Archive for February, 2008
February 15, 2008
Living near an airport isn’t just irritating, it is also unhealthy, researchers said in a study that showed loud noise instantly boosts a sleeping person’s blood pressure.
The louder the noise, the higher a person’s blood pressure went, a finding that suggests people who live near airports may have a greater risk of health problems, said Lars Jarup, who led the European Commission-funded study.
“Living near airports where you have exposure to night time aircraft noise is a major issue,” Jarup, an environmental health researcher at Imperial College London said.
“The reason we did airports is because there was no study that has looked at particular problems of aircraft noise.”
High blood pressure can lead to stroke, heart failure, heart attack and kidney failure. It affects more than a billion adults worldwide.
The research team showed that people living for at least five years near a busy airport and under a flight path have a greater risk of developing chronic high blood pressure, also known as hypertension, than those who live in quieter areas.
That study of nearly 5,000 people found that an increase in night time plane noise of 10 decibels increased the risk of high blood pressure by 14 percent in both men and women.
“We know that noise from air traffic can be a source of irritation, but our research shows that it can also be damaging for people’s health, which is particularly significant in light of plans to expand international airports,” Jarup said.
In the four-year study, published in the European Heart Journal, the researchers remotely measured the blood pressure of 140 volunteers every 15 minutes while they slept in their homes near London’s Heathrow Airport — one of the busiest in the world — and three other major European airports.
They used digital recorders to determine what noises had the biggest impact on blood pressure, ranging from road traffic to a partner’s snoring to a plane taking off or landing.
The decibel level, not a sound’s origin, was the key factor, but planes had the most significant impact, Jarup said.
“Most of the time you will find road traffic noise is not too bad during the night,” he said. “If you live near an airport where there are night flights, that is quite another story.”
(Reuters)
February 14, 2008
Amsterdam airport operator Schiphol Group reported a 17.7 percent rise in 2007 net profit excluding exceptional items and property gains on Thursday, but said a flight tax would hurt its results in 2008.
The group said in a statement net profit rose to EUR233 million euros (USD$339 million) from EUR198 million in 2006. Including a one-off fiscal gain in 2006 and gains on its property portfolio, net profit fell 40.1 percent to EUR316 million.
Turnover rose 10.6 percent to EUR1.146 billion, while the Amsterdam, Rotterdam and Eindhoven airports that the group runs saw a 4.4 percent increase in passengers to 50.4 million.
The Dutch government, which owns 75.8 percent of the group, abandoned plans to privatize the company last year after the city of Amsterdam, which owns a 21.8 percent stake, blocked the sale of a minority stake through an initial public offering.
The group’s head Gerlach Cerfontaine said he was satisfied with strong performance at its retail and real estate businesses in 2007, but said he was less optimistic for this year.
“Due to the introduction of the flight tax on July 1, 2008, there will be little or no increase in passenger numbers and air transport movements, causing our net result to decrease,” he said.
However, the airport expects cargo transport to increase by 4 percent in 2008 to 1.67 million tonnes.
Amsterdam’s Schiphol is the fourth-largest passenger airport in Europe and the third-largest in freight volume.
The Schiphol Group also holds stakes in Brisbane airport and in Terminal 4 of New York’s John F Kennedy airport.
(Reuters)
February 6, 2008
Major US airlines racked up more than 7.4 million flights last year, a record high, with late arrivals also hitting their peak at 1.8 million, the US government said on Tuesday.
The biggest airlines packed their schedules at major airports, squeezing in more passengers at busy times in a bid to maximize revenues from premium paying business passengers.
There were more late arrivals than in any year since the US Transportation Department began keeping records in 1995, and the percent of on-time arrivals, 73.4, was the second-worst yearly performance. The worst was 72.5 percent in 2000.
On-time performance was highest, over 80 percent, during the years early in the decade when airlines scaled back operations to cope with the industry’s severe financial downturn.
Flight delays have grown each year since 2004 when the number of flights annually topped 7 million for the first time.
Atlanta Hartsfield Airport, the main hub for Delta Air Lines, was the busiest US airport for flights by major airlines with more than 827,600.
Chicago O’Hare, home of United Airlines, was second at 751,500. Dallas/Ft Worth, home to American Airlines was third at just under 600,000.
(Reuters)
February 11, 2008
A French air traffic controllers’ strike forced cancellation of some flights in and out of Orly, Paris’s second airport, on Monday at the start of a week of threatened air travel disruption in the French capital.
