A nice mid-afternoon laugh:

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One year later and we still haven’t seen airlines being fined left and right for delays and we still haven’t seen the forecasted crippling effect the three hour rule was predicted to have by airlines.

There have been a number of delays exceeding 3 hours and the FAA continues to investigate these but no fines have resulted so far.  At this time, the FAA seems to be approaching this subject carefully with respect to both the public and the airline industry and that’s good.

After a year, I also think that we could change this rule and offer a bit more “cushion” to airlines.  4 hour limits seem more appropriate at this point and why not impose them upon foreign airlines flying international routes into and out of the United States?

The issue of delays appears to be largely solved and no one is being severely impacted by the solution by all appearances.  If anything, the rule has had the effect of giving airlines the motivation to plan better and cancel flights that, in the past, should have been cancelled.

With all of that said, I would still maintain that we still need at least another year or so to truly judge its effect on the airline industry.

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French parliamentarians went a bit crazy and became furious with Air France’s decision to accept bids from both Boeing and Airbus for 100 mid-sized widebody jets.

Boeing’s 787 and Airbus’ A350 are in the running and Air France officials have said that it is likely to be a split purchase.

France continues to own a stake in Air France and is also one of two major stakeholders in Airbus.

I find this ironic since Air France has found it very economical to use Boeing’s 777-200/300 aircraft and owns 60 at present.  The 787 fits nicely into their plans since the transition from a 777 to a 787 is short and easily accomplished.  The transition from an A340/330 aircraft to the A350 is sure to be similarly easy. 

Politics in the airline world inside France is always nationalistic but this move is just a bit too overt for our taste.

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In a deal tentatively agreed upon and subject to Frontier Pilots Association ratifying it, Frontier pilots will get an equity stake in Frontier Airlines. 

Parent company, Republic, led by CEO Bryan Bedford, has so far struggled to make Frontier truly work under its business plan.  Why?  In Frontier’s case, it was based upon lower oil prices (aka lower fuel prices) than exist today.

While Republic’s regional airline business is continuing to do well financially, Frontier’s isn’t.  It doesn’t help that it is hubbed in Denver and surrounded by two 800lbs gorillas:  United Airlines and Southwest Airlines.

Both United Airlines and Southwest have made it clear that they are there to stay in Denver while Frontier has flailed about attempting to survive.  One has to wonder if the Southwest purchase of Frontier wouldn’t have been a better deal both for employees of Frontier as well as investors.

In hindsight, Southwest’s “loss” in the bid for Frontier now looks like a far better choice and its admirable they walked away.  Now they’ve filled spots in their route map that were “must haves” and get to integrate a fleet and flight crew that more closely matches their own.

It’s notable that Frontier is struggling in its two focus cities of Milwaukee and Denver.  Frontier is bracketed with Southwest and United in Denver and bracketed with Southwest and Airtran in Milwaukee.  

In addition, Frontier lost the man largely reseponsible for producing profits at Frontier:  Sean Menke.  Menke has just agreed to go to work for Pinnacle Airlines, a competitor of Republic.

Is Frontier over?  No.  Can it survive in the long term?  Only if it breaks out of being in entrenched battles for its cities.  So far, Frontier has mainly concentrated on building new routes to lesser cities that connect back to its Denver hub and Kansas City focus city.  It needs more coverage across the United States and there are few cities that are ripe targets for Frontier’s entrance at this point.

In addition, starting new routes is mostly only possible with Republic’s E170/190 jets as it has no more A319 jets on order and only one more A320 jet due this year.  Additional A320s are to be delivered starting in 2015.

Republic Airways does have Bombardier’s CS300 on order (40 orders and 40 options) but those aircraft aren’t due until 2014 officially and they are likely to be as much as 2 years late.

One has to question whether or not a stake in Frontier has that much value over the next several years.  In the past, airlines could survive for years and still bleed money.  Today, airlines have to manage their cash very closely and Frontier isn’t generating enough positive cash flow to have a very optimistic future.  It’s possible that Republic could keep the company afloat but only with further concessions from labor and I think that is unlikely.

