This is a great news: Vienna Airport to offer coronavirus tests to avoid 14-day quarantine as of tomorrow, 4th May 2020. This could be the turning point, seriously.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-heal ... SKBN22F0IO

fil87 wrote:

This is a great news: Vienna Airport to offer coronavirus tests to avoid 14-day quarantine as of tomorrow, 4th May 2020. This could be the turning point, seriously.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-heal ... SKBN22F0IO

The link is broken, please see here:

Vienna Airport to offer coronavirus tests to avoid quarantine

Heathrow airport which expects passenger traffic to be down by 97% in April has finalised the consolidation of flights into T2 and T5 by transfering airlines from T4 to T2. T3 has already closed.
https://www.businesstraveller.com/business-travel/2020/05/04/heathrow-closes-terminal-4-to-passengers/

Heathrow airport still wants a third runway but expects the current coronavirus crisis to delay completion, put before the crisis between early 2028 and late 2029, by at least two years.
https://www.independent.co.uk/travel/news-and-advice/heathrow-third-runway-expansion-terminal-british-airways-ceo-a9495126.html

Iran's Mahan Air seen as key vector in worldwide coronavirus pandemic

This was featured on the BBC this morning, although I cannot find a link to the BBC as yet. However it seems to be a story which has been developing since March.

A Mahan Air pilot died and cabin crew were infected.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/articl ... China.html
https://afghanistan.asia-news.com/en_GB ... feature-01
https://www.jpost.com/middle-east/pilot ... rus-621780

VS to close its LGW operation, make 3,150 of its 10,000 employees redundant and reduce its fleet to 36 twin-jets by immediately retiring its seven 744s and four 332s in early 2022.
https://corporate.virginatlantic.com/gb/en/media/press-releases/Our-post-Covid19-future.html

Aer Lingus shamed by photograph of a packed flight.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-northern-ireland-52539141

LH losing €1 million/hour:

Europe's leading global airline is losing $1 million an hour and needs a bailout
https://www.cnn.com/2020/05/05/business ... index.html

Qatar airways warns of substantial job losses:

https://www.msn.com/en-in/news/other/co ... r-BB13ETpr

A general overview of the airline industry and how hard it has been hit. Estimated that airlines worldwide will lose approximately 314 billion dollars this year. Asia airlines are the hardest hit followed by Europe. The world has gone from 120,000 daily flights in January to 29,000 in April and still falling in May.

https://www.cnbc.com/2020/05/06/coronav ... harts.html

ICAO has forecast 1.5 billion fewer international air travellers this year with international seat capacity dropping by almost three-quarters.
https://www.icao.int/Newsroom/Pages/Billion-fewer-international-air-travellers-this-year-according-to-latest-ICAO-forecast.aspx

Qatar to add new flights and open up more cities:
https://www.channelnewsasia.com/news/bu ... e-12708654

SQ and QF team up with Australian government to restart food exports to key markets.
https://www.channelnewsasia.com/news/si ... s-12708800

Large part of SIA fleet parked in Alice Springs
https://www.straitstimes.com/singapore/ ... hangi-with

American to store its entire fleet of A330-200s until 2022 at the earliest.
https://www.dallasnews.com/business/air ... el-demand/

It had previously announced the early retirement of its A330-300s, so this latest announcement effectively removes the A330 from American's fleet for at least two years.

CEOs of airlines operating at ORY (TX, XK, CE, SS, BF, B0, LV and TO) ask for a reopening of ORY on June 26.

Article in French

IATA on physical distancing (p3): "Physical distancing on board can be achieved to a large degree especially during the airport processes and boarding, but leaving large numbers of empty seats is probably unsustainable".
https://www.iata.org/contentassets/f1163430bba94512a583eb6d6b24aa56/covid-medical-evidence-for-strategies-200504.pdf

Courtesy: Fox News

Frontier Airlines scraps plans to charge passengers for keeping middle seat empty

https://www.foxnews.com/travel/frontier-airlines-scraps-plans-middle-seat-charge-keepempty

VN operated a repatriation flight today, HAN-SFO, with a B781.

https://flightaware.com/live/flight/HVN ... /VVNB/KSFO

Photos posted on SFO's Facebook page.

India's repatriation effort is officially under way. 15,000 will be repatriated in this phase. If there are more phases, this will likely be the largest evacuation on record surpassing the evacuation of Indians before Desert Storm in 1990.

