (IAH) with new service to Cancun, Mexico.

Spirit will add six additional Latin American destinations in the coming days, with nonstop service to Los Cabos, Mexico; Toluca, Mexico; Managua, Nicaragua; San Jose, Costa Rica; San Pedro Sula, Honduras; and San Salvador, El Salvador available.

The debut is part of the steady growth by Spirit, which announced last year the addition of 10 new non-stop destinations out of IAH, bringing its total of routes served to 22. This includes expanded domestic service to Tampa and Baltimore/Washington, which began in March, and nonstop service to Oakland/San Francisco, which began in April.

The expansion nearly doubled the nonstop service offered by Spirit from Bush Intercontinental, adding to a roster that already includes flights to Chicago-O’Hare, Denver, Detroit, Fort Lauderdale, Kansas City, Las Vegas, Los Angeles, Minneapolis/St. Paul, New Orleans, Orlando, and San Diego. The new routes will make Spirit one of the busiest carriers operating out of IAH.

Spirit Airlines aircraft slide show:

Spirit Airlines launches 10 new routes

Spirit Airlines (Fort Lauderdale/Hollywood) yesterday (April 16) began nonstop service to 10 new destinations and increases service to 18 popular summer routes, including Cleveland, Boston, Denver, Los Angeles, Houston and Chicago. This marks one of the biggest days in Spirit’s history.

New Routes:

Resumed Routes:

Copyright Photo: Ken Petersen/AirlinersGallery.com. Airbus A319-132 N502NK (msn 2433) approaches the runway at Las Vegas.

Spirit Airlines aircraft slide show:

The end of US Airways, today American Airlines is operating under a single FAA operating certificate

American Airlines and US Airways (American Airlines Group) (Dallas/Fort Worth) today (April 8) are operating under a single operating certificate from the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) (Part 121 FAA Air Operators Certificate-AOC).

Before midnight last night, all originating US Airways (formerly USAir) US/USA (AWE) flights were using its codes and after midnight all originating flights were using the American Airlines (AA/AAL) codes. Some US Airways flights technically landed today after midnight using the old codes.

Therefore as an airline, in the eyes of the FAA, US Airways technically was fully merged into American Airlines today (April 8) although brand remnants of US Airways (especially on the aircraft) will take longer to erase.

All flights now use the “American” call sign.

For the record, the last Cactus call sign US Airways flight was flight US 696 from Los Angeles (LAX) to Charlotte (CLT) arriving a little after 6 am (0613) with Airbus A321-231 N971UY (msn 6249) painted in full American colors.

American Airlines issued this statement:

American Airlines today (April 8) received a single operating certificate from the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) for American and US Airways, marking a major milestone in the integration of the two airlines.

The FAA’s approval for American and US Airways to operate under one certificate is the culmination of more than 18 months of work aligning the carriers’ operating policies and procedures. Beginning today, most flight operations, maintenance and dispatch procedures will be identical for all flights. Air traffic control communications will refer to all American and US Airways flights with the call sign “American.”

“Achieving a single operating certificate is an important step toward becoming a fully integrated airline and the effort to reach today’s milestone touched nearly every area of our company,” said Robert Isom, American’s Chief Operating Officer. “For a project of this scope, many entities and people must come together and see it through to completion, but one person must ultimately oversee it in its entirety. With that, our appreciation for the leadership of Captain and Senior Vice President, Integration Operations Ed Bular, who oversaw this massive project, along with the CAVOK Group under the leadership of Vice President Jim Ballough, cannot be overstated. Likewise, our frontline employees and the union leaders who represent them are to be enthusiastically applauded for their role in learning and implementing new policies and procedures and adhering to those as we move forward under one certificate.

“The FAA’s Joint Transition Team, led by Skip Whitrock, helped guide us through a rigorous process designed to ensure that our airline is built on a solid foundation of regulatory compliance. We are extremely appreciative of the valuable direction that Skip, Division Managers Nick Reyes and Larry Fields and all at the FAA have provided us over the past year.

“Lastly, as a global airline, this work spanned many regions. We thank the Department of Transportation and regulatory authorities in more than 50 countries who worked alongside us to ensure this critical project remained on track.”

Isom concluded, “While today marks a significant milestone for our integration, there is still much that remains ahead and we will intensify our focus on moving to a single reservations system and website and combining our frontline employee workgroups.”

A team of more than 700 employees reviewed 465 manuals along with policies, procedures and programs from both carriers and selected best practices to implement for the merged airline. More than 110,000 employees completed hundreds of thousands of hours of training in multiple phases and more than 115,000 pages on policies and procedures were published.

The FAA’s recognition of American as a single operator does not mean change for customers, who will continue to check in for their flights on aa.com, usairways.com, or at American or US Airways ticket counters until later this year when American moves to a single reservations system.

Since American and US Airways merged in December 2013, the airline has been making steady integration progress, including inducting US Airways into the oneworld alliance, merging separate frequent flyer programs into the single AAdvantage program and reaching five-year joint collective bargaining agreements with its pilots and flight attendants.

