Volaris has observed an "inflection point" in transborder travel between the USA and Mexico, according to executives who spoke on the Mexican carrier's earnings call on 28 October. "We believe we have reached an inflection point in the US-Mexico transborder market, with booking trends showing sustained improvement compared to last year," says Holger Blankenstein, EVP airline, commercial and operations. "Since mid-August, our sales in the US-Mexico transborder market are above last year's level and that clearly demonstrates our ability to fine-tune our capacity, manage demand and capture the market momentum that we're seeing." Blankenstein adds: "If you look into the fourth quarter, the US-Mexico transborder booking trends are also showing a sustained improvement compared to last year and that's why we are quite optimistic about the fourth-quarter traffic evolution both in the domestic but also in the transborder market." Volaris's international load factor for the third quarter was 77% "as we actively prioritised yield over loads to optimise profitability", Blankenstein says. He notes that for the fourth quarter, as Volaris heads into the "holiday high season", international traffic is "tracking stronger with historical seasonality, setting the stage for improved profitability as we close the year". Chief executive Enrique Beltranena adds that this improvement came "notwithstanding the geopolitical disruptions observed throughout the year". He says: "In the international market, we are seeing a steady recovery in cross-border demand, with traffic improving month over month and holiday bookings already trending ahead of last year." In an analyst note about Volaris released ahead of the earnings call, TD Cowen notes that international traffic is "heavily exposed to VFR demand uncertainty around policy, possibly a lingering headwind for the duration of the current US administration". Tom Fitzgerald, an analyst at TD Cowen and the author of that note, adds: "Despite the uncertainty around policy and demand, we believe Volaris has an attractive set-up going into 2026. "The months of June and July should see a boost to demand around the World Cup. Volaris has direct service to 10 of the 16 host cities and feed to an additional three cities via its relationship with Frontier." Volaris's operating income and net profit fell 46% and 84%, respectively, in the third quarter, but the Mexican low-cost carrier expects a "solid start" to 2026 amid growing demand. Operating profit came in at $68 million, compared with $126 million in the same period last year, while net profit declined to $6 million from $37 million. Revenue dropped 3.6% to $784 million, while operating expenses grew 4.2% to $716 million. Capacity was lifted 4.6%, outstripping a 1% rise in traffic. This resulted in a three-percentage-point dip in load factor, to 84.4%.

United Airlines has added 10 new domestic destinations for flights departing O'Hare International, an expansion the US major says was enabled by the addition of five new gates allocated to it by the city of Chicago. The Chicago-based carrier notes that the Illinois city reallocates airport gates annually. It adds that gates are reallocated based on how many O'Hare flights each carrier flew in the prior year. In full-year 2024, United operated the most flights departing from and arriving at O'Hare, with 352,383, followed by American Airlines (255,061 flights) and Delta Air Lines (27,476), Cirium schedules data shows. Flights commence in 2026 for United routes connecting O'Hare with Santa Barbara and Monterey, in California; Eugene, Oregon; Paducah, Kentucky; Lynchburg, Virginia; St George, Utah; Rochester, Minnesota; Wausau, Wisconsin; Marquette, Michigan; and Idaho Falls, Idaho. "United is already flying its busiest schedule in history at O'Hare, and now these additional gates have unlocked new opportunities to intertwine cities across the country, serve more customers in Chicago and strengthen our hometown hub," states Patrick Quayle, senior vice-president of global network planning and alliances, for United.

Brunei's department of civil aviation has granted the Chinese-manufactured Comac C909 type certification. The type certification covers ARJ21-700 (C909's former name) and its converted freighter, business, medical and emergency variants, according to a type certificate acceptance report dated 22 October. The certification comes on the heels of Brunei's civil aviation authority accepting the design standards of the Civil Aviation Authority of China on 18 October. With the type certification, Brunei is poised to be the fourth country outside China to operate the regional jet. Startup carrier GallopAir has a letter of intent with Comac to purchase 30 aircraft, with confirmed orders for 15 C909s and 15 convertible orders for the regional jets and C919s. Indonesia's TransNusa and Lao Airlines operate five and two of the type, respectively, while VietJet previously wet-leased a pair of C909s from Chengdu Airlines.