Aviation

Travel agencies worldwide connected to Amadeus can now sell seats on Germanwings, the new German low-fare carrier. On 1 April 2003, Germanwings joined other low fare airlines already available through the Amadeus System, such as Virgin Express, Zip Air, Norwegian Air Shuttle, Sterling, AirTran Airways and AirAsia.

Luxair, Luxembourg’s flag carrier, resumed flights to Athens on March 30. The airline had suspended its flights to here some four years ago but now flies daily out of Athens to Luxembourg, with a stopover at Italy’s Milan Bergamo airport, using a 49-seat Embraer 145 Eurojet that boasts leather seating in both business and economy class.

The first AEA traffic report for 2003 shows an increase in passenger-km of 6.4 percent over January of last year. This brought traffic volume back to within 1.5 percentage points of where it had stood in January 2001.

An agreement was signed last month by Travel Transaction Processing Corporation to purchase Worldspan from its three airline owners (Delta Air Lines, Northwest Airlines and American Airlines).

Executives from the airline alliance SkyTeam, met in London recently where they announced plans to introduce an associate airline program that will expand customer benefits to additional regions of the world. The plan calls for opening associate SkyTeam membership to carriers that meet specific operational and service standards. The result will be an extension of the alliance’s network.

Athens International Airport is about to open an environmental information center within its main terminal building, according to a recent press release issued by airport management.

Greece’s transport ministry announced a tender for the sale of a majority stake in Galileo Hellas. Tenders were to be accepted up until January 17.

Aegean Airlines is one of the few airlines in the world today that has been able to cut costs drastically, without cutting service standards, over the past 12 months. As well, the private Greek carrier managed to increase revenue in 2002 by more than 14%, to reach 180 million euros. Not an easy feat.

The European Union’s transport council recently announced a decision to effectively double the compensation paid to passengers who are unable to be accommodated on the flights on which they are booked.

When Greece assumes the European Union presidency on January 1, for a six-month period, its transportation brief will include a member states’ agreement to award the European Commission a wide-ranging mandate to negotiate a bilateral USA-EU “open skies” agreement.