Qantas managers have been training in the US to be ramp and baggage handlers in preparation for expected strikes by the airline’s ground staff. The training involves teaching employees how to load and unload aircraft as well as how to drive trucks in restricted space. According to one Qantas worker, the training, which has taken place in Los Angeles, includes learning how to line up trucks with aircraft cargo doors so that baggage can be transferred to and from the plane.

The training has to be done in a foreign country because Australian contractors have refused to teach those who could become strike breakers. A spokesman for the airline said this type of contingency was something the airline had been involved with for the past decade as a way to… Read the full story

by Mia Harris on April 5th, 2011

Crash investigators hoping to piece together the events which led up to an Air France passenger plane crashing into the Atlantic in 2009 have been given fresh hope as more debris is recovered from the ocean bed. Flight 447 went down as it was en route from Rio de Janeiro to the French capital Paris on 1 June. All of those on board were killed and the latest search is the fourth to be conducted for the airliner’s data and voice recorders.

If they are not recovered, then what happened to cause the crash is likely to remain speculation. Flight 447 encountered a tropical storm as it left Brazil and there is evidence that the pitot air speed indicators were malfunctioning and sending incorrect information to the Air France pilots.… Read the full story

by Riley Walker on April 4th, 2011

Qantas has been accused of being greedy by unions attacking the flag-carrier’s decision to axe jobs and services. The airline recently announced that it would be making management cuts in response to the rising cost of oil. The Transport Workers Union, which represents employees including catering staff, baggage handlers and refuellers, is demanding job security in contracts.

Tony Sheldon, national secretary of the TWU, said Qantas employees deserved a decent and fair wage from their employer and that if Qantas was not delivering this it was because of greed. He added that any job cuts should be marked by a removal of the kangaroo from aircraft tails and three dollar signs put up there instead.

Alan Joyce, Qantas’ chief executive, hit back at the union by saying that it was… Read the full story

by Cooper Anderson on April 1st, 2011

In an effort to capitalise on the growing Asia-Pacific online travel booking market, budget carrier AirAsia has announced a new tie-up with Expedia. Although still relatively small compared to markets such as the US, online booking in the region is expected to increase rapidly. Currently around 20 per cent of ticket sales in Asia-Pacific are made over the internet, compared to some 50 per cent in America.

The equal partnership is the first of its kind involving a low cost airline and an on line travel agent in a travel market worth around $200 billion annually. Expedia Asia Pacific, a new company, will deal with businesses in East Asia, Southeast Asia, India and Japan. It will also look after bookings for AirAsia’s AirAsiaGo and the company’s hotel arm, GoRooms.

Tony… Read the full story

by Isabella Robinson on March 31st, 2011

Flag-carrier Qantas has announced it will be scaling back its domestic and international services, retiring some older aircraft and making redundancies as the high cost of jet fuel continues to bite. According to estimates made by the airline, the second half of the financial year will record a loss of around $140 million because of the natural disasters in Japan, New Zealand and Queensland.

Although it has been unable to attach a figure, the carrier also predicted that next year’s finances would be affected. However, Qantas is maintaining that pre-tax profits will be stronger than last year’s underlying earnings of $377 million.

Both Qantas and budget offshoot Jetstar will scale back on growth in international capacity to seven per cent from 10 per cent and in domestic capacity to eight… Read the full story

by Lily Thompson on March 30th, 2011

Virgin Atlantic has won two major awards for its marketing in the past week. At the British Television Advertising Awards, the carrier picked up a golden arrow, one of advertising’s most illustrious prizes, as well as four additional silver arrows. The accolades celebrated Virgins latest advertising campaign.

Virgin Atlantic then went on to collect a one-off award for being the Travel Brand of the Decade. Travel Marketing Awards’ judges said they had chosen to give the gong to Virgin Atlantic for a number of reasons including its reliable and innovative product offering, the airline’s fun, cheeky and distinctive personality, the strength of its brand and its overall reputation with consumers.

Director of sales and marketing at Virgin Atlantic, Paul Dickinson, said that the prizes were a reflection of all the… Read the full story

by Mia Harris on March 29th, 2011

Following the explosion of a jet engine on board a Qantas A380 superjumbo in November last year it has been revealed that Rolls-Royce, the engine manufacturer, may have know that there was a fault in the Trent 900 before the incident occurred. The cause of the dramatic engine failure shortly after flight QF32 had departed Singapore for Sydney is thought to have been a fracture which resulted in a cracked pipe and oil leak.

This in turn caused a fire which resulted in a turbine disk weighing around 200kg breaking apart and bursting out of the engine casing. The pieces were travelling at extremely high velocity and caused damage to a number of the aircraft’s systems.

Richard de Crespigny, the pilot in charge of the Qantas A380, said he thinks… Read the full story

by Riley Walker on March 28th, 2011

Flag-carrier Air France and planemaker Airbus have both been indicted for manslaughter following the 2009 crash of an A330 into the Atlantic. Flight 447 was en route from Rio de Janeiro to Paris when it came down in a violent electrical storm. None of the 228 people on board survived.

A fourth search for wreckage is now underway and it is hoped that the operation will result in the recovery of the passenger jet’s voice and data recorders. Without the black boxes it is extremely unlikely that the cause of the tragedy will ever be fully understood. Shortly before ditching into the ocean, an automatic transmission was relayed indicating that the pilots were being given inaccurate information by the plane’s air speed sensors.

Experts are unanimous in saying that problems… Read the full story

by Aadyn Taylor on March 25th, 2011

A Qantas passenger jet en route to Sydney from the Philippines was forced to make an unscheduled landing in the northern Australian town of Cairns after a fire in the cockpit. According to reports, a small electrical fire started in the control deck but was extinguished by safety systems designed to automatically cope with such problems. However, the situation became more serious when a second fire started just a few minutes later.

Pilots at the controls of the Airbus A330-200 were forced to don oxygen masks and use a fire-extinguisher to put the flames out. Qantas has confirmed that an electrical fault in the windscreen heating system was to blame.

In 2009, a Jetstar A330-200 flying to Australia to Japan was forced to request an emergency landing on the island… Read the full story

by Isabella Robinson on March 24th, 2011

Weakened passenger demand for flights to and from Tokyo has caused Singapore Airlines to suspend some services to the capital’s Haneda Airport. The airline has announced via its website that it will be halving capacity and that from 27 March, flights SQ636 and SQ635 will temporarily be removed from its schedule. The flag-carrier said that it would however be continuing to fly four daily services to Narita, Tokyo’s main international airport.

Demand for seats has fallen away as Japan struggles to come to terms with the results of one of the largest earthquakes ever recorded. The resulting tsunami has caused massive damage to one of the country’s nuclear reactors sparking fears of a nuclear crisis.

Workers are continuing to pump large volumes of water into the reactor in an attempt… Read the full story

by Lily Thompson on March 23rd, 2011