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The GE90 engine, found only on Boeing’s 777 aircraft, has the highest bypass ratio of any commercial turbofan engine made at 9:1.  It also has the world record for the most power ever produced by a single commercial engine at 127,900lbs of thrust. 

Can you name the first commercially available turbo-fan and it’s bypass ratio and thrust?

The answer is after the fold. (more…)

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Delta Airlines and Virgin Australia have gotten their approvals for an anti-trust immunity agreement to cooperate across the Pacific between the United States and Australia.  They did so, in part, by promising to keep up frequencies between the two countries.

This doesn’t mean that routes won’t be rationalized.  The frequencies will stay the same, the routes won’t.   These two airlines will deploy their 777 aircraft on routes that are complimentary rather than competitive.  Expect V Australia 777s to start arriving in San Francisco to replace QANTAS’ recently withdrawn flights.

Delta’s 777-200LR aircraft can potentially make the flight between Atlanta and Sydney (although with a touch of payload restriction) and provide competition to QANTAS’ new 747-400ER flights to Dallas/Fort Worth.

And for the first time, there is real competition for the QANTAS/British Airway/American Airlines Oneworld consortium.  Virgin Australia can provide domestic connections to Delta in Australia and Delta can provide domestic connections to Virgin Australia in the United States.

John Borghetti, CEO of Virgin Australia (and formerly an executive with QANTAS) has made it clear that he intends that Virgin Australia be a strong competitor with QANTAS rather than an constant underdog and he has experience with building networks as a result of working for QANTAS for many years.

Look for quite a bit of new competition on routes between the United States and Australia and I think United is going to be the airline to take the hit.  United has pretty old aircraft with a pretty old service product and no partners in Australia to assist with feed.  They also have no new large widebody aircraft to carry passengers with either although they will have the 787-8 with which they can start direct flights to New Zealand and Australia from cities in the United States that have never traditionally seen direct flights.

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So, Delta got hit badly by a viral Youtube video made by two soldiers among a group of 30+ soldiers traveling under orders back from overseas.  Because they (the group) mostly had 4 bags instead of 3, Delta charged $2800 in extra bag fees (for the entire group) and then got pummeled with bad press for it.

Before we go further, let me say a couple of things as qualifiers.  First, I’m no fan of baggage fees although I think that when anyone is traveling with more than 2 checked bags, yes, a fee is probably in order.  Second, I am not anti-military or anti-GI whatsoever.  Their government service is appreciated by me as well as most.

Now, airlines have typically allowed 3 free bags to traveling servicemen under orders with fees for in excess of that.  That alone is exceptionally generous and it isn’t a kindess to the servicemen, it’s a kindness to the US Government and, by extension, taxpayers.  Why?  BECAUSE TRAVELING SERVICEMEN UNDER ORDERS HAVE THEIR BAG FEES PAID REIMBURSED BY THE US GOVERNMENT.

From USA Today’s story:  “Army spokesman Paul Boyce says the reservists won’t be out anything because their traveling orders stated that all excess bag charges will be reimbursed by the government.”

The airlines aren’t imposing a hardship on servicemen.  In fact, they giving the US government a considerable break on fees instead.  Why is an airline obligated to giveway services and take a hit on revenue just because its government travel by GIs?  It isn’t in my opinion.  To the contrary.  Why isn’t the US government paying for the services it receives from airlines?

In other situations, airlines would heartily argue that giving away such stuff to other parties would raise *your* ticket prices.  They wouldn’t be wrong in that argument. 

Absolutely we should support the troops.  And I (and you) contribute taxes that pay for their travel (as they should) and it should be paid for in full and responsibly.   How would we feel about airlines giving away (for free) services to other public servants?  We would probably be pretty angry and concerned about that.

This may be wholly unpopular but I would offer that Delta is not the villain here.  The US Army is culpable for not making prior arrangements to transport its troops without financial burden. 

