USA: Delta Increases Flights From Seattle To Florida

Delta Air Lines will connect Seattle/Tacoma and Tampa next year, its first new domestic route from Seattle for next year.

The SkyTeam Alliance carrier will offer a daily flight between the cities with Boeing 737-800 aircraft that seat 160 passengers, according to Diio by Cirium schedules.

Tampa (TPA) will be Delta’s second nonstop flight to Florida from Seattle (SEA), joining Orlando (MCO).

Tampa is the first domestic addition from Delta’s Seattle hub for 2020. The airline will begin flights to Tokyo Haneda (HND) from the Pacific Northwest city in March, a move that comes as it ends more than three decades of service at Tokyo Narita (NRT).

Delta Air Lines will connect Seattle/Tacoma and Tampa next year, its first new domestic route from Seattle for next year.

The SkyTeam Alliance carrier will offer a daily flight between the cities with Boeing 737-800 aircraft that seat 160 passengers, according to Diio by Cirium schedules.

Tampa (TPA) will be Delta’s second nonstop flight to Florida from Seattle (SEA), joining Orlando (MCO).

Tampa is the first domestic addition from Delta’s Seattle hub for 2020. The airline will begin flights to Tokyo Haneda (HND) from the Pacific Northwest city in March, a move that comes as it ends more than three decades of service at Tokyo Narita (NRT).


Delta established its Seattle hub in 2014 to support its growing Pacific gateway at the airport. The airline will operate up to 180 peak-day flights from the airport by next June, Diio schedules show.

Delta will compete with Alaska Airlines between Seattle and Tampa, according to Diio.

Tourism Observer

CANADA: WestJet To Cease Flights To Mexico City In October 2018

WestJet will exit Mexico City in October, becoming the latest among several North American airlines to retrench from Mexico's capital city.

This only seven months after WestJet entered the Mexico City market with routes from Calgary and Vancouver.

It's just not performing up to the standards that we would like to see, WestJet chief financial officer Harry Taylor says of Mexico City. We don't want to be cost subsidizing at this point.

Taylor adds that despite retrenching, WestJet still sees long term opportunity to serve Mexico City and could return.

Long term there's something there.

WestJet will operate its last Vancouver-Mexico City flight on 3 October, followed by its final Calgary-Mexico City flight on 27 October.

The carrier launched both routes in March and does not serve Mexico City from any other destination, data shows.

WestJet's move mirrors cuts by other airlines.

Alaska Airlines will stop serving Mexico City on 7 November when it operates it last flight from Los Angeles.

Alaska called that route underperforming and said that the change frees aircraft to launch new routes, such as Seattle to Columbus, Ohio, which the airline plans to start in March 2019.

Alaska also had served Mexico City from San Francisco, but ended that route in May.

Likewise, United Airlines will also cut its Los Angeles-Mexico City flight in October, schedules data shows.

Capacity in available seats from North America to Mexico City jumped 9% year-over-year in the third quarter of 2018, primarily reflecting expansion by low-cost carriers Aeromar, JetBlue Airways, Southwest Airlines, VivaAerobus and Volaris, schedules data shows.

WestJet's move comes as the airline seeks to tighten its operation and bolster its finances.

The carrier has seen costs swell in recent quarters, and posted a second quarter operating loss.

The financial challenges hit amid a broad, companywide transformation under which WestJet is moving upscale, acquiring Boeing 787s, installing business class seats on 737s and adding flights at its hubs.


Tourism Observer

USA: Delta to Add Seattle-Osaka Service in Partnership with Korean Air

Delta is adding nonstop service to Osaka-Kansai (KIX), Japan, starting in 2019, complementing its existing international network.

As Seattle’s global airline, Delta offers service to the top destinations throughout Asia, and additional access to Japan is important for our Seattle customers as well as the business community throughout Washington state and beyond, said Tony Gonchar, Delta’s vice president — Seattle.

We’re pleased to offer another key business destination with our new nonstop Osaka service from Seattle.

Delta will fly the new route with one of the airline’s Boeing 767-300ER equipped with 25 fully flat-bed seats in Delta One, 29 seats Delta Comfort+ and 171 seats in the Main Cabin.

Every seat has access to Wi-Fi, free personal in-flight seatback entertainment screens and power ports.

Meals, created in partnership with Delta’s Michelin two-star consulting chef Norio Ueno will be featured in all cabins of service.

Schedule details will be released at a later date. Delta today at Osaka offers daily service to Honolulu, making Seattle its second nonstop U.S. destination from the Japanese city.

