Beginning in 2009, flights on Continental Airlines Inc. will be a little more entertaining.
The Houston airline has inked an agreement with LiveTV LLC that will allow Continental to broadcast 36 channels of live, satellite-based television programming provided by DirecTV at every seat during domestic flights on the airline’s next-generation aircraft.
source: Business Journal
German travel and transport group TUI and airline Lufthansa are working on creating a new low-cost carrier, the TUI Travel subsidiary said on Tuesday.
The partners have signed a letter of intent for a merger of TUI Travel, Hapag-Lloyd and Hapag-Lloyd Express with Lufthansa units Germanwings and Eurowings, a statement said.
source: AFP
British Airways PLC will be unveiled as the official airline of the London 2012 Olympics next week in a deal worth some 50 mln stg, reported Marketing magazine.
The report said BA, which ended its sponsorship of the London Eye earlier this month, will now focus on becoming an official tier-one partner for the London Olympics along with Lloyds TSB Group, Adidas and EDF Energy.
source: Forbes
After weeks of wavering, the nation’s airlines have decided their customers will bear more of the brunt of rising jet fuel costs.
Northwest Airlines Corp. and the other major airlines over the weekend raised the fuel surcharge on most routes from $20 to $40 per roundtrip ticket.
It was the third attempt this year to institute such a surcharge. This time, Continental led the way Thursday with an increase to $40, and everyone else followed, including Northwest, Delta Air Lines, US Airways, United Airlines and American Airlines. Northwest spokesman Dean Breest confirmed Monday that the airline raised its surcharge on Friday.
Deutsche Lufthansa AG and TUI AG are planning to enter into official negotiations concerning the set up of a joint low-cost airline.
Following months of preliminary talks, TUI Travel head Peter Long is to announce this at an investors’ conference in London tomorrow, the paper said.
According to the report, Lufthansa and TUI are to each hold 40 pct in the new airline, while Germanwings co-owner Albrecht Knauf is to hold the remaining 20 pct.
source: Hemscott
Pilots’ union leaders at Continental Airlines say they’re taking steps to look out for workers’ interest in case the carrier merges with another airline.
Tom Donaldson, chairman of the Air Line Pilots Association at Continental, said Friday that his members would be happy if the Houston-based airline remains as it is, but can’t ignore speculation about mergers.
“‘We will not stand idly by and allow a change in the airline landscape without taking steps to protect the interests of our pilots,'” Donaldson said. “‘We’ve made huge concessions over the past number of years.'”
Donaldson said his union expected management to cooperate with it in any merger decisions.
source: USA Today
Ryanair has begun legal action against the Financial Regulator.
The airline is challenging what it claims is a decision of the regulator not to investigate why the Government was the only party given what it called ‘inside information’ on the decision to transfer the Aer Lingus Shannon-Heathrow link to Belfast.
Ryanair was given leave to seek a judicial review of a decision of the regulator not to carry out an investigation of the matter after Aer Lingus chief executive, Dermot Mannion, revealed on radio that the Minister for Transport, Noel Dempsey, had been informed of the Heathrow decision before it was publicly announced.
A merger between Delta Air Lines (DAL) and Northwest (NWA) or United (UAUA) would greatly extend the reach of the resulting airline, giving it influence over service and fares in more major U.S. business markets than any of them has today.
A Delta-United deal would be an industry game-changer, giving the combined carrier heft in eight of the USA’s 12 biggest business markets, according to a USA TODAY analysis of schedule data from OAGback Aviation Solutions. The analysis combines the current shares of each carrier in the big markets, establishing a rough estimate of the share the combined carrier might control.
None of the airlines has publicly confirmed merger talks, but outsiders last week, including U.S. Rep. James Oberstar, D-Minn., confirmed Delta-Northwest merger talks and the possibility that Delta-United talks could heat up.
source: USA Today
Air crash investigators were Saturday continuing to seek the cause of an apparent power failure that forced a British Airways Boeing 777 into a crash landing at London’s Heathrow airport, narrowly averting disaster.
Flight schedules were returning to normal at Europe’s busiest airport following heavy delays and cancellations in the wake of Thursday’s incident.
However airport authorities were advising passengers to contact airlines before setting off, indicating there could still be problems.
source: CNN
A former United Airlines flight attendant who narrowly missed being on one of the hijacked jets that crashed into the World Trade Center has settled a federal lawsuit that accused the airline of wrongfully firing her after she was unable to work because of posttraumatic stress disorder.
Deborah Jackson of Plaistow, N.H., had worked for United Airlines out of Logan International Airport for 17 years when the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks occurred, according to the suit. She reached a settlement with the airline under terms that were not disclosed in papers filed yesterday in US District Court in Boston.
source: Boston.com
