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FEBRUARY 2013 PAGE 62
THE FLYING COLUMN
Aviation with Gerry O’Hare
Waiting Game
AIR CANADA has announced its
new low-cost carrier and leisure group under a new brand, Air Canada Rouge. initially to fly routes which are new for Air Canada to Venice, Athens, Edinburgh and several destinations in Cuba, Costa Rica, Dominican Republic, and Jamaica. Service will primarily be out of Toronto initially, with two flights a week to Athens from Montreal. Rouge’s B767s will have a three-class configuration with 282 seats, including 230 economy, or ‘rouge,’ seats; 28 “rouge plus” premium economy seats with more legroom; and 24 “premium rouge” seats. Air Canada’s last remaining 767 will fly Dublin to Toronto in summer 2013, leading to rumours Dublin may become a Rouge route in 2014.
NORWEGIAN Air Shuttle is to operate Dublin-Helsinki next summer twice weekly April 14-October 26, competing with Aer Lingus. Norwegian Air Shuttle ASA warned it will go outside Norway to register the B787 planes it has purchased for long-haul flights unless the government loosens up labour laws. Norwegian plans to begin flying to New York and Bangkok next summer, but it may need to register the planes in Sweden or another country in order to hire foreign staff.
Ryanair pushes ‘fresh concessions’ in takeover bid
LUFTHANSA’s Dublin Frankfurt morning flight departure will be one hour earlier during summer 2013 than before (at 05.45), as the current winter times continue. Dublin-Munich increases to 3 weekly between May 1 and October 2. A Wednesday A319 flight has been added. SCHIPHOL airport is to be moved
from a six to a seven wave hub.
RYANAIR has received the last of its ordered B737-800 aircraft from Boeing, making 350 delivered, 305 in service. Ryanair said. “We remain ready to place a significant order for more aircraft if and when we can reach a sensible pricing agreement with one of the manufacturers.”
WALES government wants to buy Cardiff Airport from its current owners, First Minister Carwyn Jones has announced. He said an agreement had been reached with owner TBI and it will work towards a purchase over the next few months. Passenger numbers fell in the first half of the year to 440,000 from 558,000, which the airport said was mostly caused by the decision by low-cost carrier bmibaby to end its Cardiff flights. The airport reported a 2011 operating loss of £319,000. CYPRUS Airways is asking the state for an additional €73m as part of a restructuring plan to make the company viable. This would be over and above €31m requested earlier this year, with €15m already granted.
ETIHAD is buying a 70pc stake in Air Berlin's frequent-flyer scheme. Air Berlin said it expected cash proceeds of €184.4m from the sale of the 'topbonus' scheme - more than the whole company's market value. Under the deal, Air Berlin will keep 30pc of the scheme, which has 3.1 million members.
Ryanair’s chances of EU approval for their Aer Lingus takeover bid are about one in three yanair has offered fresh con- competitor to bolster its Irish opera- ing its Aer Lingus stake if regulators cessions in December to Eu- tion, five years after the EU blocked turned down a “revolutionary” packropean Union antitrust an earlier takeover attempt because it age of concessions. The airline has regulators reviewing its €694m bid would create a monopoly for Irish said it could exit all 46 Dublin routes flights. The bid has also drawn oppo- that overlap with Aer Lingus and that for Aer Lingus. The EU’s antitrust authority in sition from Aer Lingus management several rival carriers are interested in competing at Irish airports. Brussels extended until Feb. 27 its and Irish politicians. Ryanair last month received formal Ryanair is also facing a full invesdeadline to rule on the deal, according to a website filing today. It didn’t antitrust objections from the Euro- tigation by the U.K.’s Competition give details of Ryanair’s offer. The pean Commission, listing the regula- Commission of its holding in the carrier’s previous offer to allay possi- tor’s competition concerns with the smaller carrier after the national regble antitrust problems failed to con- deal. The antitrust agency said in Au- ulator said it may lead to higher vince regulators who didn’t send it to gust that the takeover could eliminate prices. When Leo Varadkar said he would rival airlines for their comments, ac- competition on a large number of routes because the two airlines are not sell the government share holding cording to two people familiar with each other’s closest competitors and to Ryanair, Ryanair responded by saythe matter. ing Varadkar had has no power to Ryanair, which owns 29.8 percent few new competitors are likely. Ryanair Chief Executive Officer block Ryanair’s offer “if we acquire a of Aer Lingus, in June renewed its pursuit to buy the rest of the smaller Michael O’Leary said in September shareholding of 50pc or more.” that the company would consider sell-
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NEW EU AIR INCIDENTS DATA RULES
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he European Commission has proposed new rules for the better protection of air passengers. The rules aim to achieve a decreased number of aircraft accidents and fatalities through better use of
data on occurrences. An occurrence is defined as any type of event significant in the context of aviation safety which might not have resulted in an accident but which merits being collected and analysed. In addition, new rules
would promote more efficient exchange of information between member states. This legislative proposal is the core element of the future European aviation safety system which aims to shift Europe towards a
proactive and evidencebased safety system, i.e. a system that attempts to foresee and prevent accidents based on the collection and analysis of data, rather than simply reacting after accidents.