MAS poised to order up to 55 narrowbodies

Malaysia Airlines (MAS) later today plans to announce an order for narrowbody aircraft and it is expected to be for Boeing 737-800s.

The national carrier has earlier said it is evaluating 737 next generation aircraft and Airbus A320s and would make a decision in this year's first half.

A source at MAS tells me that the airline will be making an announcement today on aircraft but it will wait until the Kuala Lumpur stock exchange closes.

The source was responding to reports in the Malaysian newspapers - quoting from unnamed sources - saying the airline plans to buy as many 55 737-800s with first deliveries to start in 2011.

It will announce the deal today, say the reports.

MAS currently operates 37 Boeing 737-400s on domestic and short-haul routes but these aircraft are around 16 years old.

This is too old considering its major competitor is AirAsia which operates new A320s.

AirAsia has said publicly that having new aircraft has proven a boon for its business because new aircraft are more reliable to operate and consume less fuel.

If MAS orders 737-800s, as expected, it will have to wait a few years for the aircraft to arrive from Boeing.

But it could speed up its aircraft fleet renewal by getting some 737-800s on lease sooner.

Picture slide show of Ameco A380 hangar opening

Interview with Andreas Meisel, general manager of Ameco Beijing which is Lufthansa and Air China's MRO joint venture in Beijing

Is Ameco going to enter the 747 freighter conversion business?

How many 747s would you need to convert to freighters each year to make it viable?

Have you spoken to 747 freighter conversion supplemental type certificate (STC) holders Boeing and Bedek?

With your airframe heavy maintenance business, what percentage do you want to come from third party customers in future? Today it is 50%.

Who are your competitors?

What's your staff turnover?

What impact is China's high inflation having on wages?

What's happening with wages at Ameco?

How do you cope with wage rises and remain competitive?

Phone interview with Budhi Suyitno, director general of Indonesia's Directorate General Civil Aviation

Here's an unedited phone interview I did with the head of Indonesia's civil aviation authority discussing the country's efforts to improve air safety. Topics we touch on include: the ICAO audit and recommendations, Indonesia's efforts to have the EU ban lifted on Indonesian carriers and registered aircraft and efforts by the DGCA, airport authorities and National Transport Safety Committee to improve training and best practices. The interview is about 10 and half minutes long.

Viva Macau's big challenge

Imagine running an airline where your competitor has the power to prohibit you from operating to particular destinations even if you have already invested money to establish services to that destination.

This is the problem Viva Macau faces because Air Macau has a monopoly concession to Macau's international air traffic rights which effectively means Air Macau - rather than the Macau Government - decides how the territory's air traffic rights will be distributed.

Air Macau CEO, David Fei, disclosed this crucial nugget of information earlier this month when he was interviewed by the Macau Daily Times newspaper.

He reportedly confirmed to the newspaper: "Viva Macau is not restricted as to where it can fly as long as Air Macau approves it."

Viva Macau then pounced on this disclosure by writing an open letter to the newspaper attacking Air Macau by claiming Air Macau is hoarding traffic rights, failing to generate traffic to Macau and, as a consequence, is failing to act in the in the interests of Macau.

It says Air Macau has rejected the majority of applications made by Viva Macau for new points to fly to.

And it cites, as an example, the fact Viva Macau last year launched services to Phuket in Thailand but then had to suspend the service because Air Macau objected.

I feel sorry for the Viva Macau employees in Phuket who would have lost their jobs as a consequence of this spat between Viva Macau and Air Macau.

Hopefully, common sense will prevail and the two carriers will work to complement each other's network rather than going at each other's throats.

