Aviation

  Bloomberg A surge in demand for Mediterranean holidays suggests Britons are coming to terms with a weaker pound and the threat of terrorist attacks, according to Monarch Airlines Ltd., the UK’s second-biggest leisure carrier. Vacation bookings for summer 2017 are up 40 percent, Monarch reported. While the increase may have been enhanced by lower sales during this year’s peak ...

  Bloomberg The UK wasted 285 million pounds ($360 million) on an almost unusable airport in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean, a panel of lawmakers said on Wednesday. Test flights in April to the landing strip on St. Helena, a British territory in the south Atlantic, revealed “dangerous wind conditions on the airport approach,” preventing the operation of regular ...

  Washington / AFP Amazon said it completed its first delivery by drone, in what the global online giant hopes will become a trend in automated shipments by air. The delivery to a customer near Cambridge, England, was announced in a tweet by Amazon founder and chief executive Jeff Bezos. “First-ever #AmazonPrimeAir customer delivery is in the books. 13 min ...

  DUBAI / Reuters Out-of-favour corporate jet ownership is fuelling growing demand for flights offered by business aircraft operator VistaJet, the founder and chairman of the Malta-based firm said. “The purchase of a business jet is not necessarily seen favourably by the boards or by the shareholders,” Thomas Flohr said during a visit to Dubai recently. However, executives still want ...

  Bloomberg American Airlines Group Inc. was ordered to pay $1.6 million in penalties and fines to settle charges it trapped passengers on 27 flights that were delayed for more than three hours on the ground. The penalties equal the previous record for violations of tarmac-delay regulations that Southwest Airlines Co. paid after reaching an agreement with the Department of ...

  Bloomberg SAS AB plans to cut 1,000 administrative jobs and double its cost-savings target as the Nordic airline prepares for rising fuel prices and intensifying competition that’s lowering fares and hampering earnings growth. Profit in the fiscal first quarter, which started Nov 1, will decline from a year earlier following “more demanding” trading conditions in the autumn autumn, Stockholm-based ...

  Bloomberg JetBlue Airways Corp. plans to reduce annual costs by as much as $300 million by 2020 after efforts to boost revenue over the past two years have done better than the company expected. The largest share of savings — as much as $125 million — will come in aircraft maintenance operations, with additional cost reductions being generated by ...

  BEIRUT / Reuters European planemaker Airbus and Iran Air will finalise a deal to buy aircraft in two weeks, the head of Iran’s flag carrier said, adding Airbus has agreed to provide financing for 17 planes. Uncertainty over financing of the deal and political opposition in the United States against Iran have slowed down Tehran’s efforts to import aircraft ...

  RIYADH / Emirates Business flynas, the Saudi National Air Carrier, has broken a new record in the number of passengers travelling on the low cost Saudi carrier by approximately, 550,000, in November of this year, 2016, with an increase of 67% in the number of passengers in comparison to November of 2015. This record number of passengers is the ...

  Sydney / AFP Qantas plans to operate non-stop flights from Perth to London, the world’s first regular passenger service linking Australia directly to Europe in a move hailed by tourism groups. The airline will use a Boeing 787-9 Dreamliner for the 17-hour journey, some 70 years after it first began flying to London on its “Kangaroo Route” which originally ...