News Archive

Yesterday brought the end of the second walkout in as many weeks by BA cabin crew.  It was also the last of the current planned strikes, though the Union, Unite, refuse to rule out any further action.

The protests by the cabin crew have received a significant media attention not least because of the contrasting information coming from the two camps.  Both, the airline and Unite have tried to put as much information into the public domain as possible to weaken the position of their opposition. 

A survey, carried out by www.sunshine.co.uk, has found that the majority of passengers feel most secure when the pilot speaking to them over the tannoy has a standard "Oxford" accent.  At the other end of the scale, 76% of the 2000 people polled said they would not feel at ease if the aircraft was flown by someone with a Birmingham accent.

Premium traffic has been on an 18-month nose dive since the financial crisis. Passenger numbers across the industry have been hit hard, but with people looking to save money first and business class travel has all but disappeared.

This has led to significant issues for legacy carriers who, traditionally, look to generate about 50% of their revenue from premium travellers. It has also led to a number of carriers reducing the number of the more expensive seats on their aircraft.

At yesterday's second stage Open Skies meeting in Geneva a Memoradum of Consultation was signed by the US and European Union.  This is a step in the right direction but it has caused some disapointment that more progress wasn't made.

The International Air Tranport Association, IATA, released a statement in which Director General and CEO, Giovanni Bisignani, stated his disapointment that "significant progress on the issue of ownership" was not achieved.

Passengers face the prospect of yet more air travel misery after Virgin Atlantic’s pilots demanded that negotiations on pay be reopened, with the possibility that they could be balloted on strike action.

RAF jets have been scrambled 20 times in the last year to escort Russian aircraft, the MOD reveal, while releasing pictures of the latest interception over Scotland earlier this month.

Defence chiefs released pictures of two Russian Blackjack bombers which were spotted in the early hours of 10 Mar.

Two RAF Tornado F3 fighters from 111 Squadron were scrambled from RAF Leuchars in Fife where they intercepted the Russian planes near Stornoway, on the Isle of Lewis in the Outer Hebrides.

Virgin's tourist space rocket has completed its inaugural test flight over the Californian Mojave desert.

The spaceship was strapped to the mother aircraft for the three-hour test flight and reached an altitude 45,000 ft.

Tests will continue on the VSS Enterprise until 2011, before the first commercial flights take place. See some of the flight here http://www.flightcrewfinder.com/video/virgin-galactics-vss-enterprise-fi...