Air Niugini getting 787s

Papua New Guinea's national carrier Air Niugini just keeps on adding aircraft.
A few years ago this state-owned carrier was losing money hand over fist but thanks to strong demand for domestic air services and relatively little competition on international routes it has become profitable.
And it appears to be using its new-found financial strength to invest in newer aircraft.
Today I did an interview with a well-placed source of mine at the airline.
The source says Air Niugini has decided to order the Boeing 787 and is also working to get a Boeing 767-300ER and Embraer 190 on lease.
In addition, it has just bought three more Bombardier Dash 8s and is working to buy two more Fokker 100s, says the source.
He says the 787 deal will definitely go through because the carrier has already paid Boeing a deposit.
He says Air Niugini plans to buy two 787-9s and representatives from Boeing are in Port Moresby today to help the carrier decide on operating specifications.
Other issues that still need to be worked out are delivery slots.
Boeing has put Air Niugini down for first deliveries in 2015 but the airline is pushing Boeing hard for an earlier delivery slot, says the source.
I suggested that the delay in the 787 programme might make it hard for the aircraft-maker to appease the airline.
(Boeing has been aiming to deliver the first aircraft to launch customer All Nippon Airways at the end of this year but Boeing hasn't even powered up the first test aircraft yet so the latest estimate by analysts is that the first aircraft delivered to ANA might be delayed to September 2009).
But the delay in the 787 programme appears not to have fazed my source at Air Niugini. He says once Boeing starts producing 787s it can ramp up production. The hope is this will mean Air Niugini will receive its first 787 before 2015.
Currently, Air Niugini is maintaining international services using an Airbus A310 on short-term wet-lease from Portuguese carrier White Airways.
The A310 was needed because an earlier deal “went sour” on the purchase of an ex-Royal Brunei Airways 767-300ER, says the source.
Air Niugini was planning to buy the 767-300ER from Hong Kong firm Aerospace Finance Asia and receive the aircraft last October.
The source says Air Niugini “in a couple more months” will instead receive a 767-300ER on “damp lease” from Loftleidir Icelandic, by which time it will return the A310.
Air Niugini currently also has a one-year wet-lease on a Boeing 757 from Loftleidir Icelandic and has extended it for another one year, says the source.
While Air Niugini’s long-haul fleet is set to change dramatically, the airline is also making changes to its short-haul fleet.
Next month the airline will start wet-leasing an E-190 from Australia’s SkyAirWorld for a four-times-weekly non-stop service from Port Moresby to Brisbane and Sydney, says the source.
Currently Air Niugini operates on the Port Moresby-Brisbane-Sydney routing using a 767 because Sydney traffic on its own is unable to support a 767, says the source.
The E-190 is due to come in the first week of April but it will take time for SkyAirWorld to secure a foreign air operator’s certificate from the Papuan New Guinean authorities so it is more likely to start in the second or third week of April, adds the source.
Air Niugini has also been operating Fokker 100s to Australia and currently has six in total but is returning one in May on lease from Australia’s Alliance Air.
The source says Air Niugini’s CEO, Wasantha Kunarasiri, is in Dubai today to negotiate the purchase of one or two Fokker 100s.
And the source also says the airline recently purchased three Bombardier Dash 8s from German carrier Cirrus Airlines.
One is a -300, which has since arrived in Papua New Guinea, and the other two are -100s that will soon be delivered to Air Niugini, adds the source.

Video of C-160 cargo aircraft exploding at Indonesian airport

Video footage has emerged of a Transport Allianz Transall C-160 cargo aircraft operated by Indonesian carrier Manunggal Air Service that was gutted by fire 6 March soon after landing at an airport in west Papua.
The two pilots, a flight engineer and three loadmasters escaped safely from the aircraft which caught fire at 08:36 on 6 March at Wamena airport in west Papua moments after completing a flight from the west Papuan city of Jayapura, Manunggal Air Service operations manager Tjonhar Azya says from the airline’s offices in Jakarta.
He says the chartered cargo flight and was carrying diesel and jet fuel.
The aircraft had touched down at Wamena and was taxiing when the control tower informed the pilots that “smoke and fire could be seen coming from the left side landing gear”.
“They asked the pilot to taxi to the apron…and they taxied to an area …and stopped the aircraft and set down everything.”
When the pilots got out of the aircraft they could see “the landing gear was in smoke and fire and they tried to put it out with fire extinguishers but the fire kept increasing and then the fire brigade came to try and put out the fire but the fuselage kept burning”.
To watch TV footage of the blaze, click on this link http://www.metrotvnews.com/ and type in C-160 into the news search box.
The TV footage, from Indonesia's Metro TV News, shows the aircraft engulfed in flames, thick black smoke billowing plus, and at one point, a large fireball shoots out of the aircraft and into the sky.
Pictures taken after the fire was extinguished shows the aircraft’s main fuselage was completely destroyed and all that remains is the aircraft’s nose, rear empennage, wings and engines.
The aircraft that was destroyed, local registration PK-VTQ, was one of four C-160s in Manunggal’s fleet. Tjonhar says of the remaining three, two are in service and one is parked permanently at Jakarta airport.
He says the airline plans to keep its other C-160s and adds it is a good aircraft because “it is very easy to handle” and on the Jayapura-Wamena route can carry 10t of cargo.
The C-160 was built by a consortium of French and German aircraft manufacturers which developed the aircraft in the mid-1960s as a military transport.
Today the aircraft is still in service with the French, German and Turkish air forces.

Does Brazil's Embraer have a spare $1 billion it can lend to Japan Airlines?

Last month at the Singapore Airshow I was inside the Embraer chalet having lunch and chatting to one of the Embraer market analysts whose job it is to try and work out which airlines have a high propensity to order regional jet aircraft.

"I can't figure out where Mitsubishi is going to sell the Mitsubishi Regional Jet (MRJ)," he said.

His rationale was that Mitsubishi would struggle to sell the MRJ because Embraer had in the past couple of years sold RJs to nearly all the potential customers out there.

Coincidentally as he was saying this there were some executives from Japan Airlines (JAL) inside the chalet standing about 10 feet away from us.

JAL last year ordered 15 Embraer 170s, the first of which is due to arrive in Japan later this year.

"How about the Japanese?", I said to my friend at Embraer who was quick to reply that JAL had already ordered E-Jets so there is no way they would order MRJs as well.

