top of page

AvNews 09/12/17

  • Brandon
  • Jan 7, 2018
  • 18 min read

Updates: F-HPJE flies back to Paris. F-HPJE, the Air France A380 involved in the accident of AFR66 had been ferried back to Paris from Goose Bay on December 6 as AFR371V. They flew the A380 back with a replacement engine installed. However, the engine was inoperable and just used to balance the weight. The pilots had been trained in a simulator to operate the damaged A380. The damaged engine was flown to East Midlands Airport and is being evaluated by General Electric.

Major News: Passengers arrested over crystal meth. Four passengers were arrested at Sultan Syarif Kasim II International Airport in Pekanbaru in Riau. They were arrested for carrying 5.75kg of crystal methamphetamine a.k.a. crystal meth. The four passengers, Galih Nurmantyo, Slamet, Fahmi Rizki, and Muhammad Nursahlan, were planning to fly to Bandung in West Java on Citilink 982. The meth was uncovered when officers found a rather suspicious substance on Slamet’s body at the security checkpoint at the airport.

Jaya Tahoma Sirait, the airport’s general manager said, “he was about to board his aircraft, which would depart at 9:20 am. His movements aroused our suspicion, and during a security screening, our suspicion was proven. There was something hidden in his groin. We found packages wrapped in yellow tape.”

Slamet had confessed that the substance in the packages was crystal meth and the security had locked down some areas to prevent other affiliates from leaving the building. The three other passengers were found and arrested and all three had passed the security checks. They had reported that “they were waiting for Slamet in the waiting room at the gate.”

“Each of them carried two packages. In total, we confiscated two packages of crystal meth weighing 700 grams each and four weighing 725 grams each,” said Jaya Tahoma Sirait.

Saoirse Ronan’s Aer Lingus sketch on SNL. Saoirse Ronan is an Irish and American actress who had recently acted in her own sketch based on an Aer Lingus flight. The sketch was shown on Saturday Night Live. However, the actual airline had reacted to the sketch on Twitter and gave them a piece of their mind and maybe it was for good reason as well. "We know what Aer Lingus sounds like," said Ronan.

“We can’t get through a flight without someone making an Aer Lingus comment,” Cecily Strong added. They later say the word Aer Lingus sounds like. It’s cunnilingus. As the sketch continued, more Irish-themed jokes were said like when Kate McKinnon “found a dog on the runway” or when Aidy Bryant, acting as Mave, was reading the menu which only consisted different types of potatoes. The following day the airline had tweeted, “Apparently, we were written into an #SNL sketch last night! ;) So… what do you think?” The post was accompanied by a poll

As you can tell, the response was rather… negative, some people had said it was “clichéd rubbish” and some had said that the airline should disassociate themselves from the actress. However, many people and the airline itself knew it was a joke and had also added a joke themselves, let's just say it's a great impression:

SQ422 to Mumbai almost landed at the wrong airport. Singapore Airlines 245 from Singapore to Mumbai was on final approach to what the pilots thought was runway 09 at Mumbai but was actually Juhu Airport. Singapore Airlines had commented that the incident was due to bad conditions, the conditions being poor visibility. However, ATC at Juhu said that the flight did a go-around because the pilot had mistaken Juhu as Mumbai.

The airline said, "Singapore Airlines flight SQ422, operating from Singapore to Mumbai on December 4, was scheduled to land on runway 09 at CSIA at 1035 hrs. Due to poor visibility conditions, the crew discontinued the approach to runway 09 at approximately 1,000 feet, in accordance with standard operating procedures.”

"The ATC Mumbai then vectored the flight for a subsequent approach onto runway 09 and the flight landed uneventfully at 1044 hours. At no time did the pilots of SQ 422 mistake Juhu airport as Chhatrapati Shivaji International Airport," the airline added.

The airline had denied the ATC’s story on how the pilots had mistaken Juhu for Mumbai and noted, “At no time did the pilots of SQ422 mistake Juhu airport as Chhatrapati Shivaji International Airport.”

Air New Zealand grounds some 787s. The Kiwi airline had decided to ground some of their 787s and in turn cancelling some of their international flight because of an engine problem with the Rolls-Royce Trent 1000 engines. They had grounded some of their 787s to have a check-up and maintenance on the engines after two engine related issues which caused the aircraft to return back to Auckland.

