Air Canada and WestJet Airlines Reported Higher Level of Passengers in March
Air Canada and WestJet Airlines Ltd said on Tuesday that passenger levels raced higher in March, with customers flocking to the top two Canadian airlines as pressure from the economic downturn eased.
WestJet, the country’s second-largest carrier, said its March load factor, a measure of how full its flights to destinations in Canada, the United States and elsewhere were during the month, rose 1.9 percentage points from March 2009 to 83.8 percent, even with a big rise in its capacity.
The Calgary-based airline said it flew 94,000 more passengers last month compared with the year-earlier period, as the economy strengthened.
Capacity, measured in available seat miles, rose 7.4 percent to 1.63 billion as it increased space to southern vacation destinations.
However, that rise was outmatched by an increase in customers, measured in revenue passenger miles, which rose 10 percent to 1.37 billion from 1.25 billion in March 2009.
“WestJet’s increased capacity … (was) deployed into southern markets and benefited from WestJet’s strong brand and strengthening sales channels,” Gregg Saretsky, WestJet’s recently appointed chief executive, said in a statement.
“We continue to draw from our entire route network to fill our southbound aircraft with a healthy mix of WestJet and WestJet Vacations guests,” Saretsky said.
The company said the rise in traffic was encouraging but it still expects a decline in revenue per available seat mile of up to 3 percent for the first quarter of the year.
For its part, Air Canada, the country’s largest airline, said its load factor was 82.1 percent in March, up 1.4 percentage points from March 2009.
Traffic jumped 9.6 percent to 4.23 billion revenue passenger miles as capacity climbed 7.7 percent to 5.16 billion available seat miles.
Chief Executive Calin Rovinescu said he was encouraged that traffic rose in domestic, transborder and international segments, the latter by a hefty 14.4 percent.
“We continue to manage and deploy our capacity effectively and retain the loyalty of our customers while attracting new ones,” Rovinescu said in a statement.
Air Canada’s A-series shares rose 5 Canadian cents, or 2 percent to C$2.59 on the Toronto Stock Exchange, representing a doubling of the stock price of the Montreal-based company since the start of 2010.
WestJet slipped 3 Canadian cents to C$13.51, a nearly 9 percent gain this year.
US Airways Asks 400 Flight Attendants To Take Furloughs
US Airways Group Inc. is asking 400 flight attendants to take voluntary furloughs and leave as it faces overstaffing in the wake of flight reductions.
Three-hundred of the impacted flight attendant are in Phoenix and Las Vegas, said US Airways spokeswoman Valerie Wunder. The other 100 will come from the Tempe-based airline’s East Coast operations where it has flight attendants in markets such as Boston, New York and Charlotte, N.C. US Airways is the second largest carrier at Albany International Airport, behind Southwest.
US Airways (NYSE: LCC) has more than 6,600 flight attendants. Wunder said the Phoenix and Las Vegas furloughs and leave will be from four to 16 months while the East Coast terms will be three months.
US Airways cut 1,300 positions in 2008 as it and other airlines reduced flight schedules and costs in the wake of a pullback in consumer and business travel and record-high fuel prices. Fuel costs have dropped compared to last summer, but the U.S. recession continues to bite tourism and business travel.
Wunder said flight attendants were not part of the 1,300-worker reduction but current demand and flight capacity leaves that work group area overstaffed.
US Airways has more than 33,000 employees.
High Fuel Cost, Global Crisis Hurt Airlines Companies and Aviation Industry
This was a year the aviation sector would rather forget as the industry, both locally and internationally, faced turbulent times.
From high fuel costs to the financial crisis and reduced demand, the industry is bleeding with increased losses being reported both in the country and beyond.
Kenya Airways announced reduced profits in October. The airline’s profit before tax had declined by 62.7 per cent to stand at Sh1.05 billion, for the six months ended September.
The airline is headed for hard times as it tries to navigate the skies during these turbulent times when a number of its markets are in recession. However, the airline remains optimistic in its expansion plans that have seen it link Africa with Asia and the Middle East.
It is counting on its passengers from Africa to weather the ongoing global financial crisis that has seen some of its markets, especially Europe, affected.
Recently IATA, the industry lobby body, announced its forecast for 2009 that showed the industry stood to lose $2.5 billion (Sh192.5 billion).
According to the association, the industry’s revenues were expected to drop by over $500 billion with passenger traffic expected to decline by three per cent, the first decline since 2001.
Mr Giovanni Bisignani, the director general and chief executive of IATA, noted that the outlook for the future was bleak with “the chronic industry crisis” continuing into 2009 with $2.5 billion in losses
Amex Sees Slow Recovery For Business-Class Airfare
Airlines can expect a modest recovery in premium airfares in 2010 as business travelers begin returning to the skies, American Express Co.’s business-travel unit said Wednesday. Globally, domestic business-class airfares will be flat to up 5%, while long-haul and international flights could see ticket prices rise by 1% to 6%, the group said. Projected growth in GDP next year will be the primary driver for business travel, as well as pent-up demand among businesses that slashed travel budgets this year and put off customer meetings. For North America, which accounts for nearly a quarter of all global traffic, domestic business-class airfares are likely to climb 2% to 7% next year, and 1% to 6% or long-haul and international flights, American Express said.
Iraq Domestic Airlines, Baghdad Gets First Flight from Western Europe in 17 years
In case you missed this story from earlier this week, the BBC writes “the first commercial flight between Western Europe and Baghdad in at least 17 years has landed in Iraq.” That flight -– operated by Sweden’s Nordic Leisure -– arrived in Baghdad last Friday carrying about 150 passengers. Most of the passengers were Iraqis, according to the BBC. The news agency adds “air services to Iraq are gradually increasing after UN sanctions were imposed following the 1990 invasion of Kuwait.”
Still, the BBC notes some carriers — such as Turkish Airlines –- had already begun flying to Baghdad as early as October. Despite that, flights to Baghdad have remained largely off-limits to most Western European carriers. But, the BBC notes “while few direct flights between Europe and Baghdad are available, a number of airlines have been running services for some time to the northern Iraqi cities of Sulaimaniya and Irbil.” One such carrier is Austrian Airlines, which began Vienna-Irbil service in February.
And the ramp-up of commercial service raises another issue for Iraq. The Tacoma News-Tribune writes that “Iraq officially began to govern its skies last week, but it has enough trained air traffic controllers to manage only the highest heights above the country. That leaves the U.S. still in control of everything below 24,000 feet, meaning that American air traffic controllers handle everything from the runway to 23,999 feet. U.S. and Iraqi officials say that they’re hopeful that Iraq will say goodbye to all its American air traffic advisers by 2011 — the year designated in the security agreement for the total withdrawal of U.S. forces from Iraq — as Iraq’s airline industry grows for the first time in decades.”
