TUI fly Belgium adds more wet-leased narrowbodies ch-aviation PRO exclusive

TUI fly (Germany) (X3, Hanover) has announced in a press release that it will base two B787-8s out of Düsseldorf Int'l starting in the Winter 2020/21 season.

The German unit of TUI Group announced earlier that it will commence widebody operations with two B787-8s but did not disclose its operational plans.

According to the statement, the airline will initially connect the German hub with destinations in the Dominican Republic and Mexico. Details of the schedule are still being worked out with the launch of sales expected in the coming weeks.

"The launch of our Boeing 787 Dreamliner flights is getting closer, and of course there are important milestones on the way there - the announcement of our long-haul base is one of them. With the decision to base the Dreamliner in Düsseldorf, we are relying on the Rhein-Ruhr location and the good cooperation with the airport," Managing Director Oliver Lackmann said.

The carrier underlined that its flights to Mexico and the Dominican Republic will benefit from both TUI's extensive hotel portfolio...

Miami Air International (LL, Miami Int'l) has filed a motion with the US Department of Transportation (DOT) opposing an emergency exemption that would allow Nolinor Aviation (N5, Montréal Trudeau) to carry out relief flights to Puerto Rico.

The Canadian operator has been transporting emergency personnel and humanitarian aid to Puerto Rico in the aftermath of a January 7 earthquake, under a contract awarded by the US Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). On January 8, the airline applied to the DOT for emergency exemption from cabotage (ninth freedom) restrictions given the fact that flights between the mainland US and Puerto Rico, a US territory, are considered domestic operations.

Nolinor Aviation was tentatively awarded the contract through January 15, 2020. It used three B737-200(M)s, C-GNLN (msn 23050), C-GNLK (msn 20836), and C-GNLW (msn 23130), to operate from Norfolk Int'l, VA to San Juan Luis Muñoz Marin, Flightradar24 ADS-B data shows.

"Grant of this application is in the public interest and necessary to avoid an unusual hardship. Grant of this application is also...

TUI Group has indicated that the grounding of the B737-8 could cost it up to EUR400 million euro (USD447 million) in the next year according to a report on Reuters. However, the leisure specialist would not speculate over the level of compensation it expects to receive from Boeing (BOE, Chicago O'Hare).

The aircraft type was grounded in March this year after two crashes - one from Ethiopian Airlines (ET, Addis Ababa) and one from Lion Air (JT, Jakarta Soekarno-Hatta) - where 346 people died as a result of faulty Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System software. The grounding of its fifteen B737 MAX 8s cost the airline EUR293 million euro (USD327 million) in the financial year ending in September. This impacted on the holiday airline group's financial performance as its pre-tax earnings dropped by nearly 30% to EUR691 million euro (USD772 million).

However, the September demise of rival Thomas Cook Airlines UK (MT, Manchester Int'l) has given TUI a welcome boost, with Summer 2020 bookings up by 18% in the...