The Air New Zealand flights that had to return back to Auckland were on their way to Tokyo and Argentina when they had to make an emergency landing back at the airport due to a mechanical engine issue. Air New Zealand said that maintenance on the engines was required “sooner than previously advised”.

Two other airlines had issues with their Trent 1000 engines on their 787s, British Airways and Virgin Atlantic.

British Airways stated that they are carrying inspections on their engines and precautionary inspections as well to ensure the safety of passengers even if it means rebooking customers or offering them a refund.

Demand for pilots is soaring and airlines are hiring record numbers. This might be because airlines have opened many new routes this year as well as additional flights which obviously, in turn, results in needs for more pilots and airlines hire many of them. Southwest had hired around 880 new pilots this year. American Airlines had also been hiring many pilots, around 500 pilots were hired this year and estimate to hire 900 more next year. Many pilots who have been with airlines for many years are also coming to the end of their career which opens up positions for new pilots to join the airlines.

Those two are the main points experts have pointed to being the cause of the hiring spike in the aviation business.

Hainan Airlines: First flight to the US partly using cooking oil

About two years ago, Hainan Airlines had first flown their 787 from Beijing to Shanghai partly using cooking oil. Now, recently they have flown their 787 loaded with passengers and cargo from Beijing all the way to Chicago with a mix of aviation fuel and cooking oil. The mix consists of 15% waste cooking fuel and the rest if the 85% is regular aviation fuel fro Zhennan Refining and Chemical. They are an oil manufacturer based in eastern China. One of the senior engineers at Zhennan said that they could collect 100,000 tons of cooking oil that has been waste from restaurants and process that oil per year. As reasons were obvious, cooking oil is cleaner for the environment rather than the fossil fuels we use today.

Sun Jianfeng, the president of Hainan Airlines, as well as the captain of that flight, said that the flight ran smoothly with no complications and smooth performance.

Other airlines have been using biofuels to lessen emissions from fossil fuels and make flying greener. Some airlines like United have been using biofuel for regular commercial flights since last year. KLM, as well, started using biofuels on flights to Los Angeles. Cathay Pacific said they would begin using biofuels on flights to the US starting 2019. Lastly, Qantas had also begun flying to Los Angeles from Australia with biofuels, Virgin Australia had also been testing the idea of using biofuels on their flights.

Aircraft News: A320 Family:

  • Qatar orders 80 A321neos with the option for 30 more.

A330:

  • DHL’s first A330F nearing completion.

A350:

  • Malaysia’s second A350 (9M-MAC) in the “Negaraku” livery.

Photo: Clement Alloing

Airline News: Air India: Assets sold, transition into privately-owned. Pradeep Singh Kharola, the new chairman and managing director of Air India will be given the task of selling the airline’s assets as the airline transitions to being privately-owned rather than state-owned. Air India is an airline owned by the government and they are going to sell the airlines as an “integrated airline”. The Indian government claims that the sale includes the “core aviation assets” including the aircraft, the airline’s flying rights to specific countries and slots at airports they depart and arrive in. When selling an airline as an “integrated airline” the domestic division and international division are sold as one and not separately. So that means whoever buys the assets of the international division of Air India will also be buying their regional subsidiary, Air India Express.

However, not everything is a core aviation asset such as the Air India building in Mumbai. Other assets of the airline which will be sold separately are the airline’s transport services and their engineering services. Potential buyers might even be IndiGo, India’s second-largest airline which is privately-owned rather than state-owned.

British Airways’ open skies to shut down in 2018. British Airways has announced that its boutique airlines, Open Skies, will be shutting down in September of 2018.

Open Skies has been operating for 10 years being launched in 2008 with its fleet, consisting of 3 Boeing 757-200s and 1 Boeing 767-300ER. Their 757s are configured with 20 “Biz Bed” seats, 28 Premium Plus seats, and 66 Economy seats. Their 767s are configured with 24 “Biz Bed” seats, 2 Premium Plus seats, and 144 Economy seats.

Right now, the airline flies between New York and Paris and when operations are ceased, all staff working for Open Skies will be transferred to IAG’s new long-haul budget airline, LEVEL. IAG also plans to give other assets of Open Skies like slots at airports to LEVEL expanding LEVEL’s routes to include Paris Orly airport and for it to become its second base.

