Aviation News

Emirates Airline

Dubai-based Emirates airline will be hiring more than 4,500 personnel to fill a wide range of vacancies across all continents in the next fiscal year, starting from April 1, 2012.

Alison Ward, Vice-President of Recruitment at Emirates, told Emirates 24l7 that the Arab world’s largest carrier will add 450 pilots and around 4,000 cabin crew in the next fiscal year.

“Emirates is planning to recruit approximately 450 pilots in the upcoming fiscal year, this is in addition to our recruitment of 570 pilots last year. We also need around 4,000 cabin crew in the next fiscal year; plus hundreds of operational staff as well,” Ward said.

The carrier said recently that so far in 2012 alone, the airline has recruited cabin crew talent in US states including Houston, Chicago, Los Angeles, Miami and Washington DC and will be holding an open day in Seattle in March. Emirates will be holding pilot recruitment drives in Atlanta and New York over the coming months.

Emirates airline recently held open days in the UAE and will hold more open days in the UAE and other countries in the coming yeas to fill a wide range of vacancies including engineering, airport operations, cabin crew and IT.

“Emirates holds open days for a variety of positions throughout the year on a monthly basis; most regularly are open days for pilots, cabin crew and engineering roles.

“However, Emirates also holds recruitment events for other positions such as airport operations and IT, as needed. Candidates interested in any role with Emirates or Dnata are encouraged to look at its website for the latest information about recruitment events and positions available across the Group,” Ward told Emirates24l7.

Ward said Emirates has held several recruitment events for both UAE nationals and expatriates.

“With our headquarters based in Dubai, the majority of our roles are also located here. Recently Emirates has conducted road shows for Emirati high school graduates across the UAE for operational roles such as pilots, cabin crew, engineering and airport services.

Additionally, we have hosted open days for cabin crew roles and staff for the new Concourse 3 at Dubai International Airport which were open to all nationalities. Emirates will continue to recruit and employ staff in the UAE to support the airline’s continued growth.”

The Dubai-based carrier announced in the last fiscal year that it would hire 4,000 personnel. When asked if these are in addition to the numbers announced in the previous year, Ward said: “The figure for the number of cabin crew needed has remained relatively the same year over year due to the fact that Emirates is continually receiving additional aircraft.

“Approximately 35 new aircraft will be added to the fleet this year and Emirates will need additional cabin crew to support these aircraft, just as it did last year. Emirates successfully met its cabin crew recruitment goals last year and looks forward to another positive recruitment year.”

The Emirates fleet has grown to 162 aircraft with another $55 billion on order, carrying more than 30 million passengers in its last fiscal year to a network now spanning 122 cities. The airline posted a profit of Dh5.46 billion ($1.49 billion) in the year to March 31, 2011.

Emirates’ profit in the first half of current fiscal year ended on September 30, 2011 plunged 76 per cent as fuel costs surged by $1 billion.

Approximately 35 aircraft will be added to the fleet by Emirates in this fiscal year which relates to around 2-4 aircraft each month (Boeing and Airbus together) with one per month being an A380.

“We do not have specific targets for certain countries but instead look to hire qualified candidates who can meet Emirates high level of safety and standards.

“One change to Emirates pilot recruitment this year is that we will be hiring experienced pilot into captain roles within the organisation. Previously, all pilots, regardless of experience and qualifications, joined in the First Officer roles.

However, due to the aircraft joining the fleet this year and our estimated increased need for flight crew, Emirates has opened up recruitment to captain roles and it has met with great success,” Ward said.

In November last year, Dubai Duty Free announced that it would recruit

1,000 personnel in 2012 for the launch of its outlets at Dubai Airports’ third concourse.

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China Southern A380

HONG KONG – China Southern Airlines recently welcomed a new A380 to its existing fleet of more than 450 airliners, its third delivery of the largest civil aircraft in the world.

A ceremony held in Hong Kong on March 2 marked the A380′s maiden flight from Beijing to Hong Kong.

The route departs every day from Beijing at 8:50 am and returns from Hong Kong at 2:40 pm.

The latest A380 was delivered to China Southern Airlines on Feb 29 in Toulouse, France, where the manufacturer Airbus is headquartered.

After its arrival at Beijing Capital International Airport on March 1, the airplane was used on the Beijing-Hong Kong flight on following day.

The route was previously served by the much smaller A321.

China Southern has ordered five A380s from Airbus. The first two were delivered in the last half of 2011, followed by the recent arrival and a remaining two that will be delivered later this year and in 2013.

The A380 is by far the biggest civil aircraft in the world, which can accommodate 40 percent more passengers and has 50 percent more floor space than the second-largest aircraft at present, according to China Southern Airlines.

The plane used in the Beijing-Hong Kong flight has 506 seats – eight in first class, 70 in business class and 428 in the tourist cabin.

“Compared to the A380′s standard seat number of 560, our plane offers more spacious room for travelers and as a result makes them more comfortable,” said a China Southern executive.

The airline said market prospects for the A380 flight are “very promising” due to close business links between Hong Kong and Beijing.