It is inappropriate and, frankly, lacking class to make a video, put it on Youtube and turn a company into a villain for something your command structure didn’t identify and take care of.

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Southwest CEO Gary Kelly spoke about using Baltimore’s airport (Baltimore Washington International – BWI) as a “hub” for international flights some time in the future.  He described it as being a number one consideration during conversations about Southwest going international.

Before anything else, don’t go presuming that Southwest is about to buy trans-Atlantic aircraft and start low cost services to Europe.  They aren’t as there is way too much on their plates right now.  However, it is another logical area to grow into once they are done digesting Airtran in about 3 years and provided the market exists at that time.

Quite a few might question using Baltimore but it does make sense.  It is relatively uncongested and offers the ability to not just draw those in Baltimore to its flights but also from the Washington D.C. and Philadelphia areas as well.  In addition, it connects nicely to all of the cities that Southwest services in the eastern half of the United States.  Furthermore, it is likely that any LCC airline taking on such a venture need not be tied to a major international airport such as JFK or Philadelphia or Washington Dulles.  In fact, they would probably want to avoid such airports because the cost of congestion is far higher than the cost of attracting people to some place like Baltimore.

Potential customers for this kind of airline service won’t be business oriented.  These will be leisure passengers looking for a great deal.  You won’t see business class on these airplanes but I do think you’ll see assigned seating.  (Assigned seating is almost a must for a widebody aircraft, IMHO.)

What kind of aircraft?  It won’t be 757s and I don’t *think* it will be 767s.  Although, it is interesting to contemplate the economics of an all economy 767-300ER new build aircraft for trans-Atlantic flights.  Many have thought that the 767 will remain competitive on such routes vs the 787 and that might be true.  787s?  Maybe but I think Southwest might have missed the train when it comes to advantageous pricing on that aircraft and I don’t think SWA will find used 787s on the marketplace anytime soon.

Airbus A330s almost seem interesting until you consider just how many people you would have in a high density, all economy aircraft like that.  It feels like too many and the same is true for the 777-200 (but I think you could almost make a business case for early build 777-200 “A” models that are starting to be retired by airlines such as United.)   The fact is that the 767-300 or 787-8 fits the size category almost perfectly and size will drive this choice. 

So will dispatch reliability because someone like Southwest needs an aircraft they can push into high utilization for such routes.  Not only would trans-Atlantic service require good load factors but it also requires frequency that uses that aircraft on 2 to 3 segments a day.  It’s doable and it is doable with the 767.

But at the end of the day, it’s all speculative right now and I do not expect SWA to announce anything like this at all until at least 3 years have passed.  In the meantime, they’ll gain experience operating Airtran’s international flights and learn how to deal with foreign travel.  They can buy and/or engineer new IT infrastructure that will meet the needs of such flights.  In short, don’t go planning a family vacation to London quite yet.

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I had to fly to Chicago again this past weekend and took Southwest once more.  That caused me to consider Southwest as an airline with respect to where it is and what is happening with it today. 

In many respects, Southwest remains my favorite airline.  I like how they move their planes.  I like their seats and I like the prices quite a bit, too.  They still largely have a friendly and motivated staff and they take their jobs seriously.  Their service is far more consistent than many other airlines and, as an airline, they’re pretty creative in how they get the job done.

I’m also a bit irritated with them and I’m really irritated with the cities of Dallas and Fort Worth. 

I’m irritated with Southwest because of the now 3 flight attendants who have tried to either A) move my briefcase from the bin above me to the back or B) tried to convince me to move it under the chair in front of me.  All because they are unwilling to say “no” to the new business travelers they have carrying their entire life with them.  I was traveling on business each time.  I had a lot of stuff with me in fact because of the work I was doing and I still managed to check my bag.  Ironically, I got into my ride’s car in Chicago and left before several of the business travelers managed to who were waiting for taxis. 

But don’t tell me that the overhead bin is reserved for large suitcases.  Poppycock and balderdash.  They aren’t, they never were and just because you find gate checking bags difficult doesn’t mean you get to move my briefcase to the back of the plane to make it more convenient for someone else to put their large suitcase up in a bin.