“We’re delighted to launch flights from our second European city with four exciting new routes,” said IAG CEO, Willie Walsh. He also added that LEVEL “will benefit from the local experience and knowledge of the Open Skies team.”

LEVEL will have two of their Airbus A330-200s based at Orly and they will fly to New York, Montreal, Guadeloupe, and Martinique starting in July of 2018.

Delta-WestJet venture.

Earlier this week, Delta, one of the United States biggest airlines, and WestJet, Canada’s second-biggest airline, had agreed to a joint venture. This venture gives Delta a “bigger footprint in Canada” and both airlines would share revenue, costs, and profits. This deal is part of Delta’s ambitions to grow more and improve global routes after solidifying the company post-bankruptcy.

Partnerships are a very common way to really solidify routes and airlines themselves. Many airlines operate routes that are backed-up by airline alliance members and partnerships. In fact, in this whole month, 88% percent of the seats flown from the US or Canada to Europe were operated by an airline that is partnered up with other airlines.

For Delta, this is their eighth partnership with an airline not based in the US. However, both airlines had a codeshare agreement.

Japan Airlines & Boom join forces. Boom Supersonic is developing the world’s newest supersonic passenger aircraft and this week, Japan Airlines had invested $10 million into Boom to help Boom with strategic investment and aircraft design and also helps with in-flight passenger experience.

Japan Airlines also has been given the option to purchase 20 Boom Supersonic aircraft once they are available commercially. If Japan Airlines goes on with the 20 purchases, this would total up to 75 aircraft to be purchased by 5 airlines worldwide. Japan Airlines has actually been working with Boom Supersonic for over a year and having partners and stakeholders closely involved in how the aircraft is developed is a very good advantage for Boom, one of their big partners in the development of the aircraft is Richard Branson’s Virgin Atlantic. Boom’s CEO and founder, Blake Scholl explained in an email,”We expect to do many deals with many airlines. Initially, our goal is to select at least one partner in every region of the world. We will continue to engage with other global carriers to maximize the value of JAL’s investment and bring back supersonic commercial travel.”

More on the aircraft itself, Boom’s aircraft design intends to reach Mach. 2.2 during cruise and can fly up to 8,334km on one full fuel tank, the plane can seat up to 55 passengers with Business class-like accommodations and the comfort of any business class product you would find on any commercial airliner. The prices for a ticket are also similar to current prices, despite the cut travel time. The company is hopeful for the jet to enter service in 2023.

North Korea missile tests force Singapore Airlines to reroute flights from Seoul. Earlier this year a Singapore Airlines flight between South Korea and the US. The flight had to make changes to their flight plan to reroute due to missile tests from North Korea. Singapore Airlines’ operates daily between the South Korean capital, Seoul, and Los Angeles, the airline had made changes to every flights’ route to avoid certain areas after an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) test was launched from Pyongyang.

During the same month, this had gone into effect, an Air France flight from Tokyo to Paris had left Tokyo and had merely passed the splashdown site of a missile test, 60 miles away. The missile had landed in the water approximately five to ten minutes before the flight had passed. Due to this, the French airline had made North Korean airspace a no-fly zone as well.

The tests for these ICBMs have put any airline that operates flights in East Asian airspace on alert for missile tests, however, the chances of one of the missiles colliding with an airliner are slim.

Rather recently, the crew of a Cathay Pacific flight from San Francisco to Hong Kong had “reported the sighting of what they believed was a North Korean missile” re-entering Earth’s atmosphere. North Korea had claimed that on the same day they had launched the Hwasong-15, their biggest and most powerful missile to date. It had reportedly reached 1,000 miles higher compared to the launch in July.

Cathay Pacific had said that the flight was “far from the event location” and that they had contacted the relevant authorities but have no intent to change routes. “We remain alert and review the situation as it evolves,” said the airline.

David Wright, a missile defence expert at the Union of Concerned Scientists, said that the crew on the Cathay Pacific flight had most likely seen the missile during its early stages of flight, not the missile re-entering the atmosphere.

“Given the timing, it seems likely that the crew might have seen the first stage burn out and separate from the rest of the missile. This would have happened a few minutes after launch,” Wright said.

