4000 passengers stranded as Air Australia goes under

Thousands of travellers from Hawaii to Thailand were stranded Friday after budget airline Air Australia ran out of money and went into voluntary administration, immediately grounding its five-jet fleet.

The Brisbane-based international and domestic airline, formerly known as Strategic Airlines, said all flights had been cancelled and the airline would not be accepting new bookings because it could no longer pay its bills. Voluntary administration in Australia is similar to bankruptcy protection in the U.S., and can buy a company time to trade out of its financial problems.

“It currently appears that there are no funds available to meet operational expenses so flights will be suspended immediately,” the airline said in a statement. Passengers who bought tickets with credit cards or had travel insurance may be given a refund, the airline said.

Around 4,000 passengers were overseas with Air Australia round-trip tickets, voluntary administrator Mark Korda said. Some of those affected were stranded in Honolulu and Phuket, Thailand.

“Overnight, the company was unable to refuel its planes in Phuket,” Mr. Korda told Australia’s Fairfax Radio. “The directors appointed us at 1-30 this morning and the boys have been working throughout the night to deal with what’s a very difficult situation.”

Australian airline Qantas and Jetstar, its budget subsidiary, were considering adding services to help stranded passengers get to their destinations, Qantas CEO Alan Joyce said. He said the airline will sell stranded passengers tickets for the same price they paid for their Air Australia tickets, giving them a chance to recover the full price from their travel agencies or credit card companies.

Air Australia’s fleet consists of five Airbus A330-200 and A320-200 aircraft, and regularly flies to Bali, Phuket, Honolulu and cities within Australia.

Mr. Korda said in a statement that Air Australia’s administrators were calling for immediate expressions of interest in the sale of the business.

-thehindu.com

JAL plane hits turbulence; causes broken bones

On Feb. 11, two people suffered broken bones when a Japan Airlines (JAL) plane hit sudden turbulence en route from Tokyo to Hawaii, says an airline spokesman.

According to the official, the JAL Boeing 767-300 was flying with 239 passengers and 11 crew members aboard when it encountered the turbulence at cruising altitude, some 300 kilometres (188 miles) west of Honolulu.

The accident occurred at 3:30 am Japan time (1830 GMT Thursday).

One passenger broke their left thigh bone and a crew member suffered a broken right elbow, the spokesman said without giving further details.

Established in 1951 and became the national airline of Japan in 1953, Japan Airlines is the Flag carrier of Japan and its main hubs are Tokyo’s Narita International Airport and Tokyo International Airport, as well as Nagoya’s Chūbu Centrair International Airport and Osaka’s Kansai International Airport.

With deliveries for a total 104 with no unfilled orders, the Boeing 767-300 is a 6.43 m stretch of the 767-200, with an overall length of 54.94 m. The 767-300 was first ordered by Japan Airlines in 1983. It first flew on January 30, 1986, and was delivered to JAL later that year on September 25. The 767-300′s direct competitor from Airbus is the A330-200. The 767-300 is expected to be replaced by the 787-8 in Boeing’s lineup.

 

-asdnews.com

-wikipedia.org

French “Air Force One” completed first flight

Air Sarko One

French president Nicolas Sarkozy’s Airbus A330-200 dubbed “Air Sarko One” has just been taken on its first test flight in Bordeaux, southwestern France, with all internal fittings due for completion by October.

“Air Sarko One” was approved earlier this month in a low key vote. Reserved for use by Sarkozy and his entourage, the A330 has been bought second-hand from the Air Caraibes airline and is undergoing a multimillion-pound renovation.

The specially upholstered Airbus A330-200, will also include a 12-man meeting room, 60 business class seats, top-grade encrypted communications systems, a reinforced fuselage and missile decoy system.

While still not quite on the scale of Air Force One 747-200B, when finished the 60 metres (190ft) long and 17 metres high A330,  is expected to have a private wing for the head of state, complete with office, bedroom and bathroom, a meeting room for his staff, and seats for 60 people.  The A330-200 was developed to compete with the Boeing 767-300ER.

President Nicolas Sarkozy

The French leader is understood to have long envied the luxurious conditions in which Barack Obama, the US President flies across the world in his Boeing 747-200B, and has complained that his two smaller Airbus A319s lacked the necessary presidential stature.

“Air Sarko One” as the plane has been dubbed, will have a wingspan a good two feet longer than the US model.

On the other hand, Mr. Sarkozy’s €176 million (£147 million) purchase and refit of the jet from tourist airline Air Caraïbes has raised eyebrows as the winds of austerity blow through Europe and other leaders are reining in their perks.

- google.com

- telegraph.co.uk