Copyright Photo: Michael B. Ing/AirlinersGallery.com. The real story here is how upstart America West Airlines (AWE) (and the Doug Parker-led management team) (Phoenix) became the largest airline in the world by taking over two struggling and larger airlines and adopting their names. US Airways’ legacy 1983 America West retro scheme is pictured on Airbus A319-132 N828AW (msn 1552). You did it Doug Parker. Congratulations. Well done.

American Airlines aircraft slide show (current livery only):

US Airways aircraft slide show:

USAir aircraft slide show:

America West aircraft slide show:

British Airways to add London Gatwick-Vienna service

British Airways (London) will add the London (Gatwick) – Vienna, Austria route on September 17. The carrier will operate six days a week with Airbus A319s according to Airline Route.

British Airways aircraft slide show:

Air Malta joins the growing list of airlines and changes its cockpit policies

Air Malta (Malta) has updated its Cockpit Policy and issued this statement:

The devastating airline incident this week has sparked a discussion around the world about how crew policies can be improved to enhance passenger safety.

Our thoughts are with the family members of these passengers as well as our colleagues around the world.

Air Malta is committed to continually improving its safety policies and maintaining its impeccable safety record.

In light of this, we have decided with immediate effect to make it compulsory to have two crew members in the cockpit at all times.

This measure complements our other security procedures already in place.

Air Malta aircraft slide show:

Norwegian and easyJet adopt a “two-person” cockpit rule

Norwegian Air Shuttle (Norwegian.com) (Oslo) and easyJet (UK) (London-Luton) have become early adopters of a new “two persons” cockpit rule in the wake of the devastating news of what caused Germanwings flight 4U 9525 to crash in the French Alps. The rule is already in place in the United States.

In addition, Deutsche Welle is reporting “Germany’s BDL aviation federation announced late Thursday that airlines such as Lufthansa and Airberlin intended to immediately enact the two-person rule in consultation with the Federal Office of Civil Aviation.”

Read the full report: CLICK HERE

Above Copyright Photo: Keith Burton/AirlinersGallery.com. In celebration of the new 26th base at Amsterdam, easyJet has introduced this new Amsterdam logo jet on Airbus A319-111 G-EZDN (msn 3608) painted at Southend. The new theme was rolled out of the paint shop on March 25.

In other news, overshadowed by the stunning Germanwings crash investigation announcements, easyJet yesterday (March 26) celebrated the opening of its new base at Francisco de Sá Carneiro Airport in Porto. Three new UK routes from Manchester, Bristol and London Luton Airports to the new Porto base will be launched this summer.

Flights from Bristol to Porto will commence on April 19 and operate on Wednesdays, Fridays and Sundays.

Porto is the 25th base of easyJet’s network and the airline will also inaugurate its 26th base in Amsterdam on March 31.

easyJet started its operations in Portugal in 1999 and flies now to 48 destinations in Europe being the third largest airline in the country with 12% market share and more than 4 million passengers carried in 2014. easyJet flies to Faro, Funchal, Porto and Lisbon and from 29 March a service will start connecting the capital with Ponta Delgada in Azores.

Top Copyright Photo: Paul Bannwarth/AirlinersGallery.com. Boeing 737-8JP WL LN-NIF (msn 39434) with Finnish writer and social activist Minna Canth on the tail arrives at Tenerife Sur.

Norwegian aircraft slide show:

easyJet aircraft slide show:

Will Lufthansa retire the Germanwings brand earlier?

Lufthansa (Frankfurt), in the wake of the tragic crash of Germanwings (2nd) (Cologne/Bonn) flight 4U 9225 in the French Alps, is facing some tough decisions on the future of its low-cost subsidiaries. Before the crash, Lufthansa was planning to gradually phase out the Germanwings brand and shift a number of routes to the new Eurowings (Dusseldorf) low-cost brand.

According to Airline Route, on October 25, 2015, a total of 55 Germanwings routes (and the 4U code) operating from Cologne/Bonn, Dusseldorf and Hamburg were due to be transferred to Eurowings and the EW code.

The Germanwings brand was expected to be gradually phased out with no end date specified. However with this tragic loss and the now apparent criminal act, will Lufthansa close out the tarnished Germanwings brand sooner?

Lufthansa has touted the success of its low-cost subsidiaries. Is this strategy now in jeopardy with the tragic loss of Germanwings flight 4U 9225?

Fortune explores this question: CLICK HERE

Top Copyright Photo: The current red and orange brand was introduced with much fanfare in 2012. Airbus A319-112 D-AKNT (msn 2607) taxies at London (Heathrow).

Germanwings aircraft slide show:

Bottom Copyright Photo: Arnd Wolf/AirlinersGallery.com. The ill-fated Airbus A320-211 D-AIPX (msn 147) is pictured taxiing at the Cologne/Bonn hub in the previous 2002 yellow and maroon livery.