Air Canada’s inaugural to Melbourne. Earlier this month, Air Canada had started its first service to Melbourne from Vancouver, Melbourne’s first destination to Canada. The flight, Air Canada 37, is Air Canada’s third route to the ‘Great Southern Land’ from Vancouver, the other cities being Sydney and Brisbane. The flight is operated on a Boeing 787-9 and will be operating four times a week until February 4th and will resume again year-round on June 1, 2018.

The President - Passenger Airlines at Air Canada, Benjamin Smith, said,"We are delighted to welcome customers onboard our flights to Melbourne, our newest destination in Australia. Our seasonal service will be of particular interest to Australians travelling for a Canadian winter vacation and North Americans travelling to enjoy Australia's summer season. The launch of year-round service next June will provide additional options for business and leisure travellers between our two continents.”

"Our Melbourne flights complement our daily flights from Canada to Sydney and to Brisbane, solidifying our market-leading position as the airline providing the most service between Canada and Australia. The seamless connections through in-transit pre-clearance facilities combined with our extensive domestic Canada and USA network at our Vancouver hub positions YVR to be the preferred trans-Pacific gateway for business and leisure travellers travelling between North America and Australia,” he added.

Craig Richmond, the President and CEO of Vancouver Airport Authority embraces the fact that people have more travel options for this winter season. "We are also thrilled that Air Canada has announced year-round service to Melbourne, prior to the start of the seasonal service. This is an incredible achievement for our airline partner and showcases Air Canada's commitment to growing their transpacific hub at YVR,” said Richmond.

"Air Canada's landmark service is the first of its kind to fly from Melbourne to Canada, opening up unprecedented access to North America.”

“We also know Canadian inbound tourism to Australia is on the rise with forecasts expecting a 10.2 percent increase in visitation in the next two years, growing from 162,000 travellers in 2016/17 up to 179,000 in 2018/19. It's the perfect time to launch this service and we look forward to welcoming Air Canada's year-round service in June 2018,” said Simon Gandy, the Chief of Aviation at Melbourne Airport.

Air Canada’s 787-9s feature 30 seats of the International Business Class lie-flat suite product, 21 Premium Economy seats, and 247 Economy Class seats with IFE for every seat.

The timing of the flights is perfectly coordinated so that you arrive in the cities in the morning and you could do whatever you want for the day. Air Canada 37 departs from Vancouver at 10:45 pm and arrives in Melbourne at 9:45 am + 2 days you departed from Vancouver. (Yeesh, time zones, am I right?) The return, Air Canada 38 departs Melbourne at 11:40 am and arrives back in Vancouver at 7:30 am. The flights will operate every Monday, Wednesday, Friday, and Sunday.

Qatar’s first A350-1000 takes flight. Airbus’s first A350-1000 due for commercial service with Qatar Airways had taken flight for the first time. Qatar was the first operator of the shorter A350-900 and will now be the first to operate the A350-1000. The aircraft has already been painted and will also feature Qatar’s new admired business class QSuites.

A little bit of info on the extended A350. It is only 7m longer than the -900 and slightly more powerful than its sibling, being fitted with Rolls Royce Trent XWB-97 engines that can exert 97,000lbs of thrust per each engine, while the -900’s engines exert 93,000lbs per engine.

In terms of competition, the A350-1000 was made to directly compete with Boeing’s 777-300ER and in the future the Boeing 777X variants. The A350-1000 could seat approximately 350 passengers, 50 more than it’s sibling. The aircraft is undergoing the final stages of cabin installation and integration along with cockpit fitting, fun fact: 95% of the onboard systems are exactly the same. The wings on the -1000 are 4% larger than the ones on the -900, with changes made to the flaps, slats, and ailerons. In turn, the aircraft is heavier but now enables the aircraft to have a lower approach speed.

To add, the A350-1000 now features a six-wheel main landing gear making it now the second airliner to have a 3 wheel bogey, the 777 being the first. This means that the weight of the aircraft is now more distributed among the six wheels rather than the four on the -900.

Qatar’s A350-1000s will feature 46 QSuites and 281 Economy seats. Unlike Qatar’s 777-300ERs with QSuites, the A350-1000 will have onboard Wi-Fi as well. Qatar has bought 37 A350-1000s making them the largest operator of the A350-1000 for now.

