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Beijing says it lodged complaints about questioning of arriving workers about Communist Party membership
HONG KONG—China accused American officials of harassing Chinese airline and shipping crews that arrive in the U.S. in attempts to single out Communist Party members, and warned that Beijing may retaliate against Washington for what it considers to be provocative behavior.
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying said U.S. law-enforcement personnel have recently conducted surprise raids on sailors aboard arriving Chinese ships and questioned arriving Chinese airline crews to ascertain whether they are members of the Communist Party. She didn’t offer details.
Ms. Hua, speaking at a routine briefing on Monday, denounced such enforcement actions as a severe political provocation designed to “provoke ideological confrontation.”
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Airport screenings were elevated this weekend, and some chose to drive rather than fly
Many would-be fliers opted to remain at home or drive. Travelers at O’Hare International Airport in Chicago on Sunday.
The weekend after Thanksgiving met expectations that it would be the busiest travel period in the U.S. since the coronavirus pandemic began, aided by clement weather and lower gas prices that encouraged some to drive rather than fly.
Almost 50 million people were expected to have made a journey during the Thanksgiving holidays, said AAA, despite tightening local clampdowns and warnings from federal health officials. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Nov. 19 recommended people not travel over Thanksgiving.
The number of travelers from Nov. 25 through Nov. 29 was down more than 10% from a record set last year, according to AAA, which includes flights and road trips of more than 50 miles. Airlines, which boosted capacity earlier in the month only to trim flying when cancellations started to climb in recent weeks, said traveler numbers were in line with their revised expectations.
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Carriers are positioning doses for quick distribution if vaccines are approved by regulators
The flights are one link in a vast global supply chain being assembled to tackle the logistical challenge of distributing Covid-19 vaccines.
United Airlines Holdings Inc. UAL -0.55% on Friday began operating charter flights to position doses of Pfizer Inc.’s PFE 2.90% Covid-19 vaccine for quick distribution if the shots are approved by regulators, according to people familiar with the matter.
The initial flights are one link in a global supply chain being assembled to tackle the logistical challenge of distributing Covid-19 vaccines. Pfizer has been laying the groundwork to move quickly if it gets approval from the Food and Drug Administration and other regulators world-wide.
Pfizer’s distribution plan also includes refrigerated storage sites at the drugmaker’s final-assembly centers in Kalamazoo, Mich., and Puurs, Belgium, and expanding storage capacity at distribution sites in Pleasant Prairie, Wis., and in Karlsruhe, Germany, in addition to dozens of cargo flights and hundreds of truck trips each day.
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Pilots accept lower pay to prevent over 1,700 furloughs as pandemic roils airline industry
Delta Air Lines Inc. pilots agreed to accept reduced pay in exchange for job security until 2022, as the industry continues to grapple with reduced travel demand due to the coronavirus pandemic.
Delta and the union that represents its pilots said Wednesday that the cost-cutting agreement would prevent the more than 1,700 pilot furloughs the carrier had originally planned. Under the agreement, pilots who would have been furloughed will receive pay for 30 hours a month, though they won’t have to fly. Delta would also be able to reduce pilots’ minimum guaranteed work hours by as much as 5%, which results in lower pay, and the company agreed not to carry out furloughs until Jan. 1, 2022.
“Pilots, as long-term stakeholders in our company, have stepped up to the plate once again to help Delta weather this crisis,” said First Officer Chris Riggins, a spokesman for the union that represents Delta’s pilots.
Airlines have had to shrink to match a diminished outlook for travel demand. The global airline industry is forecast to lose $38.7 billion next year even if Covid-19 vaccines and testing help reopen more borders, the International Air Transport Association said earlier this week.
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The U.S. on Wednesday approved Boeing Co.’s 737 MAX jets for passenger flights again after dual crashes took 346 lives, issuing a set of long-anticipated safety directives and notices to airlines globally that will help resolve the plane maker’s biggest pre-pandemic crisis.