France’s civil aviation authority (DGAC) said one in two flights was cancelled at Orly, south of Paris.
There had also been some delays to flights at the larger Charles de Gaulle Airport at Roissy, north of the capital, which is home to Air France, a DGAC spokeswoman said.
Both airports are owned and operated by Aeroports de Paris.
The CGT union was protesting at plans to move Orly controllers to Roissy before regrouping them all on one site near Paris in 2015. The CGT last week foresaw industrial action continuing up to next Friday with up to 50 percent of flights being cancelled at Orly and lesser disruptions at Roissy.
The more moderate CFDT union withdrew plans for similar action after talks with the DGAC
“I had a flight this morning for Bordeaux which was cancelled so I now have a flight at mid-day. So I’ll be spending my morning here, waiting,” said passenger Nicole Geantet at Orly.
“The air control authorities are trying to change the way air traffic control works but no-one believes in it. The biggest ever European study invalidates it,” said Jean-Paul Armango, a member of CGT’s air traffic branch.
The strike is the latest in a series of industrial actions to hit Paris air traffic.
In October, Air France cabin crew went on strike for five days over pay and conditions, hitting thousands of travelers during a public holiday and school holidays.
In December and January, strikes by Air France ground crew forced some flights to be cancelled.
(Reuters)
February 9, 2008
Flights to and from Paris airports Roissy CDG and Orly are expected be disrupted next week by a strike by air traffic controllers, the civil aviation authority and the union said on Friday.
The CGT union, which has called the strike, said up to 50 percent of flights could be cancelled between Monday and Friday at Orly while 20-40 percent could be cancelled between Tuesday and Wednesday at Roissy.
The dispute is over a plan to move Orly controllers to Roissy before regrouping them all on one site near Paris in 2015.
“The conflict is really about security, from moving Orly to Roissy before doing better afterwards,” said Philippe Lohat, national secretary of the CGT’s air traffic branch.
The more moderate CFDT union withdrew its strike call after talks with the DGAC civil aviation authority. The DGAC said discussions with the CGT were continuing to try to find a solution.
The strike is the latest in a series of industrial actions to hit Paris air traffic.
In October, Air France cabin crew went on strike for five days over pay and conditions, hitting thousands of travelers during a public holiday and school holidays.
In December and January, strikes by Air France ground crew forced some flights to be cancelled.
(Reuters)
February 6, 2008
Major US airlines racked up more than 7.4 million flights last year, a record high, with late arrivals also hitting their peak at 1.8 million, the US government said on Tuesday. The biggest airlines packed their schedules at major airports, squeezing in more passengers at busy times in a bid to maximize revenues from premium paying business passengers.
There were more late arrivals than in any year since the US Transportation Department began keeping records in 1995, and the percent of on-time arrivals, 73.4, was the second-worst yearly performance. The worst was 72.5 percent in 2000.
On-time performance was highest, over 80 percent, during the years early in the decade when airlines scaled back operations to cope with the industry’s severe financial downturn. Flight delays have grown each year since 2004 when the number of flights annually topped 7 million for the first time.
Atlanta Hartsfield Airport, the main hub for Delta Air Lines, was the busiest US airport for flights by major airlines with more than 827,600. Chicago O’Hare, home of United Airlines, was second at 751,500. Dallas/Ft Worth, home to American Airlines was third at just under 600,000.
(Reuters)
WASHINGTON - Domestic airline delays in 2007 were the second worst on record, the Transportation Department said Tuesday.
Flights in the U.S. were late more than 26 percent of the time last year, a slightly better performance than in 2000, when airlines were tardy 27.4 percent of the time. The federal government began collecting airlines on-time data in 1995.The industry’s poor performance reflects rising passenger demand coupled with congestion in the skies and on tarmacs as the Federal Aviation Administration grapples with a growing number of air traffic controllers nearing retirement age. In 2006, domestic flights were late about 24.5 percent of the time.
President Bush has demanded action to avoid another summer of record delays, but there is little consensus among airlines, airport operators, Congress and the administration on what should be done.
Transportation Secretary Mary Peters earlier this month said congested airports can charge landing fees based on the time flights land and traffic volume to encourage carriers to spread operations more evenly throughout the day.
But the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, which runs John F. Kennedy International Airport, LaGuardia and Newark Liberty, said the new policy was a minor fix for a major problem. In 2007, those three airports had the lowest on-time arrival rates, and aviation officials say delays there cascade throughout the system and cause three-quarters of all flight delays.
