Ireland's CityJet eyes E1s in 2022, mulls A220s/E2s later

Air Nostrum, CityJet merger faces Brussels review

Italy freezes SuperJet International assets

The Italian government has frozen EUR146 million euros (USD154 million) in assets owned by SuperJet International, a joint-venture of UAC United Aircraft Corporation and Italy's Leonardo responsible for marketing SSJ 100/95 regional jets outside of Russia.

The assets include cash and four SSJ 100/95Bs parked at Venice Marco Polo airport, where the Italian JV has its headquarters. The ch-aviation fleets advanced module shows these are:

• I-PDVY (msn 95087) and I-PDVZ (msn 95106) ordered by Mexico's Interjet (AIJ, Toluca) but never delivered to the carrier,
• msn 95104, also originally ordered by Interjet but since reassigned to Red Wings Airlines (WZ, Moscow Domodedovo), and
• msn 95122, ordered by CityJet (WX, Dublin Int'l) but not delivered to the Irish carrier and not reassigned to any other operator.

The Italian financial police (Guardia di Finanza) said in a statement that the freeze only concerned the 90% of assets held by the Russian JV partner. The 10% owned by Leonardo is not affected.

The asset freeze has...

SAS axes 4000 flights, blames understaffing, delivery delays

SAS Scandinavian Airlines (SK, Copenhagen Kastrup) has been forced to cancel around 4,000 flights this summer, blaming understaffing and delays in aircraft deliveries, spokeswoman Karin Nyman has told the Swedish financial newspaper Dagens Industri.

The decision is part of an industry-wide problem, especially acute in Europe, as airlines struggle to re-employ the staff numbers and secure the aircraft needed to meet pent-up demand during their first post-pandemic summer.

The lost flights at SAS cover the period between May and August 2022, during which the carrier had a total of 75,000 flights planned. Around 5% of flights during the four peak-period months will be affected.

“The vast majority of travellers won’t be affected by this, other than being rebooked onto a flight within a few hours or on the same day,” press officer Karin Nyman, the airline’s VP for communications, told the newspaper. The reasons behind the cancellations, she added, are the staff shortage coupled with delayed aircraft deliveries.

According to the ch-aviation fleets advanced module, SAS is awaiting delivery of two A350-900...

Ireland's Emerald Airlines eyes closer ties with IAG