I’m also irritated at their gates.   Their gates in Chicago and Dallas are cramped, hot and uncomfortable.  Even with the new “business areas”, they are cramped, hot and uncomfortable.  So much so, that I realized I was getting tired from just jockeying for a seat in a gate area.  And you know what I noticed?  Many of the seats are being taken up by people putting their large bags in the seats.  There has to be a better way.

Southwest has announced that they won’t withdraw Airtran from DFW until November 21st and now Dallas and Fort Worth mayors are being crabby about that.  Well, I tend to agree that getting that done earlier is unlikely to be a very difficult thing to do and is unlikely to inconvenience many more additional passengers.  But it irritates me because this is, in part, who Southwest has become as an airline.  They’re becoming the company that doesn’t cope with its size very well.  It’s lethargic because it lacks the IT infrastructure to deal with its size.  They could be a lot more agile than they are.

I’m irritated with the City of Dallas because Love Field really is abysmal as an airport.  Yes, it’s being renovated and that means inconveniences but that does not mean that restrooms need to be dirty and stores and restaurants need not act entitled to every last dollar bill in my wallet.  The terminal is blazing hot already and nothing has really been done to accomodate passengers during this construction.

Frankly, this is a job that should have been done 10 years ago, not scheduled for completion sometime in 2014.

The way the use of Love Field airport is being dictated even post 2014 is silly.  I get that Fort Worth wants to be a Big City and they aren’t small, for sure.  But please quit acting like your whole world crashes if airlines use Love Field.  It was the preferred airport in the Metroplex back in 1959 and remains so today.  It’s a shame that Fort Worth couldn’t support a similar airport but they couldn’t do so in the last 50 years.  DFW serves them very well and it isn’t inconvenient to most of that city. 

If Fort Worth needs more airline access, how about we let them build an airport in south west Tarrant county?   The entire Dallas / Fort Worth Metroplex has over 6 million people.  We can support more than just DFW airport these days.

But the petty squabbling that goes on between these two cities over airports is just stupid in 2011.  And both Southwest and American Airlines could stand to get a bit more real over that subject as well.  Let’s not be naive:  the reason both those airlines continue to poke and prod the city governments over the issue is driven by their desire to continue to monopolize their respective airports in the area. 

Southwest could stand to become a better airline and I think they’re actually headed towards some serious trouble.  They’re innovating on the customer side but I don’t see them investing in their infrastructure quite the way a big airline should.  Holding on to perfectly good things is fine but you must reinvest in your systems from time to time to continue to grow and compete.  Let me point out that Southwest is using a reservations system it bought from Braniff originally titled “Cowboy” and developed in the late 1960’s.  Yes, it’s basic reservations infrastructure is 50 years old and never was all that good to begin with.

Why does this irritate me?  Because I think Southwest is good and it could be really great but for how slow it is moving these days.

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Airbus has committed itself to the A320NEO series recently and Boeing continues to decide to not decide on what it will do with the 737.  All the while hinting at a new aircraft development for a 737 replacement to enter into service around 2019/2020.   Except that Boeing has also hinted from time to time that a re-engine might be in order while also saying that customers don’t want a re-engine. 

In addition, Airbus will be releasing its configuration for the A350-1000 aka 777 killer in the next few weeks.  Boeing doesn’t believe it quite meets the mark without a new wing and Airbus has said nothing about a new wing.  Right now, on paper, the 777-300ER still beats the A350-1000.  Unless Airbus releases a configuration that causes people to pause and gasp, Boeing will most likely not feel too threatened by Airbus for the time being.

And that’s why I say watch Airbus to see what Boeing does.   Boeing knows it can probably win against Airbus with a 737 replacement in the time frame it is talking about while managing to keep customers interested in the current 737 through incremental improvements that should keep the two aircraft competitive.  I’ve felt that Boeing wants to know what Airbus’ move is on the A350-1000 so it knows where to commit its resources.  If the configuration and definition for the A350-1000 moves it into competitive territory with the 777, Boeing knows it needs to get to work on improving the 777 (an exceptional moneymaker for Boeing presently) in order to not lose those customers for the next 2 decades. 