Here is a video of the A350-1000s first flight along with its sister:

EasyJet to begin flights from Berlin Tegel. Starting January 5th EasyJet will start operating from Berlin-Tegel and announced 19 new routes operating from Berlin Tegel to fill ex-Air Berlin slots that EasyJet had bought. 25 of their aircraft will be based in Berlin. Some of these aircraft, in fact, are ex-Air Berlin aircraft returning home in new colours. The development of this base at Berlin was set up by EasyJet Europe, EasyJet’s affiliate airline that is based in Austria. This is to avoid anything that may cause conflict that Brexit may inflict. The first flights of the 19 new routes are set to take flight in March 2018. From Berlin, EasyJet will be starting new routes within Germany like Düsseldorf, Frankfurt, Munich, and Stuttgart. They will also be operating out of Germany from Berlin like to Budapest, Catania, Fuerteventura, Helsinki, Copenhagen, Madrid, Milan-Malpensa, Palma de Mallorca, Paphos, Paris-Charles de Gaulle, Rome-Fiumicino, Stockholm-Arlanda, Tel Aviv, Vienna, and Zurich.

EasyJet had already previously been operating from Berlin’s other airport, Schoenefeld. EasyJet’s Germany Director, Thomas Haagensen had announced that tickets for these flights will start as low as €42 for one-way flights. “Our offer will bring more competition to Berlin, especially for German routes where few other carriers operate,” said Haagensen explaining it with the relativity of Air Berlin’s bankruptcy, as well as Lufthansa being the only airline operating German flights to and from Berlin-Tegel. Airline Consultant, Mafred Kuhne, thinks otherwise, “the added competition from Easyjet won’t hurt Lufthansa too much.” The fact is EasyJet will barely fill the space Air Berlin left. Being Air Berlin’s main hub, they operated 1800 flights a week where EasyJet plans to have a maximum capacity of approximately 1000 flights weekly. Ryanair had also applied for some slots at Berlin-Tegel and they will be starting in the summer.

Emergencies: AirBaltic 737-500 skids off the taxiway at Moscow. AirBaltic 428 from Riga to Moscow operated with a Boeing 737-500 (YL-BBE) landed in Moscow on runway 06L and everything was normal. However, when it began its turn onto taxiway 13, the 737 had missed the turning point and had stopped and run aground (literally). The aircraft had not passed the hold-short point of the runway, but the aft was clear of the edges of the runway. The pilots had claimed that they missed the turning point. ATC had told them to proceed on taxiing, but the crew had said that they were not able to taxi on the aircraft’s power anymore.

Besides the aircraft being grounded and not past the hold point, the aircraft on approach, an Aeroflot Boeing 737-800 (VQ-BWE) operating Aeroflot 1413 flying from Ekaterinburg to Moscow, had already been cleared to land when YL-BBE had run aground. Despite the incident, Aeroflot 1413 continued its landing onto 06L and ATC had subsequently instructed them to vacate on taxiway 14 further down the runway. The rest of the day the runway was closed which left the airport operating on one runway which is 06R/24L.

Alaska bomb scare at San Jose. Alaska Airlines 837, a flight from San Jose, California bound for beautiful Honolulu, but just before they were going to get into the air, a bomb scare had struck. Vicki Day, a San Jose International Airport spokeswoman said that it was “an indefinite bomb threat” that temporarily grounded the flight.

“We evacuated the plane, and police brought in their K-9 crews. They determined it was a non-credible threat,” she said.

The flight took off 90 minutes later. Alaska Airlines had made a statement, “We removed guests from the plane out of an abundance of caution and worked with TSA to re-screen passengers and get them on their way.”

Volaris A319 lines up on the wrong runway at JFK. Volaris 880 operated by an A319 (XA-VOI) from Mexico City to New York. The flight was on the Canarsie visual approach for runway 13L and was cleared for the landing on 13L.

However the pilots hadn’t exactly lined up with the correct one, they just lined up with the first runway in sight, which happened to be runway 13R. Tower had immediately notified the pilots that they were lined up with the parallel runway.

The controller had told the pilots to then make a left turn, so the pilots had gone around at 300ft. and turned left. The aircraft had climbed up to 2000ft. and was vectored for an approach onto 22L where it subsequently landed without any other incidents.