Delta has made the difficult business decision to cease Seattle-Hong Kong service, with the last flight out of Hong Kong on Oct. 4. Delta will continue to serve Hong Kong from Seattle via Seoul-ICN, with its joint venture partner Korean Air.

Delta continues to make significant investments in the Puget Sound region and remains Seattle’s No. 1 global carrier, said Gonchar.

We look forward to serving our customers this summer as we operate our busiest schedule yet at our Seattle hub with more than 170 peak-day departures to more than 50 destinations.

The Seattle-Osaka route will be included in Delta’s joint venture partnership with Korean Air, which serves 12 destinations in Japan — giving shared customers optimized schedules, a more seamless customer experience and improved loyalty program benefits.

Giving customers more choices between the U.S. and Asia, the launch of Seattle-Osaka is another milestone in building the industry’s best trans-Pacific joint venture with Korean Air, said Matteo Curcio, vice president — Asia Pacific.


Tourism Observer

USA: Alaska Airlines And Virgin America Expand To Dallas Love Field,Turkish Introduces New Product

Virgin America and Alaska Airlines are expanding service to Dallas Love Field from four West Coast airports. With new routes between Love Field and Seattle; San Diego; Portland, Oregon; and San Jose, California, the combined airline will serve eight destinations from Love Field with 18 daily peak season departures, up 40 percent.

Four months into its merger with Virgin America, Alaska Airlines has announced unprecedented growth from the West Coast, adding a record 37 new markets to date.

The new Love Field expansion builds on Alaska's successful service to Texas, which began 12 years ago. After today's announcement, Alaska Airlines and Virgin America will offer guests 59 peak season flights a day to/from five Texas airports, including Austin, Dallas Fort Worth, Dallas Love Field, Houston and San Antonio.

The four new routes will be flown using three-class jets. The Embraer 175 jet, operated by SkyWest Airlines, will fly daily to Portland, San Diego, San Jose and Seattle.

One of the two daily flights to Seattle will be operated by Virgin America using an A320 family aircraft. All guests flying the new routes will enjoy Free Chat, free movies, premium food and beverages, Wi-Fi and advance seat selection.

Starting this summer, Virgin America jets will be replaced with a 76-seat E175 jet in two Love Field markets – New York's LaGuardia Airport and Washington, D.C.'s Reagan National Airport. On Aug. 27, three-times daily service to New York's LaGuardia Airport will operate using an E175 and increase to four daily flights on Oct. 28.

Starting Feb. 18, twice-daily service to Reagan National Airport will also be replaced with an E175. The third daily Love Field-Washington Reagan National daily trip will continue to be operated by Virgin America until March 11, when SkyWest will take over the evening flight. As part of these schedule changes, Virgin America will permanently exit Love Field-Las Vegas on Aug. 26.

The fleet changes will free up Virgin America planes used in Love Field, to fly new, previously announced long-haul San Francisco flights to Philadelphia, New Orleans, Nashville, Indianapolis, Raleigh-Durham and Kona, as well as new flights between Los Angeles and Philadelphia.

Virgin America will continue to operate three daily flights between Love Field and Los Angeles and three daily flights between Love Field and San Francisco. Additionally, all Virgin America employees in Dallas and LaGuardia are keeping their jobs. There is no change in employment status for any teammates as a result of this announcement.

Meanwhile, Turkish Airlines takes in-flight experience even further. Having the passenger’ satisfaction as the airline’s priority, wide on-board selection of the carrier continues to be broadened in order to reach the widest range of passengers’ requests.

Yet another innovation developed by Turkish Airlines to enable its business class passengers to enjoy the best Turkish hospitality within the concept of privileged travel.

Living garden concept including new cosmetics consisting of hand lotion, hand soap and room odor branded with Molton Brown –a brand identified with refreshment, naturalness and luxury-, are presented on specially designed wooden stands with live plants in business class lavatories.

The flowers and green plants placed in the lavatories within the scope of the project make passengers feel like in a flower garden above the sky.

Virgin Atlantic, Delta, Jet Airways To Expand Codeshare Cooperation

Delta Air Lines and joint venture partner Virgin Atlantic will expand the airlines’ existing cooperation agreement with India’s Jet Airways, the carriers announced Oct. 31.

Beginning Nov. 2, Delta and Virgin Atlantic passengers flying from the US into London Heathrow (LHR) will be able to make connecting flights to Mumbai and Delhi on Jet Airways.

Simultaneously, Jet Airways passengers will be able to connect through London Heathrow onto Delta routes to nine US cities: Atlanta, Boston, Detroit, Minneapolis, New York, Philadelphia, Portland, Salt Lake City and Seattle.

