American Airlines expects to defer up to 18 Boeing 737 Max deliveries in the coming years but still anticipates acquiring 18 new Max from Boeing this year. The company is also deferring delivery of some Airbus A321s, American president Robert Isom says on 12 November. American currently has 24 737 Max in its fleet – all in storage due to the type’s grounding. Additionally, Boeing has in its inventory another 16 737 Max that it produced for American but, due to the grounding, has not yet delivered, says American. American intends to take delivery of those aircraft, plus another two it has on order, starting when the Federal Aviation Administration lifts the type’s grounding. Boeing predicts that will happen before year end. “Those 18 aircraft – we want them to come in,” Isom says, speaking during a transportation conference hosted by financial services company Baird. American reached a settlement with Boeing related to the delayed delivery of those jets, he adds. The Fort Worth-based airline is also scheduled to receive another 18 737 Max between 2021 and 2022. But American holds rights with Boeing to defer those deliveries. Market conditions would have to “get much, much better” for American to take those jets as scheduled, Isom says. “Assumptions are, over time, that they will be deferred.” The carrier has also deferred delivery of “four to five” A321s it had been scheduled to receive in 2021, he adds. The deferrals come as American has otherwise overhauled its fleet by retiring some 150 jets, including 757s, 767s, Embraer 190s and A330s. The retirements help streamline American’s pilot-training requirements and mean the carrier needs fewer pilots, Isom says. American aims to strip $1 billion from its 2020 costs through fleet changes and other cost-cutting measures. This year the carrier cut its workforce by about 40,000 staff, or roughly 30% of its 133,700-strong workforce at the end of 2019.

Source: Cirium

JetBlue Airways is the latest US carrier to announce plans to unblock middle seats, citing research showing passengers face a low risk of catching coronavirus on an aircraft. The New York-based low-cost carrier says on 12 November it will gradually remove seat blocks and open all seats from 8 January, following studies showing aircraft are “as safe or substantially safer than other more common settings.” “With the science validating the safety of the aircraft cabin, JetBlue will phase out seat blocks by early 2021,” chief operations officer Joanna Geraghty writes in a note published on the carrier’s website. “We have always been confident that the potential for transmission on the aircraft is extremely low,” she adds. JetBlue will cap loads at 70% until 1 December, after which it will raise that number to 85% through 7 January. After that, all seats will be available for booking. When the global pandemic began earlier this year, most airlines blocked middle seats, giving customers more space for social distancing. Airlines hoped that keeping passengers separated would encourage them to return to the air sooner. But as time passed and financial pressures on airlines mounted, many carriers, including Spirit Airlines, United Airlines and American Airlines, stopped the practice. Southwest Airlines has said it will begin unblocking middle seats on 1 December. That leaves Delta Air Lines the only other major US carrier to continue blocking the seats through early January. US airline lobby group Airlines for America (A4A), of which JetBlue is a member, said earlier in the day that the top nine US passenger airlines are still burning upwards of $180 million daily, and are desperately looking for ways to save money and generate revenue. So far this year, the nine have posted a combined $36 billion in losses. Industry analysts have said it is unrealistic to expect airlines to continue blocking middle seats in the long term. Hospital-grade air filters in aircraft along with enhanced cleaning protocols and personal protective equipment such as face coverings have been proven to be effective measures to limit or stop the spread of the virus on aircraft, studies have shown.

Source: Cirium

Pre-flight testing for coronavirus only makes sense if it is delivered before passengers arrive at airports, in the view of Ryanair group chief executive Michael O’Leary. “It’s too late, it takes too long, and what do you do in the middle of a terminal when you’ve a couple of positive tests?” O’Leary said of airport testing during the World Travel Market conference on 10 November. He adds, however, that “we’re generally supportive of pre-departure testing”, but that it should be within “72 hours or 36 hours” of departure. Under such a system, “people should be coming to airports with negative tests”, he explains, meaning that with “certainly in short-haul within Europe, we can go back to flying with reasonable confidence, with reasonable security”, without the patchwork of quarantine requirements that currently exist across the carrier’s network. O’Leary also laments the lack of mass testing of the general population within individual countries, which he believes would help to control the spread of the virus. In recent weeks, Ryanair has criticised the policies adopted by the Irish and UK governments around Covid-19 travel restrictions. In the wider industry, airlines body IATA and airports association ACI World have been lobbying for an internationally recognised pre-flight testing regime to replace quarantine requirements for arriving passengers. Their proposals to the European Union – made in mid-September in conjunction with airlines body A4E – suggested both pre-airport and at-airport testing as viable options. The European Union Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) and the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) announced in late October that they are working on a common testing protocol for travellers within the EU, with their proposals due soon.


Source: Cirium