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-india-52555432

The first 777 to the US is airborne DEL-SFO but it will return SFO-BOM:
https://www.flightradar24.com/AIC173/24770951

Here is the complete schedule:
https://www.bangaloreaviation.com/2020/ ... india.html

Some good news - a few scheduled operational restarts:

TK Turkish
"Turkey's national flag carrier will resume domestic flights in June and reintroduce international flights gradually, said the sources, who spoke anonymously due to restrictions on speaking to the media. According to the three-month flight plan, starting in June Turkish Airlines will fly to 22 destinations in 19 countries, including Canada, Kazakhstan, Afghanistan, Japan, China, South Korea, Singapore, Denmark, Sweden, Germany, Norway, Austria, the Netherlands, Belgium, Belarus, Israel, Kuwait, Georgia, and Lebanon, with a weekly frequency of 75 flights. The airline is projected to operate 60% of domestic flights to all destinations, then to add destinations in July and August. The number of destinations and flight frequency on international routes will rise to 103 and 572, respectively, in July, and to 160 and 937 in August."

Source: https://www.aa.com.tr/en/economy/turkis ... ne/1830537

OK - Czech
"Destinations which we will connect with Prague
- as early as 18 May 2020:
Amsterdam up to 13 flights a week
Frankfurt up to 6 flights a week
Paris up to 21 flights a week
Stockholm up to 2 flights a week
- as early as 24 May 2020:
Kyiv up to 7 flights a week
- as early as 25 May 2020:
Odessa up to 3 flights a week
Bucharest up to 6 flights a week

Btw. EU citizens with a negative COVID19 test result are able to enter the country, as are students and long-term workers with valid documents (or those entering for emergency reasons and in a few other exceptions.)
Source: https://www.csa.cz/cz-en/news/resumption-of-flights/

KL - KLM
"Effective 4 May 2020, KLM will resume service – one daily flight, seven days a week – to the following destinations:
Barcelona, Madrid, Rome, Milan, Budapest, Prague, Warsaw, Helsinki"
Source: https://news.klm.com/klm-starts-gradual ... -on-board/

BA - British
British Airways are to resume flying from July at at 50 per cent capacity, but warns passenger numbers won't return to normal until 2023. "Willie Walsh, IAG chief executive, said: "We are planning for a meaningful return to service in July 2020 at the earliest, depending on the easing of lockdowns and travel restrictions around the world."
Source: https://www.thesun.co.uk/travel/1156218 ... ronavirus/

Feel free to add others or update.

Air Baltic getting 250m Government support. That is a huge amount for a small Government.
https://www.aero.de/news-35317/Lettland ... altic.html

Reuters is reporting that due to growing customer demand Lufthansa is going to fly 80 more aircraft in June. Total number of aircraft operated by the group to be 160. Routes to be operated are including tourism destinations.

Lufthansa to start flying 80 more aircraft in June to meet travel demand

American Airlines is resuming flights to continental Europe for the first time since the coronavirus shut down by launching daily nonstop service from DFW to MAD.
https://www.star-telegram.com/news/business/aviation/american-airlines/article242522401.html

U.K. plans 14 day quarantine for arrivals: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-52594023

Heathrow and Gatwick are pushing on with plans to increase capacity despite coronavirus crisis.
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2020/may/09/aiports-heathrow-gatwick-expansion-coronavirus-airlines

European Airlines to resume flights for summer travel at different paces but EU3 are likely to converge by the fourth quarter with long-haul taking longer to recover than short-haul.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/willhorton1/2020/05/10/european-airlines-resume-flights-for-summer-travel-at-different-paces-but-british-airwaysiag-air-france-klm-and-lufthansa-may-converge/#5e0504a01b57

Qantas to defer Airbus A321neos and Boeing 787 deliveries due to Coronavirus:

https://www.smh.com.au/business/compani ... 54rsh.html

All Transavia flights from or to France are canceled until June 25.

https://www.transavia.com/fr-FR/coronavirus/

Avianca files for bankruptcy protection (CH 11 in the US). Surprised this isn't posted here yet.


https://www.cnn.com/2020/05/11/business ... index.html

Just a reminder that this is not a discussion thread. This is a source that only. Discussion must occur in the applicable threads.

✈️ atcsundevil

United breaks pledge to block middle seats with a full flight from EWR to SFO.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/suzannerowankelleher/2020/05/10/so-much-for-united-airlines-pledge-to-block-the-middle-seat/#59e1dba13d6c

Interesting repatriation flights today with cruise ship staff from HAM to DPS https://www.flightradar24.com/JAF8331/247b5e7d with B 787 TuiFly Netherland.

Sister ship PH-TKM is on it's way to CGK as well also with cruise ship staff..https://www.flightradar24.com/JAF8451/247b7899.

