Ever wondered what happens when a larger aircraft clips a smaller aircraft with its wingtip?  Wonder no more:

The Air France A380 hit the tail of the Comair (Delta) CRJ-700 Monday evening and spun the CRJ-700 around by 90 degrees.  Listen to the ATC audio on this clip:

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Watch the videos of the Virgin Galactic WhiteKnight Two and SpaceShip Two lining up with a Virgin America flight to land at SFO.  Sometimes, things are just that cool.

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Airline CEO Doug Parker says that there is one more big merger deal to be done in the United States and that is with his airline, US Airways.    Parker’s comment was made during US Airways recent media day.

The question is, who?  I’ve said before that US Airways and AA could actually do a nice deal when it comes to the complementary nature of the two airlines but I have also noted that you would be combining two airlines with very bad union relations right now.    Furthermore, neither has the cash to do the deal and a stock swap is just swapping one so-so share for another. 

The truth is, I think US Airways has something AA needs.  The executive team.  The US Airways executive team manages to deliver profits despite being an airline with not a lot of international traffic and an airline with no hub that anyone views as particularly strategic.   I would like to see that team manage American Airlines’ resources.  I think we would all be pleasantly surprised financially.

I actually don’t see a partner for US Airways.  Not right now.  It isn’t an low cost carrier (ironically enough, US Airways stock symbol is LCC) as the models are two widely apart.  It isn’t an airline that shares a similar fleet as US Airways flies Boeing and Airbus and within the Airbus fleet, it flies two somewhat dissimilar fleets of A320 series aircraft. 

I cannot identify an airline that has a strategic position that would complement US Airways routes without being a clash in every other way.  JetBlue owns JFK and an Airbus fleet but the clash in cultures and everything else makes me shudder.  The same is true for Frontier Airlines.

Southwest has no interest in them.  They simply identify where US Airways is strong and then move in to compete with them.  Southwest wins and US Airways moves along to another place.

SuperLegacies?  They don’t need US Airways.  There is no real route rationalization to be had in many cases and the few places where one SuperLegacy might want more dominance are places where anti-trust regulation is unlikely to grant it.

Right now, US Airways is on its own and that’s OK.  This is a profitable airline and, in many cases, more profitable than SuperLegacies.  5 years from now may prove differently but I don’t see it in the next 2 years or even 3.

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Airbus was the first commercial airliner manufacturer to introduce full authority fly-by-wire into its aircraft.  The A320 was the first with the A330/A340 following it.  Airbus aircraft use a sidestick controller which resembles a computer game joystick to control its aircraft instead of a “yoke”.

Can you name the next commercial airliner manufacturer to introduce fly-by-wire technology?

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One has to hand it to the Airbus PR machine and COO John Leahy.  Those guys could spin a strike as an innovative development for their aircraft line. 

One of  the latest claims from these fine folks is that the A320NEO is already the best selling commercial aircraft ever.   Not so fast.  While the NEO has racked up some good orders, much of what Airbus is counting as orders are actually just memorandums of understanding.   They are not firm orders in the sense of what Boeing would count as an order.  But it does have some good momentum and that’s great for that product.  It’s getting the kind of updates it really needs and that’s good for anyone operating the A320 series aircraft.

Yes, there is rampant speculation that the NEO could have 600 orders by this summer’s airshow in Paris but let’s see if that develops first before we proclaim world domination.

Mr. Leahy also puts forth the idea that because the NEO has the potential to last until 2030, Boeing will ultimately have to decide to do a 737 re-engine itself.  He also has decided that technology won’t be advanced enough for a new aircraft (Boeing or Airbus) until far past 2020, the date Boeing says it could come up with something to replace the 737.

Coming up with a better, more efficient airliner is a matter of engineering, not developing unknown technologies.  If there is a business case that funds the new aircraft development, then the aircraft can be built.  If anything, Airbus’ decision to do the NEO actually advances Boeing’s business case for doing a new development.  Why?  Because Airbus’ adoption of the CFM LEAP 56 and Pratt & Whitney GTF engines will encourage those companies to mature their products faster, not slower.  The faster those engines mature, the more ready they are for a newly developed 737 replacement.

Mr. Leahy thinks Boeing will re-engine.  I think Boeing will do a new development.  In fact, I think as the case for a new development gets stronger, Boeing may well pull in its date that it could be done by to as early as 2018 or just 7 years from now.  I think John Leahy desperately wants Boeing to keep the 737 because it allows the Airbus to remain competitive.  Most independent observers feel the Airbus A320NEO only manages to deliver trip costs that are equal to Boeing’s current 737, not exceed them.   If Boeing can deliver a 20%+ improvement on trip costs with a new family of aircraft in a timely manner, it clobbers Airbus’ product line right out of the door and Boeing won’t promise what it can’t deliver.