“We began to sell A380 tickets on Feb 9, and half of the seats for March have already been reserved,” said the company.

The price for a round-trip first-class ticket is 11,580 yuan – higher than on other models – while business class is 8,340 yuan and a tourist-class round trip can be as low as 1,830 yuan.

In the first day, 90 percent of the seats were occupied from both Beijing and Hong Kong.

Delegates from the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region were on the flight to attend the ongoing Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference and the National People’s Congress meetings.

China Southern is the world’s seventh and China’s only airline to use the A380.

The company now has more than 450 airplanes for serving in its passenger and cargo operations, including Boeing 777, 747, 757, 737 and Airbus 380, 330, 321, 320, 319 models.

With the world’s sixth-largest fleet, China Southern carried 80 million passengers last year, ranking it first in Asia and third in the world.

It has 1,930 flights reaching 191 destinations in 33 countries and regions every day.

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Airbus A380

Toulouse Airbus, the world’s biggest commercial aircraft maker, said it’s negotiating with two new potential Middle East customers to sell the A380 superjumbo.

The delivery schedule of the aircraft is a determining factor for the deal, Habib Fekih, Airbus president for the Middle East, said. The company’s commercial customers in the region are Emirates, the world’s largest carrier by international traffic and the biggest operator of the aircraft, Abu Dhabi’s Etihad and Doha-based Qatar Airways.

The Middle East has become the main sales region for the A380, with Emirates having ordered 90 in total and Qatar Air and Etihad a combined 20. Emirates, which already operates 20 of the double-decker aircraft, is marketing its location as a multi-directional hub in Dubai that can connect any two points in the world with an A380 with just one stopover.

The aircraft maker forecasts demand for 50 to 100 aircraft orders from Middle Eastern carriers this year, predominantly for narrow-body aircraft to replace ageing fleets, according to Fekih. This year has “good prospects,” even if it looks quieter in terms of regional orders than 2011, which was an “exceptional year”, he said.

Airlines that need to replace narrow-body planes include, Etihad, Egypt Air and Tunisair, the executive said, adding many A320 fleets have been in operation for 20 years.

Additionally, there could be “top-ups” for five or ten wide-body aircraft from Gulf carriers, though large individual orders are more likely to come from other carriers.

‘Serious negotiations’

“We have Sri Lanka, Pakistan, North Africa, I think Ethiopia, these are the sort of people where there’s very good traffic growth and there’s possibility for orders,” he said.

In total, the manufacturer is in “serious negotiations” with ten regional customers for potential orders of different aircraft sizes, he said.

Saudi Arabian Prince Al Waleed Bin Talal has ordered one A380 as a private jet.

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Kingfisher

Cash-strapped Kingfisher Airlines on Sunday refuted speculation that it planned to shut down its operations as a section of pilots have threatened to boycott work without pay and dues being given to them.

The development comes after Kingfisher’s chief executive Sanjay Aggarwal met pilots on Thursday and sought their cooperation. However, other reports also said that Aggarwal told pilots that if they do not cooperate, then the airline would have to shut shop.

Seeking to refute the allegations, an airline spokesperson said: “Aggarwal met a group of pilots to appeal to them not to stay away from flying duties which would potentially affect the operating schedule.”

“At no time was there any suggestion that Kingfisher Airlines would shut down. Our flights are operating as per schedule.”

Civil Aviation Minister Ajit Singh on Friday said the airline’s licence could be temporarily suspended as its inability to pay its staff could affect safety and the regulator, Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA), sees an operational risk in it.

The minister added that the airline can restart operations once these issues are resolved. The airline is also seeking a credit extension from Airports Authority of India (AAI), having a substantial amount of dues towards AAI.

Meanwhile, the airlines’ problems increased as service tax department — for the fourth time in last four months — freezed 40 bank accounts belonging to Kingfisher, which owes Rs 40 crore to the department as the airline failed to meet the February 29 deadline for clearing the dues.

The airline official said: “We are trying our very best to cooperate with the tax authorities and get our accounts defreezed at the earliest so that normalcy could be restored, employee salaries paid and further aircraft recoveries started.”

The airlines’ trouble started on February 18 when its employees in Kolkata went on a flash strike. The carrier, on the other hand, blames the seizure of its bank accounts by the Income Tax department as the main reason for flight plan curtailment.

The DGCA is also said to be screening the airlines’ operational aircraft to find their airworthiness and if financial constraints have in any way compromised passenger safety.

According to sources, the airline has violated Rule 140 of the Aircraft Rules by not seeking prior approval of the regulator before curtailing its schedule for the second time since last year.

Currently, the airline is operating about 170 daily flights — down from its original schedule of 240 operations.

Kingfisher has a debt of Rs 7,057.08 crore on its books. The company’s net loss widened to Rs 444.26 crore for the quarter ended Dec 31, 2011, from Rs 253.69 crore in the October-December quarter in the last fiscal.

http://profit.ndtv.com/News/Article/kingfisher-airlines-denies-shutdown-rumours-299016

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