Yesterday Air Europas 787 EC-NEI flew HAM-CGK, also cruise ship staff. All These flights are organized by TUI Europe for the staff of "Mein Schiff 1-6". At same time those are the longest nonstop flights ever departing from Hamburg Airport.

Rueters: Qatar Airways to reduce fleet by 25% and layoff 5000 staff.

https://simpleflying.com/qatar-airways-fleet-reduction/


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Changi Airport suspends operation of Terminal 4.

https://www.channelnewsasia.com/news/si ... s-12723918

This will be a shorter suspension than Terminal 2 as the terminal 2 shutdown will be used to renovate the terminal.

Transat Cancels Flights Through June as COVID-19 Crisis Continues

“Customers with departure dates for flights or vacation packages between March 17th and June 25th are eligible to receive a future travel credit in the value of the original amount paid,”

Brussel Airlines to lay off 1000 jobs (of 4000 total) and reduce fleet with 30%. Expects to be back at normal capacity in 2023 and about half at the end of the year.

https://www.upinthesky.nl/2020/05/12/br ... personeel/ (In Dutch)

Emirates will only renew some Cabin Crew contracts for two months. The airline is expexted to layoff an undisclosed number of Cabin Crew.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.paddle ... d-off/amp/

Akbar Al Baker: Qatar Airways A380s may or maynot return into service

https://www.executivetraveller.com/news ... ver-return

Tui is cutting 8,000 jobs across the entire group (i. e. including airlines but also hotels etc.), and the overall overhead cost reduction is planned to be over 30%. That's approximately 11% of their current workforce. The cuts are coming despite a major government support program of 1.8 bln € granted in March.
https://www.theguardian.com/business/20 ... -cut-costs

https://www.washingtonpost.com/weather/ ... s-flights/

There is between a 10-30% degradation in accurate weather forecasting. Many planes were sending back crucial data on wind speeds, humidity, pressure from all those altitudes ascending and descending. Victims as well as all of us, include airlines who used that data for the most up to date weather and winds in route planning.

CX could get can injection from QR

https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/tra ... -injection

SIA reports its first loss in its 48 year history:

https://www.channelnewsasia.com/news/bu ... s-12732134

Delta airlines has 7,000 more pilots than needed;

https://mobile.reuters.com/article/amp/idUSKBN22Q2B4

Delta will retire its 18 widebody Boeing 777s by the end of 2020 as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, will continue to operate its A330s and A350-900s.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/tedreed/2020/05/14/deltas-boeing-777-symbolized-an-airlines-emergence-now-it-is-one-more-vanishing-aircraft/#3d62d5873dba

Royal Brunei extends reducing flying schedule to 30JUN, but now adds KUL to existing SIN/HKG/MNL/MEL services. RB Link is suspended until NOV:
https://www.flyroyalbrunei.com/brunei/e ... 9-updates/

interesting
CI pax revenue down 97% YOY, yet cargo up 113% and total revenue only down 36%!
https://www.china-airlines.com/tw/en/Im ... -36921.pdf

BR not doing as well, pax down 95%, cargo up 105% but total revenue down 54%. Total revenue only 2/3 CIs also.
https://www.evaair.com/images/englobal/ ... -71294.pdf

Having 18 744Fs you are running like crazy helps. increased utilization of freighter fleets this year everywhere but of the Asian carriers CI remained near the top. https://www.forbes.com/sites/willhorton ... dcb98fbdd7

The daughter company of the German railway operator Schenker is using 3 converted Iceland Air 767 for cargo flights.

Link to article https://www.flightglobal.com/airlines/i ... 65.article
Link to German article with picture of the Iceland Air 767 with DB Schenker sticker. https://www.airliners.de/deutsche-bahn- ... stik/55410

Interesting twitter thread on the realities of international travel these days, in this case to Hong Kong:

https://twitter.com/willripleyCNN/statu ... 5841350656

Made to stay at quarantine hotel till covid-19 tests results were in. If the test indicated he had it, straight to the hospital via ambulance. If it did not, fourteen day self quarantine with wrist bracelet and monitoring app running on his phone, with stiff penalties for violating quarantine.

LATAM to lay off 1,400 employees in Chile, Colombia, Ecuador and Peru.
https://www.nytimes.com/reuters/2020/05 ... lines.html

Flydubai will resume flights from June 04.

https://www.businesstraveller.com/busin ... om-june-4/

Peter Cerda, IATA's regional vice president for the America, has advised Caribbean governments to cut passenger taxes if they wish to be competitive when service is restored. He said that Caribbean economies could lose US$740 million and face 23,000 job cuts if borders remain closed through to the end of June.
https://antiguaobserver.com/caribbean-governments-advised-to-cut-passenger-taxes-on-air-travel-to-compete/