There are signs that a long-running multinational blockade by Arab states against Qatar might be easing, after an agreement was reached to open airspace and other borders between Qatar and Saudi Arabia. The agreement has been disclosed by Kuwaiti foreign affairs minister Ahmed Nasser Al-Muhammad Al-Sabah, on the eve of a Saudi-hosted summit of the Gulf Co-operation Council. Al-Sabah confirms the agreement to open air, sea and land borders and refers to the summit as offering an opportunity for “fraternal relations free of abnormality”. Four countries – Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Egypt and the United Arab Emirates – imposed the blockade on Qatari flights and other interests in June 2017. Qatar Airways experienced heavy losses in its fiscal year 2019-20, which ended just before the onset of the deepest impact of the pandemic. It describes the blockade, which it is challenging through ICAO, as “illegal” and stated in its most recent annual report that “little change” had occurred despite the Qatari government’s appeals to international organisations. The Kuwaiti government has served as a mediator in the dispute. Kuwait’s emir, Nawaf Al-Sabah, spoke to Saudi Arabia’s crown prince Mohammed bin Salman bin Abdulaziz Al-Saud and the Qatari emir Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani ahead of the GCC summit in Al-Ula, due to begin on 5 January. GCC secretary general Nayef Falah Al-Hajraf had formally delivered, at the end of December, an official invitation from the king of Saudi Arabia to the Qatari emir to attend the summit. Saudi Arabia’s crown prince states that the kingdom’s policy is based on a “solid approach” aimed at “achieving the ultimate interests of the GCC member states and the Arab countries”. UAE foreign affairs minister Anwar Gargash describes the Al-Ula summit as “historic”, through which participants will “restore Gulf cohesion”, without referring specifically to the UAE’s policy regarding the blockade on Qatar.

The Federal Aviation Administration will soon require aircraft manufacturers to fully consider how various cockpit warnings might affect the ability of pilots to properly respond to failures. The requirements are laid out in a US funding law that seeks to address many concerns brought forth by two Boeing 737 Max crashes. The law requires the FAA to adopt, within one year, a recommendation from the National Transportation Safety Board that applies to “system safety assessments”. Those assessments are part of a process through which aircraft manufacturers, when designing and certificating aircraft, assign risk levels to various system failures. The risk levels are based on assumptions about how pilots will respond to failures. Within one year, the FAA must require that manufacturers’ safety assessments “consider the effect of all possible flight deck alerts and indications on pilot recognition and response”, the law says. That provision applies specifically to safety assessments that address instances when pilots must take “immediate and appropriate… corrective actions” in response to “uncommanded flight control inputs”. The law also requires that manufacturers take steps to ensure their designs are safe even when pilots respond to failures in unanticipated ways. Additionally, within two years, new aircraft types must have improved flight crew alerting systems. Specifically, aircraft will need an alerting system that “displays and differentiates among warnings, cautions and advisories, and includes functions to assist the flight crew in prioritising corrective actions and responding to systems failures”. The measures seek to address ongoing concerns that pilots can become overwhelmed by, and struggle to properly respond to, failures of advanced aircraft systems. The NTSB’s report into the two Max crashes notes that Boeing’s safety assessments for that jet “did not evaluate all the potential alerts and indications that could accompany a failure” of the Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System (MCAS). “The assumptions that Boeing used in its functional hazard assessment of uncommanded MCAS function for the 737 Max did not adequately consider and account for the impact that multiple flight deck alerts and indications could have on pilots’ responses to the hazard,” the NTSB concluded. Boeing declines to comment about the aircraft certification provisions in the law, signed on 27 December by President Donald Trump. “The FAA is reviewing the certification language that was included in the funding bill and will work to implement the changes as directed by Congress,” the agency says.

European air traffic will this year reach only 51% of 2019's levels, with the pace of recovery accelerating from summer onwards, air traffic manager Eurocontrol has predicted. In a research paper released at the start of the year, Eurocontrol also estimates that traffic levels will be 50-60% down during the "first months" of 2021, and warns that a complete recovery is unlikely until 2026. This assumes a progressive vaccine deployment across Europe that fails to provide full coverage and eradicate Covid-19. Under such a scenario, traffic would in 2022 reach 72% of 2019's levels by mid-year. Even in Eurocontrol's most optimistic scenario, traffic does not regain 2019's levels until 2024. "Substantial failures will occur in 2021, highlighting the need for financial support to the entire industry," argues Eurocontrol. "In 2020, the vast majority of state support was allocated to airlines, typically legacy/scheduled carriers; State support is needed to support the wider aviation value chain, especially the airport community." Eurocontrol is also calling for greater clarity on slot exemptions, as well as progress on the Single European Sky. Looking back over 2020, it notes that the coronavirus crisis has cut 1.7 billion from European passenger numbers, leading to €56.2 billion ($69.1 billion) in net losses for airlines, airports and air navigation service providers. Intra-European traffic was down 54%, while traffic between Europe and the rest of the world fell 59%. "Major reductions in the number of flights were exacerbated by extremely low load factors," notes Eurocontrol. "Those flights that did take place in 2020 were typically at best half full." It cites data showing European airline load factors remaining constant at around 50%-60% since early summer, having recovered from a low point of around 27% in April.