United Adds 6 Seats Back to E175 Fleet
AW Daily is reporting that United Airlines is reinstalling six seats to its E175 aircraft, returning them to their pre-pandemic seating capacity of 76.
United removed the six seats from all 190 of its E175s to skirt around the limit of 76-seat aircraft its United Express affiliates were permitted to fly through its labor agreement with the Air Line Pilots Association, UA’s pilot union. The permitted numbers declined as United’s mainline capacity dropped during the pandemic, so removing seats was the best short-term solution. Thanks to rebounding capacity, United can now reverse the process.
Work on the planes has begun and will be done in June. United will continue to fly all 190 of the airplanes, rotating them in and out for maintenance. In the meantime, some passengers on full flights will still draw the short stick and will stand in the spot on the plane where the seat would have been.
JetBlue’s Takes Delivery of First Plane Bound for London
JetBlue received its first A321LR with the new Airspace interior, the aircraft type it plans to use to launch its new transatlantic operation later this summer.
JetBlue is the first Airbus customer to put the new interior in a single-aisle aircraft. The plane features just 138 seats – 114 in the back and 24 minty-fresh seats up front. Economy seats will feature 18.4 inches of width and 32 inches worth of pitch, with the “Even More Space” seats in the front of economy coming with 37 inches of pitch.
JetBlue has 13 of the new A321neos, along with 57 other Airbus aircraft with the new interior on order. While we don’t believe these planes will feature the subway tile restrooms that its new A220s will, we understand JetBlue has plans to spray-paint graffiti over the restrooms to give it the NYC feel it wants for its passengers.
Kansas City Sees Increased Spirit
Spirit announced four new destinations from Kansas City today, bumping the number of cities served by the airline from MCI from five to nine. The cities are:
- Fort Lauderdale – daily, beginning June 10
- Fort Myers – 3x-weekly, beginning June 10
- Pensacola – 3x-weekly, beginning June 10
- Tampa – 3x-weekly, beginning June 9
The flights to Fort Lauderdale are timed to offer connections through Spirit’s FLL hub – even though it won’t call it a hub – to the Caribbean and Latin America. Though the flights are timed for optimal connections, that assumes Spirit flights will be on-time which is a big bet.
All four cities agreed to pay Spirit’s route expansion fee in exchange for new service. These four new destinations in Florida increase Spirit’s leisure and outdoor focused schedule for the summer as its pandemic recovery plan. The airline is also adding frequencies to three other leisure destination from Kansas City, upgrading Las Vegas and Orlando to twice-daily, and Myrtle Beach to 3x-weekly.
Americans Could be Welcomed Back to UK Soon
Heathrow Airport CEO John Holland-Kaye said Thursday that he expects the United States to be added to the UK’s “green list,” denoting who is permitted to travel to the UK without any required quarantine. Holland-Kaye believes PM Boris Johnson’s government could make the announcement as soon as next week, with travel reopening as soon as May 17.
The other countries likely to land on the UK’s green list include Singapore, Australia, New Zealand, Israel, Iceland, and some Caribbean islands. The UK won’t announce which Caribbean islands are on the list, forcing passengers to travel and take their chance that they aren’t turned away at border control.
Despite the uptick in domestic U.S. passenger levels, Heathrow is still operating at just 9% of pre-pandemic levels with British Airways and Virgin Atlantic operating reduced international schedules. The airport saw 20% of its pre-pandemic travel come from travel to the United States and would welcome a reopening of the travel corridor between the two countries, as would pretty much everyone else except for the people living right under the flight path.
Lufthansa Expects 90% of Business Travel to Return by 2025
Lufthansa Group CFO Remco Steenbergen said that the four legacy airlines that compose Lufthansa Group expect business travel to return to 90% of pre-pandemic levels by 2025. He made the statement on an earnings call discussing Lufthansa’s Q1 financial report in which the group posted a €947 million loss.
Lufthansa is still working toward becoming smaller and more efficient (aren’t we all). It retired many of its long-haul aircraft with large premium cabins during the pandemic, and currently has 115 fewer planes than it did a year ago. The airline believes it can operate 90% of its 2019 capacity with 80% of the fleet size through more efficient planning. If that doesn’t work, it’ll just throw a bunch more seats on its airplanes.
Lufthansa Group reduced its operating expenses by 51% in Q1 2021 down to €4 billion, compared to €8.2 billion in Q1 2020. The group’s airlines combined for 111,262 employees, a 19% drop from a year ago.
Cargo posted a record quarter with €802 million in revenue, a YoY increase of 45%. The group ended the quarter with €10.6 billion of liquidity. €5.4 billion of that figure is untapped loans and other funds offered but not yet accepted from the German, Swiss, and Austrian governments. It also has several hundred million euro tied up in planning and sponsorship of future Wheneverfests to take place all over Germany.
- Air Transat reached an agreement with the Canadian government to borrow up to C$700 million in any combination of cash and Tim Horton’s gift cards.
- Bamboo Airways is offering a status match promotion to frequent fliers from basically any airline in the world for its Bamboo Club program. Even Alitalia. Actual bamboo is not included.
- Cargolux closed out its FY 2020 books, posting a $796 million profit for the year.
- Frontier recently took delivery of three new A320neo aircraft. The three planes have been outfitted on their tails with Hudson The Bog Turtle, Odell the Lynx, and Crystal the Florida Manatee, respectively.
- GOL has pledged to go carbon neutral by 2050. Cranky Daily will provide annual updates on their progress.
- Iberia Maintenance has appointed Paul Horstink as its new Commercial and Business Development Director just in-time for this weekend’s Kentucky Derby.
- Juneyao Airlines took delivery of an A321 neo aircraft. It’s reported the aircraft came with seats, restrooms, seat belts, and everything.
- Mas Air signed an agreement with Altavair to dry-lease two más A330-200 freighter aircraft.
- Pegasus is launching new service to Batumi, Georgia (BUS), the second-largest city in Georgia. (this one, not this one.)
- Ryanair is challenging airBaltic by opening a new base at its Riga hub, with a plan of 95 flights by its Buzz subsidiary including 16 new routes. Also expect the airline to sue airBaltic at some point over something.
- Vistara applied to the DOT for a foreign air carrier permit with hopes of being able to travel to the United States this September.
- Viva Aerobus announced the closing of a $150 million funding round that will hopefully be enough to upgrade the airline to become Viva Aeroplane.
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I asked a friend of mine who used to be a gymnast to help me learn yoga. He asked if I was flexible and I told him yes, but I can’t meet up on Thursdays.