Boeing likely believes it can cover the 777-200ER territory with a 787-10 (and perhaps an incremental improvement to the -10 as an ER model later).  This leaves it free to preserve the 777-300 in its current configuration or find improvements to the existing design or even design a new aircraft family to fit above 787-10 and finish alongside the 747-8i. 

But what Boeing doesn’t want to do is commit to launching 2 new airplane programs simultaneously.  Boeing already knows what will likely happen if it does that.   

With all of that into consideration, I think that once we know the firm definition for the A350-1000, Boeing will know how to sequence its next airplane programs.  It will be either a 737RS first with a 777 replacement kicked off 3 to 4 years later or a 777 replacement first with a 737 re-engine done simulataneously and a 737 replacement coming 10 to 12 years after the re-engine. 

I strongly believe that Boeing wants to do the former sequence (737 replacement / 777 replacement) because it puts Airbus into a corner.  With this strategy, Boeing probably has an all new line of aircraft using the latest technology spanning from 150 seats to 450 seats while Airbus has the A320NEO and A350 series but with a gap between the A320NEO and A350 being filled by what will be quite the aging aircraft:  the A330.   In fact, there already is a gap, although minor, between the A320 series and the A330 series.  And make no mistake:  The A330 will begin to die in another 2 years or so as a result of the A350 and 787 developments. 

My prediction?  I think Airbus will announce nothing that threatens Boeing’s competitiveness in the 777 models.  Sometime late in the fall or early in the winter while riding on an uptick with the deliveries of the 787 and 747-8i to customers, Boeing will announce a 737 replacement program with a big airline order.  Sometime around 2017 or 2018, we’ll see Boeing announce a replacement for the 777 sized  above the 787-10 and right up alongside the 747-8i.

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A lot of airliner firsts happened in the 1950s when it comes to jet travel.  First came the Dehaviland Comet, then the Boeing 707 and Douglas DC-8.  The Russians had the Tu-104 which kind of resembled the Comet but which was really derived from a bomber aircraft.  Avro Canada even produced a airliner, the C-102 Jetliner which got killed in favor of a fighter development by Avro.  The airliner that often goes completely unnoticed in that crowd is the Convair 880. 

Question:  Why was the Convair jetliner named the 880?

Answer after the fold: (more…)

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It’s somewhat difficult to believe that the America West / US Airways merger was closed in 2005.  It’s 2011 and the US Airways pilots still don’t have a unified contract to work from.  There is no doubt that a good deal of primary fault lies with the pilots themselves who:

• Couldn’t agree on how to merge a seniority list between the two unions.
• Couldn’t agree that ALPA was their representative.
• Elected a new union in place of ALPA in order for the US East pilots to take over the union.
• Sued each other multiple times.

Now they’re suing US Airways under the supposition that US Airways has been materially altering the contract under which they’ve been working by unilaterally imposing changes.  US Airways says they think the suit has no merit.  I think the suit has merit but before it can progress, I think the pilots need to get their house in order first.  Without that done, who has standing to bring such a suit?

The pilots, both East and West, need to agree on union representation and seniority merging and then get to the business of negotiating a contract.  Sadly, the business of negotiating a contract can take from 2 to 4 years and that means this may not be done before 2015 or 10 years after the merger.  You can’t blame US Airways for taking advantage of that situation either.  Who wouldn’t?  It keeps costs low and they’ve clearly found a way to operate their airline on two different contracts.

The biggest enemy to US Airways pilots is the pilots themselves.

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Here is the basic summary:  The plane appears to have lost indications for speed in flight (although not in turbulence) while the Captain was taking a rest period.  The two inflight pilots systematically worked the problems but without much luck and resulting in a stall.  The captain did not take control.  The pilots appear to have “pulled up” instead of nosing over despite stall indications that were recorded.  The aircraft had gone into “alternate law” which does *not* prevent the aircraft from being flown into dangerous conditions.  The first read is that the pilots screwed up.

