American Airlines to stop flying to Delhi and Burbank!

Bad news for American Airlines’ Advantage program members, as the airlines is cutting some popular routes. Starting March 1st 2012, Airlines will stop flying the 14-hour direct flight from ORD-DEL-ORD.

Also, they will stop flying to Burbank, California.

The historical financial performance of the route and its future outlook given the global economic climate and high oil prices has resulted in a decision by American to cancel its New Delhi (DEL) – Chicago O’Hare (ORD) service.

o The last flight to leave for India from Chicago will be on February 28, 2012, while the last return flight from India to Chicago will operate on March 1, 2012.

o AA will continue to offer travel choices between the U.S. and India in conjunction with oneworld partners British Airways, Kingfisher Airlines and Finnair, via either London Heathrow or Helsinki (summer only), and through its codeshare partner Jet Airways via Brussels.

o The route is operated by three-class Boeing 777-200 aircraft.

• DFW-Burbank Service

o Flights between DFW and Burbank will be cancelled effective Feb. 9, 2012.

o Unfortunately, the cancellation of the DFW-BUR flights will result in AA exiting the Burbank market and closing operations at the BUR station.

o Customers can continue to reach Burbank as a destination by flying into Los Angeles, one of American’s cornerstone markets.

o American does not maintain employees in Burbank, as ground handling operations are provided by a third party, Airport Terminal Service.

From Dallas News

Makes me wonder, at this pace, if the Airlines will go from World’s largest airlines to smallest?

 

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More problems for Qantas

Recently Qantas was in news for it’s airplanes being in problems (here and here) esp. the hole in fuselage of a Boeing 747-400.

Qantas Airways faced another embarrassment on concerns of airworthiness of its Boeing 737-400s as according to a US FAA directive “to
carry out maintenance around the planes’ pressure bulkhead because of
concerns they could crack” . As a result the airlines grounded 6 of the Boeing 737s resulting in 2 canceled flights.

From The Australian –

Qantas executive general manager of engineering David Cox said the airline was verifying that the work had been done correctly.

“We have a process that we run continually that just goes back and
trawls through work that’s been done and does another check to make
sure everything’s been done exactly as it should be,” he said. “The
guys have found an irregularity. Whenever we get that situation, we
have to make sure we have 100per cent (done the work), and if it
affects an in-service aircraft we withdraw that aircraft from service
until we’re sure.”

Mr Cox said the airline decided to withdraw the six aircraft from
service and would return them to flying only when it was 100per cent
sure of what it was dealing with. Qantas had advised CASA of the issue.

Mr Cox said the airline detected a record-keeping anomaly on average once a year.

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Good news everyone: LAX gets a new taxiway to improve safety

Today ( June 24th 2008 ) LAX (Los Angeles International Airport) is opening a new $83 million taxiway. The taxiway is expected to reduce the risk collision when airplanes cross one of the two runways on the airport’s south side.

From LA times –

“Historically, LAX has had one of the highest rates of so-called runway
incursions in the nation. Officials say the project should reduce the
number of incursions by acting as a buffer between runways. After
landing, pilots will be directed by air traffic controllers to turn
onto the taxiway, where they will await clearance to cross the inner
runway.”

“In 2006 and 2007, 16 incursions at LAX were reported, nine of them on
the south runways. Six of the nine were caused by the problem the new
taxiway addresses, according to the FAA.”

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Airbus A380: Delays again?

Airbus SAS,Toulouse France based Aircraft manufacturing subsidiary of EADS, has announced new delay on the deliveries of its A380 double decker aircraft for the next three years.

Since the airlines’ future flight and crew training schedules are closely tied to airline delivery, this might be big hit for airlines that had big orders for the A380.

From Bloomberg Article –

“Airbus SAS, two years behind schedule
on the double-decker A380 plane, cut the model’s delivery targets
for three years, saying it can’t automate production as quickly
as planned after wiring difficulties forced it to assemble part
of the cabin by hand.”

“The planemaker will deliver 12 A380s this year instead of
the 13 planned, 21 airliners in 2009 rather than 25, and 30 to 40
planes two years from now instead of 42, Chief Executive Officer
Tom Enders said on a conference call today.”

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