Tag Archives: Fuel

Someone please explain Air India’s reported fuel hedging plan?

Air India Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner line number 35 test registered N1015 (later became VT-ANH) at the India Aviation show, Hyderabad March 2012. Photo copyright Devesh Agarwal.

On January 19th, Bloomberg reported that national carrier Air India will commence large scale fuel hedging for the first time. The story was promptly picked up and reported by many leading Indian newspapers the next morning, including The Business Standard and The Mint. As per the story, “Air India is hedging 2 million barrels of aviation turbine fuel annually at …

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Tech Tuesdays: Are Boeing 777-200LRs “fuel guzzlers”?

Air India Boeing 777-237LR VT-ALF Jharkand at New Delhi IGI airport. Photo copyright Vedant Agarwal, all rights reserved. Used with permission.

Air India ordered for eight Boeing 777-200LRs in 2005, along with 15 Boeing 777-300ERs. The first 777-200LR arrived in the July of 2007, and all eight were delivered by end of August, 2009. Barely six and a half years later, the first five Boeing 777s have been sold to Etihad, at a “throwaway” price, because Air India felt that the …

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Tech Tuesdays: Fuel planning: How much must you carry?

This article deals with how much fuel an airplane must carry, and why it mustn’t carry too much of it. Safety in aviation is primarily due to enforceable regulations and requirements that provide sufficient safety margins. One such requirement is the minimum fuel to be carried on board the aircraft. How much? Let’s assume a Bangalore – Delhi flight on …

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Boeing continues to Improve 737 MAX performance

By BA Staff The Boeing 737 MAX program continues to make steady development progress since reaching Firm Configuration on the 737 MAX 8 in July. Engineers have completed an assessment of the airplane’s performance confirming an additional 1% fuel-efficiency improvement over the 13% already promised to customers. Keith Leverkuhn, vice president and general manager, 737 MAX program, Boeing Commercial Airplanes …

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Alaska Airlines retrofitting 737 fleet with new, split winglet

By BA Staff Scimitar split winglets. Photo courtesy Alaska Airlines. Alaska Airline’s Boeing 737s will soon fly the more efficient performance-enhancing split Scimitar winglets, which will reduce fuel consumption by 58,000 gallons a year per aircraft saving the airline $20 million and cutting carbon dioxide emissions by 57,000 tons annually, equivalent to about 11,900 passenger vehicles. The new winglet from …

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Ryanair discontinues legal actions against Belfast Telegraph

Ryanair has dropped legal proceedings against the Belfast Telegraph after the paper issue an apology to the carrier about a number of false claims made in an article posted on the Telegraph website on August 6th. Find the details below. 19th August 2013 RYANAIR WELCOMES BELFAST TELEGRAPH APOLOGYRyanair, Europe’s only ultra-low cost carrier (ULCC), today (19 Aug) welcomed an apology …

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Opinion: Air India pilots should not resort to scare tactics

by Devesh Agarwal The Indian Commercial Pilots Association (ICPA) of the erstwhile Indian Airlines, who fly the narrow body A320 family fleet of national carrier Air India is resorting to scare tactics accusing the airline “of arbitrarily changing the flight operating procedures for narrow-body A320 aircraft, affecting flight safety.” The issue revolves around the carrier’s decision to reduce the acceleration …

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Lufthansa to lower take-off acceleration altitude globally to save fuel

Lufthansa is set to change its take-off procedure for all departures outside Germany, and implement one standard, worldwide. As of 1 June 2013, the airline will lower the acceleration altitude, for using the climb thrust and for further accelerating by its aircraft that are taking off, from 1,500 feet (approx. 457 metres) to 1,000 feet (approx. 305 metres). What does …

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Indian aviation 2012 review Part 1: Overall trends

by Vinay BhaskaraThis is part 1 of our 2012 review of Indian aviation. Part 2 will come next week with a carrier by carrier review of  2012 in Indian aviation. When the story of Indian commercial aviation in 2012 is told, the overarching narrative across almost the entire industry will be one of cautious optimism (though Kingfisher Airlines obviously belies this …

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DGCA made a bad financial decision in shutting down Kingfisher Airlines

Earlier this month, now shutdown Kingfisher Airlines, once India’s largest private domestic carrier, reported a huge net pre-tax loss of Rs. 1115.5 Crore for the second quarter of Fiscal Year 2012-13. The performance was by far and away the poorest quarterly financial performance out of any Indian airline in the last few years, though that is to be expected given …

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IBM Analytics helps Jet Airways save $6 million per year

IBM analytics is enabling Jet Airways, to accurately calculate, track and report aircraft emissions, allowing the airline to use advanced analytics to map the carrier’s carbon emissions, optimising its fuel usage by detailed analysis of each flight. This is part of a strategic 10-year business transformation agreement, the airline signed with IBM, in 2010. IBM’s Integrated Emission Management System is …

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FDI is not a panacea; but a step in the right direction

When new Indian civil aviation Minister Ajit Singh announced that the national government would soon begin the process of allowing 49% foreign direct investment (FDI) by international carriers into India’s airlines Tuesday, India’s flailing airline industry breathed a heavy sigh of relief. Following a 75 minute meeting with finance minister Pranab Mukherjee, Singh stated, “the question was to allow foreign …

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Latest AMR financial results validate American Airline’s large narrow-body order

Earlier today, AMR corporation, the parent company of American Airlines, announced its financial results for the third quarter of 2011. Traditionally, the third quarter is the strongest financial quarter for US airlines. However, AMR posted a net loss of $162 million, $0.48 per diluted share. This stood in contrast to their $143 million net profit in the third quarter of …

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Analysis of Kingfisher’s Q1 Results

Continuing the series of Indian carrier financial analyses, today we take a look at Kingfisher. Previous Analyses: SpiceJet Following the trend of most Indian carriers, Kingfisher posted a drop in net income; facing a net pretax loss of Rs. 3.90 billion vs. a pretax loss of Rs. 2.64 billion in Q1 2011. As compared to SpiceJet, Kingfisher did not see …

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India Budget 2010: Impact on the aviation sector

Keeping in mind the five year term of the Lok Sabha, the first year is the thank you budget, years two and three are the hard and bold budgets, year four is the status-quo budget, and year five is the populist budget meant to garner votes. With coalition politics in full sway, the union budget is also now subject to …

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Airlines face future oil shock during recovery period

It is difficult to believe that the global economic slowdown commenced one year ago. Since July 2008, airlines across the world began to cut back on their seat capacity, and parking their aircraft. In it’s July 2009 report on trends in the supply of airline flights and seats, the Official Airline Guide OAG reported that airlines are offering 315 million …

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Fuel populism killing air transportation

India, the world’s largest democracy, has a sorry record in sound and bold economic administration. Populist measures abound, and nothing is sacred or immoral in the perpetual quest to obtain and then secure the “gaddi”. Fuel pricing in India is a prime example. Officially, the “Administered Price Mechanism” was abolished in 2002, but today, the Indian government has a greater …

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