Hong Kong carrier Cathay Pacific has again decided to defer its dividend payment on preference shares issued to a company owned by the Hong Kong government that would have been due on 13 February. The airline has already deferred payment of the first dividends four times, which was originally due on 16 February 2021. The preference shares are part of a HK$39 billion ($4.97 billion) recapitalisation plan first revealed on 9 June 2020 and completed on 12 August 2020. Cathay issued 195 million new preference shares of HK$100 each to Aviation 2020, a company of which the Hong Kong government has ultimate ownership. The per annum dividend rate on the shares is 3% for the first three years, 5% for the fourth year, 7% for the fifth year, and 9% thereafter. These are not redeemable at the option of Aviation 2020, while Cathay may at any time redeem all or some of the preference shares, at the HK$100 issue price plus any outstanding obligation arising from the dividend policy.

Pratt & Whitney Canada and ATR have agreed to combine efforts to make PW127 series engines compatible with pure sustainable aviation fuel by 2025. European turboprop manufacturer ATR has previously disclosed its aim to obtain 100% SAF certification for its ATR 42/72 family by the same year. P&WC's latest-generation PW127XT engine, which entered service last year as a new standard on ATR turboprops, is designed for full SAF use. But earlier iterations of the powerplant are certificated for 50% SAF blends with fossil-based kerosene, as is typical for current-generation commercial aircraft and engines. "Our collaboration with ATR will be underway throughout 2023 and 2024 and builds on our recent 100% SAF test flight with Swedish airline Braathens Regional Airlines," states P&WC vice-president sales and marketing Anthony Rossi. In June 2022, the two manufacturers and BRA jointly conducted a test flight from Malmo to Stockholm with one of the airline's PW127M-powered ATR 72-600s operating on full SAF. The airframer's chief executive, Nathalie Tarnaud Laude, says the trial demonstrated that ATR aircraft are SAF-ready. "Now, we need to continue to join forces to increase SAF availability, as part of our common journey towards net zero," she adds.

The regulatory and certification processes of the US Federal Aviation Administration faced scrutiny during a hearing on 7 February in Washington DC as the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee prepares to draft a new FAA authorisation bill. US lawmakers every five years pass an FAA reauthorisation bill to set funding and priorities for the agency. The current legislation enacted in 2018 expires on 30 September. One of the committee’s witnesses, Pete Bunce, chief executive of the General Aviation Manufacturers Association trade group, complained to lawmakers about what he perceives to be the FAA’s slowness in rulemaking, along with the lack of experience among the agency’s new recruits. Both factors, he says, impair US aviation safety and technological advancement. "Some of these really large rules go up and they sit at FAA legal or they go into the black hole of DOT [Department of Transportation] or get delayed in the transmission at OMB [Office of Management and Budget], and just sit there and sit there," Bunce says. "All the while, EASA [European Union Aviation Safety Agency] promulgates the rules, as they should because they were part of the rulemaking committee, and that becomes the world standard for the rule. There is something wrong with that process." Because of delays in rulemaking and certification, he adds, specialists at the FAA spend much of their time considering and granting to aviation manufacturers exemptions and special conditions. If a rule had already been “out there”, manufacturers would merely have to show it complied with that rule “and the FAA just checks that”. "[Granting exemptions and special conditions] sucks up resources that doesn't allow us to do the technology improvements [and] move the ball forward because the resources just aren't there. And that causes delay after delay after delay." Bunce notes that new hires in the FAA's aircraft certification workforce are only making a bad situation worse. "Forty percent of that workforce has less than two years of experience." Certain incidents need not occur if FAA personnel can act with more speed, Bunce says, referring to the narrowly-avoided aircraft collision on 13 January at runways at New York JFK International airport, along with another runway near miss on 4 February at Austin-Bergstrom airport. We’ve got to fix the training,” Bunce says. “Then we can have accountability in the workforce with timelines [so] we can [have] technology that will allow a pilot to see if somebody’s been cleared for take-off on the runway because they can actually see the pictorial display in the cockpit or a safe taxi route if somebody is on an active runway… But we’ll never be able to certify that technology unless we have the technicians available and the rules to facilitate it.” David Boulter, the FAA's acting associate administrator for aviation safety, told lawmakers that Bunce was correct in his assessment that some specialists working within aircraft certification at the agency lacked experience amid an acceleration in the development of aviation technology. "The pace of technology, as we all know, has increased, but the pace of our process has not," Boulter says. "My number one goal as an aviation safety organisation it to get that speed but without ever degrading safety." Boulter acknowledges that the FAA has recruited for its aircraft certification function "a higher volume than normal" of people "with not a lot of experience". "Some of these people come from industry and others come right out of college. We look at this as an opportunity. I agree with [Bunce] that we need to look for unique ways to train folks up and maybe accelerate their training beyond on-the-job training." Congress lately has been “very generous” to the FAA with its budget, Boulter says, enabling it in 2022 to add 200 additional people to its aviation safety workforce, following the 200 staff it hired during 2021. "Having folks of all different backgrounds and different skills really will help us in the long run. It's going to be a little bit of pain in the short run, obviously, with that many folks in training. But some of the training that we have – we can accelerate that." The FAA owes a regulatory path to new entrants such as electric aircraft developers, Boulter says, adding that safety needs to remain its primary concern. "[We need to] build those paths for technology to make sure that we don't leave people wondering what the path is to operation. But what does operation look like? What are the certification standards of the aircraft going to look like? We're really focused on how do we move faster but at the same time be deliberative to the point of using our tools for risk analysis, and [to] improve safety."