Category: Aviation News

Ryanair intends to launch a no-frills long-haul airline around the turn of the decade serving five or six US cities from its 23 European bases and offering fares as low as $12.

The new carrier will operate independently of Ryanair with its own executives and board and a different name and buy a fleet of up to 50 Airbus A350s or Boeing 787s at a time when chief executive Michael O’Leary expects prices to dip following the current surge in orders.

With “the cheapest fare €10 ($12)”, O’Leary expects the services, to secondary airports such as Baltimore, Providence in Rhode Island and New York Long Island Islip Macarthur “to be full”. He expects sales of food, drink, duty-free goods and in-flight entertainment to be a major revenue earner.

However, the new airline will have a “premium class” pitched against “the best in the business” such as Virgin Atlantic.

Read the full article on: http://www.flightglobal.com/articles/2007/04/11/213208/ryanair-boss-michael-oleary-plans-launch-of-transatlantic-no-frills-airline-with-fleet-of-50.html

Delta Air Lines unveiled a new, boring, livery.

As it nears the end of its bankruptcy case, Delta Air Lines is preparing to roll out a new paint scheme for its jets — the third such repackaging in 10 years.

Delta is expected to unveil the new livery soon after its scheduled emergence from Chapter 11 at the end of this month. The airline isn’t saying much officially, other than to acknowledge a new paint job might be in the works as part of a larger post-bankruptcy marketing campaign.

Chief Executive Gerald Grinstein “has mentioned that it’s something that we’re looking at,” Delta spokesman Jeff Battcher said.

But word of the project has circulated around Delta and on aviation Web sites such as flyertalk.com and airliners.net.

The main feature of the new design is likely to be the return of Delta’s triangular shield logo, known as “the widget,” to the tail of its jets, according to one employee familiar with the design.

He said a working version features an all-red version of the logo on navy blue tails. The triangular logo — currently red, white and blue — also gets a new three-dimensional look but doesn’t change its basic shape, the employee said. Aircraft colors will also be tweaked, featuring a darker blue that matches recently-revamped employee uniforms, while the main fuselage color will remain white.

Big jets are flying billboards, so airlines take paint schemes seriously. Different managements also use them to put their stamp on a company or as part of broader “re-brandings.”

The current Delta design, with its wavy color bands draped across a logo-less tail, rolled out in 2000 during ex-CEO Leo Mullin’s tenure. One of Mullin’s lieutenants termed it “sophisticated and fluid,” although some wags have termed it the “beach towel” look.

…

Delta has sought to involve employee groups such as the Delta Board Council, which represents employees at meetings of the carrier’s board of directors.

Not long after he stepped in as CEO in 2004, Grinstein returned to Delta’s traditional widget logo because employees objected to a subtly re-designed version that Mullin had introduced.

But at the time, he professed little interest in a new paint scheme.

“If there’s one thing I’m not going to fiddle with now,” he said at the annual shareholders meeting that year, “it’s the livery of the aircraft.”

Source: http://www.ajc.com/business/content/business/delta/stories/2007/04/06/0406bizdelta.html

John Travolta was forced to make a landing in Shannon/Ireland on Monday while piloting his private classic Boeing 707 airliner from Munich/Germany to New York. The actor, who was jetting back to the US after promoting his new movie in Germany, landed safely after his Boeing 707 suffered an engine failture mid-flight. Nevertheless, the 53-year-old just hired another plane and completed the journey, while his jet was grounded for repairs.

LTU just renewed it’s livery. It’s now seen the first time on their brand new Airbus A330!

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A fiery object that nearly hit a Sydney-bound airliner over the Pacific may have been a meteorite or debris from a Russian satellite, New Zealand authorities say.

The Lan Chile A340 Airbus was flying between Santiago and Auckland, before heading to Australia, when it came within about 30 seconds of hitting the object about 10pm on Tuesday.

The pilots radioed air traffic controllers in New Zealand to report fiery objects falling in front and behind the plane.

Ken Mitchell from Airways New Zealand said the pilot reported the debris was falling “very close” to the plane.

“The pilot estimated the debris to be falling as close as five nautical miles (9.26 kilometres) to the aircraft,” Mitchell said.

“Certainly, a meteorite has not been ruled out and a formal investigation will determine that,” he said.

A plane spotter listening to a high-frequency radio broadcast told Fairfax media the pilot reported that a rumbling noise from the falling debris was louder than the plane.

The pilot also saw a piece of debris that lit up as it fell to earth.

Mitchell said the debris’ most likely origin was from a Russian satellite that had been decommissioned and fell to earth ahead of schedule.

He said the satellite was due to re-enter the earth’s atmosphere between 10.30am and noon on Wednesday.

“Around 10pm on Tuesday night we received notification from a Lan Chile flight enroute from Santiago to Auckland that he was experiencing what appeared to be falling space debris,” Mitchell said.

According to the Lan website, the A340 Airbus typically cruises at 976km/h, meaning the debris would have fallen just 34 seconds away from the aircraft.

The aircraft holds a maximum of 271 passengers.

Bill Sommer from New Zealand’s Civil Aviation Authority said there would be an investigation into the incident.

He said he was aware of reports that NASA had thought the falling satellite was not responsible and that a meteorite was most likely to blame for the incident.

An Aerolineas Argentinas aircraft flying enroute from Auckland to Argentina was notified of the debris, but elected to continue with the flight, Mitchell said.

“We have compiled a formal incident report and we will be filing that with our Aviation Safety Authority here in New Zealand in the next day or two,” he said.

A person from Lan Chile who answered a call to the company’s Auckland office today said information about the incident was confidential.

Source: http://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/articles/2007/03/29/1174761624562.html