There is one thing about Airbus that really annoys me and, in my opinion, causes trouble in the aviation world and that is its bombastic claims.  I get rather tired of tossing cold water at a company that is actually producing a great, competitive product simply because they cannot be content to be a world player in the aviation world and desire to continually proclaim themselves the World’s Greatest Ever.

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Since the Southwest decompression incident last Friday, there have been a number of parties suddenly using the event to promote an agenda.  The DoT and FAA have both acted more politically than anyone would necessarily like to see.  In fact, I believe a number of people have failed to see what went right in this incident such as a successful emergency descent and safe landing.  A recovery that was so smooth, all but one passenger continued on their flight when a replacement aircraft was sent.

Now the TWU (Transport Workers Union) is calling for the FAA to clamp down on maintenance being down out of the United States.  What they would really like is for it to be forbidden altogether.  Sadly, this is much more about jobs than it is about safety.  The reality is that if maintenance done outside the United States was the hazard that the TWU would have you believe, we would have catastrophes happening left and right.  The fact is that air travel in the United States over the past 10 years is vastly more safe (by inicidents and type of incidents) than it has ever been before. 

We don’t have lax safety procedures.  We really don’t.  An unpredicted and unpredictable event happened and the good news is that everything that was supposed to happen if the unforeseen happened did actually happen.  the hole in the fuselage was contained, the aircraft performed an emergency descent with no further issues and the aircraft was landed safetly with no substantive injuries.  And for every event remotely similar to this over the past 10 years, the outcome was the same.

Making political hay out of this or any other event is irresponsible and unsafe.  When you begin to allow political motiviations control the ultimate outcome of these situations, you lose the transparency that actually makes this industry safe.  Who wants to self report unsafe events and incidents if they know they’ll be crucified for it politically?

This is my criticism of how France approaches such things.  By opening criminal investigations into air disasters, they encourage people to not cooperate, not self report and, worst of all, not engage in self examination with a goal of avoiding or eliminating the problem in the future.

The most responsible thing that could be done in this event would be to let the NTSB do its job, make its recommendations and then follow those recommendations.   Allowing anyone to “score” politically as a result of this incidents puts us all more at risk.

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American Airlines and Japan Air Lines can now start cooperating over the Pacific and that can’t come too soon.  JAL is emerging from bankruptcy and while it has new financing, it still has a lot of work to do.  Combine the exit from bankruptcy with the recent earthquake/tsunami disaster and you’ve got an airline that has a lot of struggles ahead of it. 

American Airlines also is suffering.  Projected by some to have as much as $1billion in losses for 2011, AA needs to get some things right.  It’s now starting to benefit from its trans-Atlantic cooperation with British Airways, Iberia and other smaller Oneworld partners but only time will tell if that is truly successful.

Oneworld partner, International Consolidated Airlines Group (British Airways / Iberia Airlines) has also just expressed an interest in taking a stake in JAL when it is re-listed for stock exchanges.  This is Oneworld bringing the network closer together among partners.

AA and JAL can now cooperate similarly and both would be wise to consolidate some service between the US and Japan for the near future.  Rather than see a splashy introduction, I think we’ll see both of these airlines act as quickly and as seriously as they can to preserve their revenues on flights between the two countries.  This partnership is defensive rather than offensive in the manner of the trans-Atlantic pact.

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In the last few days, there have been a lot of airliner incidents reported in the media.  Southwest Airlines had one 737 experience decompression after a hole developed in a fuselage of a 737-300.  Another Southwest Airlines 737 diverted due to flight crew smelling smoke in the cabin.  To make matters worse, during inspections of 737-300s, Southwest discovered two more aircraft with sub-surface cracking in their fuselsages.  An American Airlines flight diverted after a few passengers and flight crew became dizzy and another AA aircraft, a 767, had to return to the airport after taking off because of a suspected tail strike on take-off.  A regional jet flew into a flock of birds and suffered major damage to its nose cone and body. 

It seems like there have been several other incidents over the past few weeks as well but are things suddenly unsafe?  No, not really.  I just named 4 flights out of several thousands that have taken place over the past few days.  Statistically speaking, they are insignificant.   One thing that drives reporting of these events is whether or not it is a slow news day.  Over the past few days, we’ve had little news to block out less significant reports related to airliners.   Japan and its disaster is settling down in the news and Libya news has settled a fair bit as well.  When things are quiet, airliner incidents get reported and the more prominent the airline is, the more its incidents get reported as well.

It’s safe, go fly.

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The latest stats on airline complaints have Delta at the top with 2 complaints per 100,000 passengers and Southwest at the bottom with just .27 complaints per 100,000 passengers.  The legacy airlines (and many of their regional airlines) occupy the worst positions with LCCs and smaller airlines doing the best.  Does that mean that bigger is worse?

