Aviation

  Bloomberg Airbus SE is exploring the next level of cockpit automation, testing a system that would provide advanced assistance from alerts on the ground to emergency diversions at cruising altitude should the crew be incapacitated. The technology, called DragonFly, is designed to let planes perform an automated landing even in difficult weather conditions or low visibility while communicating with ...

  Bloomberg Airlines in the Asia Pacific region flew 13.4 million passengers internationally in November, compared with just 1.8 million in the same month a year earlier, according to preliminary data from their trade association. Revenue passenger kilometers, which measures demand, surged nearly 500%, far ahead of the 187% growth in seat capacity. That resulted in a 40 percentage point ...

  Bloomberg Hong Kong Airlines Ltd said it expects to return to 75% of pre-pandemic capacity by the end of this year and 100% by mid-2024, after increasing operations to 30% this month. The carrier, which had a $6.3 billion debt restructuring plan approved by courts in December, is also raising basic pay by 8% and lifting flying hourly rates ...

Bloomberg US aviation safety regulators intend to require passenger and cargo aircraft to meet requirements by early next year for navigation gear to deal with potentially unsafe interference from 5G mobile-phone signals. The equipment is needed because the newer wireless signals are on frequencies near those used by planes’ radio altimeters, which determine altitude over ground and can cause them ...

  Bloomberg The failure of a key pilot notification system operated by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) disrupted air travel in the US early on Wednesday morning, with United Airlines Holdings Inc. temporarily grounding flights to all destinations. Scores of passengers due to fly domestically reported delays on social media, and there was no estimate available for the restoration of ...

Bloomberg As Covid-19 pandemic restrictions are eased and airlines rebuild flight capacity, the performance of the world’s carriers is again falling under the scrutiny of analysts and passengers alike. So which airlines are whizzing people around the world on time? And which are the laggards of the skies? The most punctual global airline of 2022 was Garuda Indonesia, according to ...

  Bloomberg Boeing Co closed 2022 with its best month of deliveries in four years, buoying the planemaker’s cash and signalling that its recovery is gaining momentum. The company said that it handed over 69 jets in December — including 54 from its cash-cow 737 family — and recorded 250 gross orders. The performance gave Boeing 387 deliveries of the ...

  Bloomberg British anti-terror police are investigating after a package contaminated with traces of uranium was detected during routine checks at London’s Heathrow airport. A “very small amount” of contaminated material was identified during the scan of a package that arrived at the hub on December 29. Border Force officers then contacted the Counter Terrorism Command of the Metropolitan Police, ...

Bloomberg Britain’s attempt to send the first satellites into orbit from its own soil failed, dealing a blow to its bid to join the ranks of space nations and sending shares of Richard Branson’s Virgin Orbit Holdings Inc. tumbling. A rocket launched from a Boeing 747 jumbo that took off from southwest England suffered a malfunction deep into the mission, ...

Bloomberg The operational chaos that engulfed Southwest Airlines Co. over the busy holiday period was a crisis decades in the making. In the aftermath of a meltdown that led to 16,700 flight cancellations and may cost the airline more than $800 million, blame has fallen on an outmoded crew scheduling system and an unusual point-to-point route network. Southwest was overwhelmed ...