The new London-Mumbai/Delhi connections complement Delta and Jet Airways codeshare agreements already offered out of Amsterdam Airport Schiphol and Paris Charles de Gaulle (CDG) airport.

“With up to 11,000 people flying daily between India and North America, and with trade and tourism flows increasing between the US, UK and India, we are giving our customers more … options between North America and India,” Delta SVP-Europe, Middle East, Africa and India Nat Pieper said. “Customers will be able to hold a single Delta ticket from North America through London to India.”

Virgin Atlantic already has a codeshare agreement with Jet Airways on flights between five Indian cities and London Heathrow via Delhi. In 2017, subject to government approval, the airlines plan to expand their codeshare agreement when Virgin Atlantic places Jet Airways’ marketing code on flights from London Heathrow to 10 North American cities.

JetBlue Expands ‘Mint’ Experience

JetBlue announced an expansion of its popular ‘Mint’ Premium service on on many of its routes, or as the carrier said, a “Monumintal Expansion”.

The carrier stated that eleven routes will now have the ‘Mint’ expansion, including Seattle, San Diego, Fort Lauderdale and Las Vegas as new cities for the service, which is offered exclusively on the carrier’s Airbus A321 aircraft.

“Mint helped traditional business class travelers realize there is a better way,” said JetBlue President and CEO Robin Hayes in a statement. “Our plan has long called for strategic growth of Mint on these valuable transcontinental routes, and now is the right time for us to capture this opportunity to bring much needed competition where customers are facing dwindling choices.”

The company has 13 planes outfitted for Mint now and four more coming this year. It expects to take delivery of nine more Mint airplanes in 2017 and more the year after. Airbus and its partners need a six-month window in order to swap any A321 orders from the all-economy cabin that the airline had been taking to the upgraded Mint interior.

The following domestic routes that will see the upgrade are:

- Seattle to Boston
- Seattle to New York JFK
- San Diego to Boston
- San Diego to New York JFK
- Los Angeles to Boston
- Las Vegas to New York JFK
- San Francisco to Fort Lauderdale
- Los Angeles to Fort Lauderdale
JetBlue’s announcement comes two weeks after it expanded ‘Mint’ to flights in the Caribbean, making it the only airline to feature lie-flat service on its regular flights there.

It also comes just days after losing out a bid battle to take over Virgin America. Alaska Airlines agreed to pay $2.6 billion in cash for the San Francisco-based carrier.

During the last decade, the U.S. airline industry has experienced an era of consolidation that has made it more competitive, and we are about to see now how airline no longer bid for their competitors but for customer retention and loyalty.

SOUTH AFRICA: Emirates To Make More International Flights To Cape Town

Emirates Airline has announced a third daily flight between Cape Town and Dubai, starting July 4.

Flight EK778 departs Dubai at 10h50 and arrives in Cape Town at 18h30.

Flight EK779 departs Cape Town at 20h05 and arrives in Dubai at 07h30.

The airline now has connections to New York, London, Seattle, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Chicago, Rome, Sydney, Athens, Mumbai, Shanghai, Milan, Beijing, Munich, Hong Kong, Phuket, Bangkok, Singapore, Medina, Deli, Male and more.

TAIWAN: EVA Air Increases Flights To JFK Airport

EVA Air of Taiwan will be adding three additional weekly flights on their direct Taipei (TPE) – JFK route effective July 7, thus bringing the airline’s total number of New York flights to ten weekly.


The Star Alliance member first began service to the New York area in 1992 with service to Newark via Seattle. With the delivery of new Boeing 777-300ER aircraft the route went nonstop in 2008, although a technical stop in ANC in one direction was still required. In 2011 the airline moved to JFK with nonstop flights and eventually increased to a daily frequency.

The additional flights will operate during daylight hours on Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday – a great opportunity for local spotters to finally catch the airline’s fun array of ‘Hello Kitty’ inspired aircraft. EVA recently introduced a new corporate livery and has announced intentions of adding Chicago and Washington, D.C. to their route map in the United States.

The airline currently serves Houston, Los Angeles, New York, Seattle, and San Francisco, in addition to Toronto and Vancouver in Canada. Further growth is expected with orders for Boeing 787 aircraft.

EVA Air joins other Asian carriers who have recently increased their JFK frequency, many adding a second rotation on certain days of the week. Among these include ANA, JAL, China Eastern, and Air China who have all added to the market.

Schedule:

BR030 TPE0750 – 1045JFK 77W 246
BR032 TPE1910 – 2205JFK 77W D

BR031 JFK0125 – 0455+1TPE 77W D
BR029 JFK1245 – 1615+1TPE 77W 246

USA: Boeing Completes Configuration Of New 777X, First Delivery In 2020

Boeing (Chicago, Seattle and Charleston) announced today the completion of the firm configuration milestone for the 777-9, the first member of the 777X family to be developed.