On the mistaken runway that the flight had lined up with, a Delta Connection E170 operating as Delta 4231 to Washington, D.C., had just been cleared for takeoff when another pilot had noticed that there was another aircraft on final onto 13R. Tower had immediately cancelled Delta 4231’s takeoff clearance and the pilots rejected the takeoff, vacated the runway, and had later arrived back at the holding point of runway 13R.

AeroUnion 767-200F engine fire out of Los Angeles. An AeroUnion Boeing 767-200F (XA-LRC) operating AeroUnion 301 was taking off from Los Angeles heading to Guadalajara in Mexico when rotating and climbing out of LAX a pilot from the next departing aircraft saw fire and smoke coming from the right engine of the AeroUnion aircraft. The tower immediately notified the AeroUnion pilots. The pilots said they would continue to fly the runway heading, then decided to return back to 25L, the runway they took off from. They levelled off at 1500ft. And continued downwind 25L. The tower advised an aircraft on final to 25L to go around and another aircraft to immediately change to the approach frequency. The aircraft safely landed back in Los Angeles and emergency services checked the aircraft and reported that there was heavy smoke being emitted from the engine. The pilots said that they had already used one bottle of fire argent.

The FAA is now looking into the cause of the fire, a bird strike isn't likely since there is no indication of one.

FBI investigates into sexual assault on United flight. A female passenger on a United Airlines flight had claimed she was sexually assaulted by the man she sat beside. The incident took place on Dec. 5th on a night flight from New Jersey to Charlotte. The woman, who was 37, had informed the cabin crew of the man’s behaviour saying that he had placed his hands between her legs and had groped her. The cabin crew separated the two and told the passengers to remain seated after landing in Charlotte. Arriving at the gate, the local police had arrived to remove the man, who was 73 years old, from the aircraft. Federal authorities will be investigating the incident since it had happened outside of the jurisdiction of the local police. United is also taking part in the investigation. United had said in a statement,"The safety of our customers is our top priority, and we are working closely with authorities as they conduct their investigation.” The man had later told investigators that his hand had merely “fell” into her lap. A witness, one of the passengers, had said that the man’s account seems “highly unlikely.”

“I’m sure a woman knows the difference between a hand hitting her versus being groped,” said Sherrel Ealy.

Qatar A321 catches fire during maintenance. A Qatar Airways Airbus A321 (A7-AIB) was parked on a remote stand at Doha Hamad International for maintenance concerning the IFE and satcom antenna. Then a fire had suddenly broken out in the cabin burning through the roof and destroyed the cabin. There were no injuries during the incident. However, the aircraft had received a heavy amount of damage and may need to be written off.

The aircraft had last flew operating Qatar 234 from Moscow Domodedovo to Doha. The airline had reported that the fire broke out in the cabin but was promptly extinguished. “Whilst there was some damage to the aircraft, there no injuries,” the airline said.

BA 747 engine shuts down during climb from Phoenix. British Airways 288 from Phoenix to London, operated with a 747-400 (G-CIVM) was on the initial climb out of Phoenix until they had called Mayday and reported that engine 3 had shut down and advised that they would be levelling off at 6000 ft. And enter a hold. During the hold, runway inspectors on the ground had been scouring the runway for anything. Back in the air, the pilots had advised that there was no fire and had climbed up to 8000 ft. then up to 10,000ft. and dumping fuel to prepare for an emergency landing back into Phoenix. The 747 had landed safely in Phoenix on runway 8.

Special:

United takes sick kids on Fantasy Flight to the North Pole. A group of more than 100 Chicago-an children who were former or current patients of the Lurie Children’s Hospital and Advocate hospitals to the North Pole on their annual Fantasy Flight. Many of the children are fighting cancer or other serious diseases. The plan for this “Fantasy Flight” was breakfast, which was provided, they met their favourite superheroes and Disney characters and boarded the plane, callsign Santa 1, and took off to the North Pole.

When the flight landed, Santa Claus himself had come to greet the eager awaiting children.

United has been doing this tradition for 35 years. This year 11 flights had brought children affected by disease and illness, poverty, and special needs to enjoy some holiday magic for themselves.

Comments


Featured Posts
Recent Posts
Archive
Search By Tags
  • Instagram Social Icon
  • Twitter Social Icon
  • Black Instagram Icon
© Copyright CanadianSpotting
bottom of page