No, not really.  Southwest Airlines carries a tremendous number of passengers but it carries them on shorter flights and most flights are “point to point” rather than hub flying.  In fact, the better airlines tend to be more “point to point” flyers and the worst airlines are those with exceptionally heavy hub flying.    Does that mean hub flying is bad?

No, not really.  It’s notable that Airtran which definitely uses hubs occupied a low complaint position despite being heavily hubbed out of Atlanta, home of Delta Airlines. 

If anything, I would argue that it indicates just how much an airline values a customer and their repeat business.  Those airlines holding bad positions sacrifice service to maintain revenue and in many instances that works out OK for them.  However, those airlines who pretty much always show profits in good times and bad are the ones that are occupying the best positions. 

There is a lesson there for airlines:  Value your passengers total experience and they’ll value the services you offer.

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United Airlines flight attendants (comprised of about 15,000 United employees and 9,000 Continental employees) will be voting on which union will represent them in the merged companies I like to call ContiUnited. 

United (old) flight attendants have been severely unhappy with United since they lost their pension in bankruptcy in 2002.  The blame has often aimed at United Chairman Glenn Tilton and employee groups at United (old) have made it clear they intend to get what is theirs with this merger including the Flight Attendants.

It’s been my observation that Continental crews haven’t viewed their merger with United with great enthusiasm either.  Continental crews have had pretty good working conditions, good industry salaries and have been rewarded with the company’s success.  That experience has been seen to be at risk since United (old) employees typically outnumber Continental employees in the same jobs.

This vote will be won by the United (old) flight attendants and expect Continental flight crews to be displeased by this.  Jeff Smisek, CEO of United and formerly CEO of Continental, has been exceptionally quiet during this merger and hasn’t put much of a “one team” spin on this merger in the public in my opinion.  As times passes, this merger appears, from the employee perspective, to be less and less a merger of equals and more and more one of Continental executives taking over United operations.

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In light of Southwest Airlines’ 737 decompression, I thought I would offer a bit of trivia on the 737.

Question 1:  How many family iterations has the 737 seen?

Question 2:  How long has the 737 been in production?

Question 3:  How many engines brands have been offered for each variant of the 737?

Question 4:  What airliner was the world’s most popular before the 737 overtook that place?

Answers after the fold:

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Southwest Airlines has had another 737 develop a hole in its fuselage while in flight.  The aircraft suffered a rapid decompression, performed an emergency descent from 36,0000 to 11,000 feet and then landed at Yuma’s airport. 

According to one passenger account in the media, the hole was about 3 feet long but I would cautiou that these accounts often are wrong.  Passengers were met with another aircraft and the flight continued onwards to Sacremento.  One passenger hitched a ride with a family relative in a Cessna 182.

Southwest has announced that it is grounding its 737-300 fleet for emergency inspections.  This particular aircraft was delivered in 1996 which is neither particularly old nor particularly young for such an aircraft. 

A little less than 2 years ago, another Southwest flight from Nashville to Baltimore also developed a hole in its upper fuselage and had to divert to an airport in West Virginia.  That hole was slightly larger than 1 square foot and was later determined to be caused by metal fatigue.

Is Southwest or this aircraft type unsafe?  No, not really.  I do suspect that we’ll see some recommendations come out of this event with respect to inspecting for metal fatigue more frequently.  Southwest’s aircraft isn’t really old at all by any standards but Southwest does tend to perform many cycles (a landing and takeoff together is a “cycle”) each day with its aircraft compared to many airlines.  The numbers of cycles an aircraft takes on is far more important than its actual age or how many miles it has flown.

Expect some delays if you’re flying Southwest as they have 81 of this aircraft type in its fleet and until inspections can be performed, Southwest is liable to have a shortage of aircraft for its flights since 81 aircraft represents not quite 15% of its overall fleet.

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Pratty & Whitney has done pretty well this week.  First off, they’ve won the IndiGo order for the Airbus A320NEO and that is a big order over time.   150 aircraft is nothing to sneeze at.  P&W already is in development on this engine for Bombardier (CSeries) and Mitsubishi’s regional jet.  In addition, COMAC has now expressed interest in this engine for its 919 developement. 

At first glance, P&W appears to be getting interest from the little knowns but that’s simply because they’re the ones with new aircraft in development.  The Airbus A320NEO adds legitimacy and the order for IndiGo’s A320NEOs solidifies it.

It does strike me that airline industry appears attracted to the perceived greater promise of the GTF.  When does the GE/Snecma CFM LEAP 56 engine start gaining interest?  It’s noticeably silent in that area so far.

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