The Boeing 777X team reached this significant design milestone after working closely with airline customers and key suppliers to optimize the configuration of the new airplane.

The 777X family includes the 777-8 and the 777-9 – both designed to respond to market needs and customer preferences. The 777-8 and 777-9 provide significant range, payload and fuel burn advantages compared to the A350.

The firm configuration milestone marks the completion of configuration trade studies required to finalize the airplane’s capability and basic design. Wind tunnel test results, aerodynamic performance and structural loads are also evaluated to ensure the airplane meets requirements. This allows the 777X team to begin detailed design of parts, assemblies and other systems for the airplane. As detailed designs are completed and released, production can begin.

The 777X will be the largest and most efficient twin-engine jet in the world, with 12 percent lower fuel consumption and 10 percent lower operating costs than the competition. In addition, the 777X will bring cabin innovations and improved levels of passenger comfort.

The 777X program has received orders and commitments for 320 airplanes from six customers worldwide. Production is set to begin in 2017.

USA: Boeing Forecasts Demand Of 6,330 Airplanes Over The Next 20 Years For China

Boeing (Chicago, Seattle and Charleston), China’s leading provider of commercial airplanes, today projected a demand in the country for 6,330 new airplanes over the next 20 years. Boeing released its annual China Current Market Outlook (CMO) today in Beijing, estimating the total value of those new airplanes at $950 billion.

“Despite the current volatility in China’s financial market, we see strong growth in the country’s aviation sector over the long term,” said Randy Tinseth, vice president of Marketing, Boeing Commercial Airplanes. “Over the next 20 years, China’s commercial airplane fleet will nearly triple: from 2,570 airplanes in 2014 to 7,210 airplanes in 2034, with more than 70 percent of these deliveries accommodating growth.”

“China’s aviation market is incredibly dynamic, from its leading airlines to its startups and low-cost carriers,” said Ihssane Mounir, vice president of Sales and Marketing for Northeast Asia, Boeing Commercial Airplanes. “Boeing is committed to serve customers in the world’s largest airplane market by providing the most fuel-efficient airplanes and services to support their growth and profitability.”

As China becomes the world’s largest domestic air travel market, Boeing is forecasting demand for 4,630 single-aisle airplanes through 2034. This sector is driven by growth in new carriers and low-cost airlines in developing and emerging markets, as well as continuous expansion in established airlines. In fact, the efficiency and flexibility of single-aisle aircraft like the 737 helps Chinese carriers connect and stimulate growth along the Economic Belt as part of the One Belt, One Road Strategy. Tinseth said the Next-Generation 737-800 and new 737 MAX 8 – Boeing products at the heart of the single-aisle market – offer airlines the best fuel efficiency, reliability and capability.

China’s low-cost carriers are currently responsible for about 8 percent of single-aisle market demand, rising to 25-30 percent of demand by 2034, Tinseth noted. “The 737 MAX 200 will have the lowest fuel costs – 20 percent per seat – versus today’s most efficient single-aisle airplanes,” Tinseth said. “737 MAX fuel efficiency and the 737’s position as the industry’s most reliable airplane offer Chinese low-cost carriers competitive advantages as they grow new business.”

Boeing forecasts that the widebody segment will require 1,510 new airplanes, led by small and medium widebody airplanes such as the 777-300 ER (Extended Range), 777X and the 787 Dreamliner. Tinseth stressed that Chinese airlines have more than doubled their long-haul international capacity over the past three years, in large part following the delivery of 747-8 Intercontinental airplanes to Air China and 777-300ERs and 787s to several leading Chinese carriers.

“Enabled by China’s growing middle-class population, new visa policies and the underlying strength of its economic growth, this expansion is expected to continue, and in fact accelerate,” Tinseth said. “The 777, 787 and 747-8 are perfectly positioned to support Chinese airlines’ continued globalization.”

Worldwide, Boeing projects investments of $5.6 trillion for 38,050 new commercial airplanes to be delivered during the next 20 years. The complete global forecast is available at http://www.boeing.com/cmo.

Today, Boeing jets are the mainstay of China’s air travel and cargo system. More than 50 percent of all the commercial jetliners operating in China are Boeing airplanes. Over 8,000 Boeing airplanes fly throughout the world with integrated China-built parts and assemblies. China has a component role on every current Boeing commercial airplane model – the Next-Generation 737, 747, 767, 777, as well as the world’s newest and most innovative airplane, the 787 Dreamliner.