Austrian Airlines’ Boeing 767-300ER registration OE-LAE became the first European airline aircraft to successfully convert and add winglets. This following American Airlines successful conversion and implementation of the blended winglets made by Aviation Partners Boeing. Austrian Airlines is in a pioneering position since its committed to the conversion at an early stage, and will now…

According to OAG’s (Official Airline Guide) March 2009 report, the world’s airlines have scheduled 4.9% fewer flights for March 2009 compared with the same month last year, with a 3.3% drop in capacity, according to the latest statistics from OAG, the world’s leading aviation data business. This is the eighth successive month of declines, and…

Buoyed by its recent lease of the Jet Airways Boeing B777-300ERs, Turkish Airlines THY is again expanding flight frequencies to the cities of New Delhi and Mumbai in India, Brussels, Venice, Helsinki, Basel and Dublin in Europe, Kuwait in the Middle East, Addis Ababa in Africa. New Delhi and Mumbai, India will increase its services…

The Aviation Herald is reporting the European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) has issued an updated Emergency Airworthiness Directive (EAD) 2009-0012-E following two incidents involving Qantas Airbus A330 and A340. These incidents were attributed to Air Data Inertial Reference Unit #1 (ADIRU-1) providing erroneous data. The EAD recognizes additional failure modes, that have been discovered in…

The Chinese have a saying “May you live in interesting times”. 2008 was certainly “interesting” to say the least. As we bid adieu to the year, I briefly recap some of the topics that made the aviation world interesting. Private greenfield airportsBengaluru International Airport at Bangalore, and Rajiv Gandhi International Airport at Hyderabad, ushered in…

While many travellers in the US, had a miserable time last few days, thanks to the winter storms, this story from AP takes the cake. It is small solace, but I hope it at least brings a wry smile to some lips. Across the world in sunny Philippines, a Philippine Airlines airplane was stuck circling…

As we wind down the year, and gear up for the festive season, I thank all the readers of Bangalore Aviation for their support and patronage. I wish you and each of your near and dear ones, a most joyous holiday, and may 2009 be bountiful, profitable, and successful. Some interesting stories that I came…

The Maytas-led consortium has taken a decision to put on hold its two Greenfield airport projects at Shimoga and Gulbarga in Karnataka due to the global recession. For now the projects are stalled and the partners will take the decision on it by end-2009, according to a report in Projects Today. In 2007, Maytas-led consortium…

Bengal Aerotropolis Projects Ltd’s. (BAPL) first private airport in Bardhaman district in West Bengal is likely to be operational by end of 2011. According to a report in Projects Today, the project, which is a part of the USD 2.5 billion (approximately Rs 12,500 crore) Durgapur Aerotropolis, has got an approval from the West Bengal…