The Air Transport Association, which represents the nation’s largest airlines, also said a more comprehensive fix is needed.
The trade group and the Port Authority prefer flight-path changes and improvements aimed at increasing the flight capacity at airports.
The airlines and the FAA are pressing for a new, $15 billion satellite-based air traffic control system, dubbed NextGen, that will take nearly 20 years to complete to improve operations. Last August, the FAA awarded ITT Corp. a contract worth up to $1.8 billion to build the first portion the system.
Peters on Monday said the Bush administration’s $68 billion fiscal 2009 budget proposal for the department would more than double the investment in NextGen technology to $688 million. But airport operators criticized the proposal for cutting the FAA’s airport improvement program to $2.75 billion in funding, which is $765 million less than this year and more than $1.1 billion below the level in the FAA reauthorization bill pending in Congress.
The nation’s 20 largest carriers reported an on-time arrival rate of 64.3 percent in December, down from 70.8 percent in the same month in 2006 and from 80 percent in November. December 2007 was the third worst month on record, but December 2000 was even worse with on-time performance of about 62.8 percent, which helped save last year from being the worst overall for delays.
In December, 43.6 percent of late flights were delayed by weather, up 12.6 percent from December 2006 and from 37.8 percent in November.
Customer complaints rose nearly 40 percent to 849 in December compared with the year-ago period, according to the government data. The rate of mishandled baggage rose slightly to 9 reports per 1,000 passengers from more than 8.9 reports a year ago.
American Eagle Airlines, which operates regional flights for AMR Corp.’s American Airlines, had the worst December with more than 46 percent of its flights delayed by at least 15 minutes. Aloha Airlines had the best on-time arrival rate in December at 93 percent.
Atlantic Southeast Airlines, a subsidiary of SkyWest Inc., had the worst on-time arrival rate for all of last year at 64.7 percent, while Hawaiian Airlines topped the list at more than 93 percent.
February 4, 2008
United Airlines said on Monday it will charge some passengers a fee to check more than one bag, a move that may generate USD$100 million annually as the carrier attempts to offset high fuel costs. The airline is the first major carrier to charge a fee to check a second bag. Some experts have long predicted that carriers would take this step to bolster revenue in an ultra-competitive industry.
“I think this is just the very, very, very beginning,” said travel expert Terry Trippler of TripplerTravel. “I think it’s going to happen throughout the industry throughout the year.” United’s new fee of USD$25 will be charged to customers who purchase non-refundable domestic economy tickets and do not have status in frequent flyer programs at United or one of its partners in the Star Alliance. The carrier will not charge passengers to check one bag.
Previously, the cost to those customers of checking two bags was included in the fare. For all customers, the cost to check up to four more bags will be USD$100 per bag. Previously, the charges ranged from USD$85 to USD$125 per bag. The cost to check items that require special handling — large, overweight or fragile items — will now be either USD$100 or USD$200, depending on the item.
Bag-check policies vary for major airlines, but generally they check two bags at no additional charge. Southwest Airlines, the largest US low-cost carrier, has begun charging travelers to check a third bag. The first two bag checks remain free. Major US airlines, hoping to build on a recovery that began in 2006, have been experimenting with ways to boost revenue by charging for services and items that once were free. For example, most carriers now charge for meals that previously had been included in the ticket price.
The trend toward “unbundling” goods and services sold on flights serves to generate additional revenue for the airlines and to reduce costs. Unbundling also helps lower base fares and saves money for customers who do not want to pay for certain items. United said that by charging for bag checks, the carrier will be able to keep its base fares lower and better compete with low-cost rivals.
(Reuters)
The year 2007 exceeded the expectations for international tourism with arrivals reaching new record figures close to 900 million. The results confirm both the sustained growth path of the past years and the resilience of the sector regarding external factors. This development has been supported by a strong world economy, which has experienced its longest period of sustained growth for more than two decades.
According to the latest UNWTO World Tourism Barometer, international tourism arrivals expanded by 6% in 2007, to 898 million international tourist arrivals, as compared to 2006.
“Economic and tourism growth are driven by emerging markets and developing economies. While mature markets remain the leading destinations in the world, the faster growth rate of new markets confirms UNWTO’s main message of tourism’s potential for the developing world”, said UNWTO’s Secretary-General, Francesco Frangialli.
Of the additional 52 million worldwide arrivals, Europe received some 19 million and Asia and the Pacific 17 million. The Americas was up by around six million, Africa by three million and the Middle East by five million.