Well, lets not be so sure about that.

A quick scan of the news out of Japan paints a very different story.

JAL is currently trying to get its finances in order as part of its turnaround plan and guess which large Japanese corporation has been coming to JAL's aid.

For example, in December Japan's Nikkei newspaper reported that JAL is looking to raise up to 150 billion yen ($1.3 billion) by selling shares to two Japanese conglomerates, one of which is Mitsubishi.

And in mid-February JAL announced it had raised 42.2 billion yen ($390 million) by selling and then leasing back two maintenance hangars at Tokyo Haneda Airport. It sold the hangars to a real estate investment trust controlled by Mitsubishi.

If Mitsubishi is pumping in the best part of $1 billion to help JAL financially then I don't see why JAL wouldn't want to return the favour by buying a few MRJs.

Pictures of crashed Air Bagan ATR 72 in Myanmar

Pictures have emerged of the Air Bagan ATR 72-210 that failed to take off from an airport at Putao town in northern Myanmar.

The pictures as you can see, show a crack down the mid-fuselage and that the rear cone has come off.

In the picture the aircraft (manufacturer's serial number 458 and local registration XY-AIE) is seen lying on a slope at the end of the runway.

I did an interview late yesterday with Tony Griffin, managing director of Phoenix Aircraft Leasing in Singapore, the firm that leases the ATR 72-210 to Air Bagan.

He says on 19th February the aircraft was on its take-off roll when a failure indicator showed that one of the engines was not working.

The pilot then decided to abort the take-off but at that stage the front nose gear had already become airborne and the aircraft was 3,700ft down the 7,000ft runway, says Griffin.

He adds, the aircraft was unable to stop in time and the aircraft damage occurred when the aircraft went down the slope.

Griffin also confirms that the insurance assessors have decided to write the aircraft off.

Earlier reports said three passengers and the two pilots were injured in the crash but Griffin says there were no injuries.

Delay to ARJ21 comes as no surprise

First flight of China's ARJ21-700 has been delayed, possibly by as much as three months.
The ARJ21-700 had its roll-out in December as scheduled and was due to have its first test flight in March but a spokesman in Shanghai for the aircraft maker, China Aviation Industry Corp. 1 Commercial Aircraft (ACAC), told me yesterday that "it will not happen in March".
He was unable to provide a new date and said they were aiming to have the first flight sometime before July.
If the aircraft ends up being delayed by three months it could have a major impact on the aircraft's customers.
ACAC has been aiming for the aircraft to receive Chinese certification in September 2009 but a three-month delay would make it hard for the aircraft's launch customer Shandong Airlines to receive its first aircraft before the end of 2009 as planned.
It also makes it hard for ACAC to fulfill Shenzhen Airlines' request that its regional airline joint venture in China, Kunpeng Airlines, start receiving ARJ21s in 2009.
At last December's roll-out ceremony Shenzhen Airlines made a commitment for 100 ARJ21-700s - a firm order for 50 ARJ21-700s with options for 50 more.
A senior ACAC official told me at the roll-out event in Shanghai that fulfilling the order would be challenging because Shenzhen Airlines had told ACAC it wants first deliveries for Kunpeng Airlines set for 2009 rather than 2010.
While the delay in the ARJ21 programme will make it hard for ACAC to meet customer expectations, the delay comes as no surprise to me personally.
At the roll-out ceremony I had an opportunity to look at the aircraft close-up and could see that there was still a lot of work that needed to be done on the aircraft.
For example, I could see that there parts of the landing gear that still had to be attached to the aircraft.
And no one at the ceremony was permitted to look inside the aircraft which can only lead one to assume that some of the equipment inside the cockpit had yet to be fitted.

US airforce's decision spells death for 767 programme

The US Airforce has decided to get specially designed Airbus A330s to use as refuelling tankers rather than use Boeing 767s, effectively putting the final nail in the coffin of the 767 aircraft programme.
Boeing had been hoping that US Airforce's requirement for 179 refuelling tankers would keep the 767 programme alive.
Currently Boeing has an order backlog of 51 767s and has been producing one aircraft per month which means at that rate the final aircraft will be completed a little over four years from now.
There are no new orders for 767 in sight because airlines instead have been ordering the Boeing 787, which promises to be far superior.
But if Boeing had been able to keep the 767 programme going - with the help of the US Airforce's massive order - it could have been a useful product in Boeing's line-up.
Not every airline can afford to buy a brand new 787 or is willing to wait six years for an aircraft to be delivered.
The 767 could have been an appealing choice for those airlines that wanted to buy a brand new widebody at a cheaper price and with the added benefit of next year delivery.
This, I believe, would have appealed greatly to airlines in developing nations such as Central Asia and Africa.
China is currently in the early stages of development on its own widebody which I suspect will end up filling the void left by the 767. China's new widebody won't be as technologically advanced
as the 787 but as long as it can be as reliable as the 767 and is significantly cheaper than the 787 then it will have a ready market and a market that could have been Boeing's.