What gets ignored is that it also appears that the pitot tube(s) that were recording the speed of the aircraft did in fact freeze up which caused a loss of speed indication on the primary flight displays.  At their altitude, speed is a very fine envelope of conditions.  It’s possible to go too slow and too fast and the higher you go, the narrower the difference is between the two conditions.

The very puzzling thing is that 3 very, very experienced A330 pilots appear to have attempted to “pull up” (i.e. go nose up which would *slow* the plane) when things began to happen instead of pushing their nose down which would recover from a stall.  It’s always sporty recovering a stall in a large airliner but it *is* something one trains for. 

So, is it the pilots?  They may have perhaps contributed to their problem, yes.  But their actions make me wonder what information they were seeing on their backup instrumentation.  In other words, did they realize they were in a stall?  The A330 has no stick shaker and, instead, has a loud audible warning for a stall.  Presumably this could be heard on the cockpit voice record. 

The way this happened is just a bit too eery still.  With the altitude they had, there was nominally plenty of height to recover from problems.  Air France isn’t Colgan Air and they do train their pilots very, very well.  Their actions may suggest that they were reading their conditions very differently from what they actually were. 

The next step is to take this into a simulator and starting seeing and experiencing what happened and try to figure out the “why” of what happened.  This “ruling” is by no means definitive or informative necessarily.

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Omni Air International has received 180ETOPS approval to fly the 777-200ER in its operations.  Omni is purchasing these aircraft used from United Airlines and that means they’re a bit lower powered and range restricted with the Pratt & Whitney engines than you find on many airlines’ 777-200ERs today.

But it is an interesting development because now we’re seeing 777s moving into charter and freight operations.  Freight operators are purchasing new build 777-200Fs.  Omni performs a variety of charters for both leisure markets as well as the US government.  The US government charters are flights to and from the US to the Middle East/Middle Asia areas. 

I suspect that we’ll see a number of these move into Omni’s operations to displace their DC-10-30s operating those routes today.  

This is a development because it means we’re seeing airlines retire older 777s and charter operations are seeing a use for the aircraft.  That means the cost of ownership and operation for these aircraft has reached an acceptable entry level for these operations.  I would not be surprised to see someone other than Boeing develop a freighter conversion for older 777s that should begin entering the marketplace soon.

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QANTAS began flying to and from Dallas / Fort Worth International Airport just a few weeks ago and they’ve already experienced a somewhat unusual diversion.  QANTAS Flight QF8 flying from DFW to Brisbane, Australia diverted to Noumea, an island in the South Pacific, to take on additional fuel.  The diversion caused the flight to be late by 2 hours and, no doubt, a bit unprofitable.

There have also been stories of baggage being left behind to reduce weight on these flight.  The flight between DFW and Australia is arguably the longest possible on the Boeing 747-400ER.  QANTAS is the only airline to fly the -400ER and the nominal max range with maximum payload on this aircraft is 7670 nautical miles.  The shortest distance between DFW and Brisbane is 8300 nautical miles.

This means the QANTAS aircraft is already flying payload restricted to achieve the route distance so it is quite possible that some baggage is getting loaded.  Ironically, the 777-200LR could probably fly the same number of people on the same route with unrestricted payload.  This was an aircraft that QANTAS found unsuitable for purchase.

Future QANTAS 787 aircraft will be capable of flying that route and I would expect that that will be one of the first routes to see the 787 although the -8 versions will be barely capable of the flight to Brisbane as well.

QANTAS is smart and I would expect that if this becomes a trend, they’ll re-think the route or look for other equipment to put on it.   If the load factors remain consistently strong, they may well choose to put an A-380 on that route as well.  Much of this new route depends upon how much American Airlines can feed traffic to it and I suspect they can feed quite a bit. 

The thing is, the last thing they want is this flight developing a reputation for taking even longer due to diversions.

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