Man lights up in loo, then runs amok on Qantas flight

A MAN kicked walls and broke free from restraints before finally being subdued and handed over to Singapore police after attempting to smoke on a Qantas flight.Qantas cabin crew restrained the burly man, believed to be in his 40s, after a toilet smoke alarm went off.The man was restrained by his hands and mid-section twice after he managed to break free of the restraints once.He continually yelled and kicked walls throughout the flight.

Qantas axes China flights

A softening in demand for travel to China, triggered by the global financial crisis, has forced Qantas to cut back services to the country.Qantas is scrapping its Melbourne-Shanghai and Sydney-Beijing services as part of a belt-tightening effort, the airline said in a statement today. As leisure travel to Beijing declines, Australia’s largest airline will cut three flights to China, consolidating services to the nation into a daily Sydney-Shanghai route.”The Qantas group is performing well in this difficult environment, but we are not immune from the need to address under-performing routes,” group chief executive Alan Joyce said.

Bad weather to blame for increase in flight problems

Storm and tempest are largely to blame for more late flights, writes Clive Dorman.It’s a long-standing truism that the reason for Australia’s near-flawless air travel safety record is that it “doesn’t have weather”, while the US and Europe face frequent blizzards, hurricanes and severe electrical storms.But now Australia truly does “have weather” – and lots of it. In the past two years, increasing incidences of fog, wind and rain have been blamed for an otherwise mysterious deterioration in the punctuality of Australia’s air services. Once the best in the world, they are now comparable with the chronic delay-ridden industries of Europe and the US.

Jetstar scraps fuel surcharges, cuts fares by up to $68

Jetstar is removing almost all international fuel surcharges in response to lower oil and jet fuel prices.The move follows the removal of all domestic fuel surcharges by Jetstar and Qantas from January 1.Jetstar said from midnight on Thursday, 12 February, it would remove the $25 fuel surcharge on trans Tasman services, the $35 surcharge on its short haul Asian services and the $68 surcharge on its international long haul services.However, the airline will maintain fuel surcharge for tickets sold within Japan.

V Australia offer women-only toilets

THONGS and Vegemite will feature on flights by the nation’s newest international airline as part of an assault on Qantas’s claim to be the spirit of Australia.V Australia will also offer a women-only toilet as it seeks to differentiate itself from its competitors, reports The Australian.”Men don’t often get it right and I felt sorry for women on aeroplanes so I made it clear I wanted a women’s-only lav,” Virgin Blue Group chief executive Brett Godfrey said yesterday as the first of seven, 360-seat Boeing 777 aircraft ordered by the airline landed in Sydney.

Qantas: Defending Its Rich U.S.-Australia Route

When Australia-based Qantas Airways launched its first superjumbo Airbus A380 flight last fall, it boasted in advertising campaigns that “it’s not the size of the plane; it’s what you do with it.” Qantas will soon begin learning whether its strategy for retaining control of the lucrative U.S.-Australia route can stand up to that claim. It faces unprecedented competition for a route that is among the most profitable for long-haul business travel in the world, with Qantas routinely charging some $18,000 for a round-trip business-class fare. In a research note issued late last month, Macquarie Bank predicted the launch of new service from Virgin Australia and Delta Air Lines (DAL) will lead to a trans-Pacific discount war.

Qantas shares tumble to 12-year low

QANTAS shares fell to a 12-year low today after it completed a heavily discounted $500 million institutional placement.The Australian carrier yesterday posted a 66 per cent drop in first-half earnings and some analysts had questioned the need for the placement.Qantas said today it had placed about 270.3 million shares at $1.85 each after receiving “strong interest from a range of existing and new institutional investors”.The funds will be used to support its $35 billion dollar fleet renewal program, reduce net debt and support its investment grade credit rating, Qantas said.

Qantas achieves record US sales thanks to bargain flights

Qantas has defied the economic downturn in the US by achieving record fare sales to Australia in the past fortnight.The Australian airline, offering deeply discounted fares and riding on the promotional success of the G’Day USA festival, announced it had a 160 per cent rise in bookings from the US to Australia compared with the same period a year ago.”The past two weeks has set an all-time high,” Wally Mariani, Qantas’ senior executive vice president, The Americas and Pacific, told AAP.

Launch into space with Virgin Blue

AUSTRALIANS will have a chance to fly into space with Virgin Blue launching an out-of-this-world frequent flyer promotion. From Sunday until June 1, Velocity members who book a flight on Virgin Blue, use any of its partners or transfer credit card points to the frequent flyer scheme will be eligible for a draw to win the 25 million points, reports The Australian. The points can then be converted into a flight on Virgin Blue part-owner Richard Branson’s Virgin Galactic. Velocity general manager Phil Gunter admitted yesterday that the airline had picked the prize for the huge figure’s shock value in raising awareness of the frequent-flyer scheme.

Qantas aims for better customer service with $10m training centre

QANTAS is about to send 18,000 staff, from the chief executive down, back to school as part of a massive push to boost customer service standards.A high-tech $10 million training facility, which opened yesterday in Sydney, is at the centre of the strategy to propel the Qantas brand back to the top.The move comes after a horror year for the airline where delays and maintenance problems battered its reputation with travellers, The Australian reports.