The Federal Aviation Administration’s official order to release the MAX, grounded since March 2019, came as the Chicago aerospace giant grapples with a host of new problems in the midst of the continuing health crisis.
The FAA’s mandate allows Boeing to resume delivering the jets to airlines and lets them carry passengers, pending completion of certain mandatory fixes and additional pilot training requirements spelled out in related documents also released by the agency. U.S. carriers said Wednesday that they would broadly reintroduce the MAX into their schedules starting early next year, while FAA chief Steve Dickson said he expected approvals from some foreign regulators within days.
But the pandemic has sapped demand for air travel, prompting airlines and aircraft-leasing firms to cancel about 10% of Boeing’s outstanding MAX orders this year. Boeing has said it believes hundreds more of its remaining 4,102 orders could be in jeopardy because of the financial health of some customers.
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Even after the 737 MAX gets cleared for takeoff, the plane maker will have a hard time delivering it to customers
It seemed difficult to imagine a worse year for Boeing BA 2.80% than 2019—until 2020 came along. What should worry investors now is that the long-awaited 2021 return to grace is slipping away.
On Wednesday, the Chicago-based plane maker reported a $466 million loss for the third quarter. Revenues came in 29% lower due to the Covid-19 crisis, even though the prior-year period was itself badly hit by the grounding of Boeing’s 737 MAX jet in March 2019. However atrocious, the results were better than analysts were expecting: Boeing stock fell about 3% in afternoon trading, in line with the broader equity market’s poor performance Wednesday.
Like other companies in the aerospace industry, Boeing is taking steps to cut costs to face years of depressed travel demand. It is closing the original 787 Dreamliner assembly line in the Seattle area; the model will only be made in the lower-cost South Carolina plant from mid-2021. And Chief Executive David Calhoun wrote to employees Wednesday that a further 11,000 jobs will be cut by the end of 2021. He also plans to get rid of 30% of office space, echoing what peers such as Raytheon have said.
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World’s largest plane maker has moved back its narrow body ramp up plans by three months
Airbus stemmed an outflow of cash in the third quarter as it learned to navigate an industry reeling from the pandemic, but also said the aviation market’s recovery would start later than initially forecast.
The world’s largest plane maker posted a positive free cash flow of €600 million, equivalent to $705 million, as it started delivering more planes. Amid a sudden drop in traveler demand, airlines have moved to delay, defer or cancel orders for new jets. Airbus and rival Boeing Co. have reduced production levels to adjust.
However, Airbus was making more planes than it could deliver, hitting cash flow, as airlines typically pay most of the cost of a new jet upon delivery. Airbus still has finished planes awaiting delivery, but the company was able to reduce the number by around 10 aircraft to 135.
Airbus burned through €4.4 billion in each of the first two quarters of the year. It set a target for free cash flow to be at least break even in the fourth quarter, its first guidance since the start of the pandemic.
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The European plane maker will increase production rates of the short-haul workhorse next year, throwing a lifeline to a battered industry
When it started flying in 1987, Airbus’ A320 seemed like a moonshot project from an upstart plane maker, with little chance of challenging the supremacy of the Boeing BA 2.97% 737 on short-haul flights. Skip to 2020, and it is one of the few products keeping the aviation industry afloat.
This week, Airbus reported positive cash flows for the third quarter as plane deliveries resumed. The European company shipped 145 commercial aircraft, compared with 28 for its U.S. rival Boeing. While the Airbus number was still down 20% from a year earlier, it is an impressive figure in a pandemic. Global air traffic remains stuck at half of 2019 levels, giving airlines little reason to take on planes.
The workhorse A320 family stands behind Airbus’ resilience. At this pace, it could amount to 63% of combined deliveries from both plane makers this year, compared with 39% in 2018—before the grounding of Boeing’s troubled 737 MAX. Airbus Chief Executive Guillaume Faury confirmed reports that A320 production rates will start to ramp up from 40 to 47 a month in the second half of next year.
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