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Continental, AMR’s Eagle face $605,000 in fines

From Bloomberg News | Continental Airlines and AMR Corp.’s American Eagle regional carrier face a combined $605,000 in possible fines for maintenance flaws, the FAA said.

Boeing to announce 787 test flight return soon

Boeing Co. said on Wednesday that it will soon announce the resumption of test flights for its 787 Dreamliner plane, which have been halted since last month due to technical problems. “Probably the next announcement from Boeing would be an announcement of a return to flight tests. We expect that announcement very soon,” Boeing Japan President Mike Denton told reporters. Get the full story »

French prosecutors appeal Concorde crash ruling

A French prosecutor’s office said Tuesday it is appealing the court ruling that blamed Continental Airlines for the deadly crash of a supersonic Concorde jet outside Paris a decade ago.

Prosecutors at the court in Pontoise, outside Paris, had argued that the former head of the Concorde program at planemaker Aerospatiale should share some legal responsibility with Continental for the crash. Get the full story »

Boeing to increase production of 777 aircraft

Boeing Co. for the second time this year said it will increase its 777 aircraft production rate based on strong global demand.

Boeing said Monday it will raise its production of the airplanes to 8.3 per month in the first quarter of 2013. In March, the company announced it would increase production to seven from five airplanes per month starting in mid-2011. Get the full story »

7th delay likely coming for Boeing Dreamliner

From the Financial Times | Boeing is expected to announce by the end of the year that its troubled 787 Dreamliner will officially be delayed a seventh time. The program was halted last month following a fire aboard a test aircraft. More than a month after the incident, Boeing is yet to issue a new certification target or restart flight testing. A new timetable would likely move first deliveries to May 2008, more than three years behind their original scheduled delivery. Get the full story>>

Southwest Airlines to order larger Boeing aircraft

Southwest Airlines will order 20 new, larger versions of the Boeing 737 that could pave the way for the all-domestic airline to offer international flights.

CEO Gary Kelly said Wednesday that Southwest will change an existing order with Boeing to get new 737-800 jets beginning in early 2012. The 737-800s have 38 more seats than the largest planes in Southwest’s current fleet. Get the full story »

Asian, Latin carriers take lead among airlines

The world’s five biggest airlines by market value now hail from Asia and Latin America, highlighting the industry’s shift away from the U.S. and Europe to higher-growth countries, the International Air Transport Association said Tuesday.

Based on its share price, Air China is twice the size of either Delta in the U.S. or Germany’s Lufthansa, indicating that markets expect future revenue growth to be strongest in Asia, IATA said. Get the full story »

Boeing boosts jet prices 5.2%

From Bloomberg News | Boeing Co. is raising aircraft prices by about 5.2 percent, the first increase in two years, and dropping the short-haul version of the 787 Dreamliner. Get the full story>>

JetBlue to pay $600,000 for violations

JetBlue has been ordered to pay $600,000 for what the government said were violations of rules for handling disabled passengers and disclosing flight information to passengers. Get the full story »

Continental appeals ruling in Concorde crash

AFP | Continental Airlines on Monday lodged an appeal against a conviction by a French court, which found it criminally responsible for the 2000 Concorde air disaster in which 113 people were killed.

Olivier Metzner, lawyer for the U.S. airline, said he had lodged the papers with the appellate court in Versailles, west of Paris. Get the full story »

Airbus forecasts faster recovery for industry

European plane-maker Airbus is forecasting a faster-than-expected recovery in the aircraft industry. It says the world will need $3.2 trillion in new passenger and freighter aircraft over the next 20 years. That figure translates to nearly 26,000 planes. Get the full story »

FAA loses track of a third of U.S. planes

The Federal Aviation Administration is missing key information on who owns one-third of the 357,000 private and commercial aircraft in the U.S. — a gap the agency fears could be exploited by terrorists and drug traffickers.

The records are in such disarray that the FAA says it is worried that criminals could buy planes without the government’s knowledge, or use the registration numbers of other aircraft to evade new computer systems designed to track suspicious flights. It has ordered all aircraft owners to re-register their planes in an effort to clean up its files. Get the full story »

FAA steps up checks on Boeing 757s

Aviation regulators are poised to order stepped-up inspections of more than 600 Boeing Co. 757 jetliners worldwide, prompted by a recent in-flight incident that left roughly a one-foot hole in the fuselage of an American Airlines plane.

Impending safety directives by the Federal Aviation Administration, according to people familiar with the matter, are expected to cover certain older models of the widely used, twin-engine planes. The FAA is drafting enhanced inspection mandates in the wake of the sudden rupture and rapid decompression that occurred Oct. 26 while the American jet was cruising at 31,000 feet en route from Miami to Boston. Get the full story »

Boeing could delay 787 delivery until summer

Boeing Co. said it was still studying its delivery schedule for the 787 Dreamliner after a published report suggested deliveries of the carbon-composite plane could be put off until late June or July.

The French newspaper Les Echos reported on its Web site that Boeing could begin deliveries next summer, based on talks between Boeing and Air France-KLM. “We continue to assess our schedule and will announce a new schedule when that work is complete,” Boeing said in a statement Thursday. Get the full story »

United Continental November traffic up 4.8%

United Continental Holdings Inc. said the combined traffic of both United and Continental airlines rose 4.8 percent in November.

The airlines, which are still operating as separate companies, said late Tuesday they flew paying passengers 16.15 billion miles last month, compared with 15.4 billion miles a year earlier. Get the full story »