Category: Aerospace

(Reuters) – Australia’s competition watchdog said on Friday it had given Virgin Australia [IPO-VIR.AX] and Qatar Airways interim approval to operate flights between Doha and Brisbane, Melbourne, Perth and Sydney under an integrated alliance. The two airlines can start marketing and selling 28 weekly scheduled return flights between the destinations, the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission said in a statement. Qatar Airways had said in October that it was set to buy a 25% stake in Virgin Australia from U.S….

TAIPEI, Taiwan (AP) — The United States has approved $2 billion in arms sales to Taiwan, including the first-time delivery to the self-ruled island of an advanced surface-to-air missile defense system, in a move sure to anger China. Taiwan’s presidential office on Saturday thanked Washington for greenlighting the potential arms sales. Under the island’s new president, Lai Ching-te, Taiwan has been stepping up defense measures as China increased its military threats against the territory it claims as its own. Beijing…

Global financiers are poised to flock to Saudi Arabia’s annual flagship investment conference next week as a tightening of the kingdom’s purse strings and a deepening of regional conflict cloud the outlook. Among those expected to descend on the Future Investment Initiative (FII) in Riyadh are top CEOs, including Goldman Sachs’ David Solomon, BlackRock’s Larry Fink, Citigroup’s Jane Fraser and the London Stock Exchange’s Julia Hoggett. The high-profile event, first held in 2017, fills an opulent hotel in the capital…

Raytheon Company (Raytheon) — a subsidiary of Arlington, Virginia-based defense contractor RTX (formerly known as Raytheon Technologies Corporation) — will pay over $950 million to resolve the Justice Department’s investigations into: (i) a major government fraud scheme involving defective pricing on certain government contracts and (ii) violations of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) and the Arms Export Control Act (AECA) and its implementing regulations, the International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR). Raytheon will enter into a three-year deferred prosecution agreement (DPA) in…

Toyota is investing another $500 million in Joby Aviation as part of a partnership aimed at helping get the American air taxi company’s commercial business off the ground. Toyota’s investment will be used to support certification and production of Joby’s electric air taxi, the companies said Wednesday, and brings Toyota Motor Corporation’s total investment in Joby to $894 million. After the investment, which will come in two equal tranches later this year and next, Toyota will own about 22% of…

FAA vows to hold Boeing accountable, revamp agency safety program WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The head of the Federal Aviation Administration will tell Congress on Tuesday the agency will hold Boeing accountable to ensure the planemaker is building safe airplanes and will revamp its own safety management program. “As a result of systemic production quality issues, Boeing must make significant changes to transform its quality system and ensure the right layers of safety are in place,” FAA Administrator Mike Whitaker will…

Defence Minister Minoru Kihara calls on the Russian government to prevent a recurrence. Japan has protested to the Kremlin after a Russian patrol plane entered its airspace three times, Defence Minister Minoru Kihara says. “We confirmed today that a Russian Il-38 patrol aircraft has violated our airspace over our territorial waters north of Rebun Island, Hokkaido, on three occasions,” Kihara told reporters of Monday’s incidents. Japanese F-15 and F-35 fighter jets warned the Russian military over the radio before firing…

The following article is from a Russian news source, Tass, which is controlled by the Russian Government. ASTANA, September 18. /TASS/. Command exercises with the participation of the CSTO Collective Peacekeeping Forces ‘Indestructible Brotherhood-2024’ will be held in Kazakhstan from September 26 to October 7, the republic’s Defense Ministry said. According to the agency, the exercise will be held at the Bereg training ground in the Almaty Region. The defense ministry added that military contingents from Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia…

The Justice Department today announced the seizure of a Dassault Falcon 900EX aircraft owned and operated for the benefit of Nicolás Maduro Moros and persons affiliated with him in Venezuela. The aircraft was seized in the Dominican Republic and transferred to the Southern District of Florida at the request of the United States based on violations of U.S. export control and sanctions laws. “This morning, the Justice Department seized an aircraft we allege was illegally purchased for $13 million through a…

On July 9, Turkish aviation authorities banned a Boeing 777F cargo plane of Ethiopian Airlines from flying through its airspace en route to Armenia, reports Armenian publication Hetq. The publication states that the plane had departed from Liège, Belgium, and, after flying through the airspace of several European countries, was supposed to enter Turkish airspace from Bulgaria. However, without receiving permission from the Turkish side, the plane made an intermediate landing in Vienna and returned to Liège. The Civil Aviation…

ANCHORAGE, Alaska — An Air Force colonel who is the director of operations for the Alaskan Command is one of the two men missing after a small airplane crashed into a remote lake, officials said Thursday. Alaska Wildlife Troopers and the Alaskan Command identified the men as Col. Mark “Tyson” Sletten, 46, of Anchorage, and Paul Kondrat, 41, of Utah. They were aboard a small airplane on an instructional flight that crashed into Crescent Lake near Moose Pass on Alaska’s Kenai…

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Transportation Department said Thursday that it fined Middle Eastern airline Emirates $1.8 million for flights in regions off-limits to U.S. airlines while it allowed JetBlue Airways to sell seats on the planes. The fine involves a “significant number” of flights from December 2021 to August 2022 that passed over Iraq on their way between the United States and the United Arab Emirates. UAE-based Emirates was fined $400,000 in 2020 for similar flights and agreed not to…

Donating fighter jets to Kiev will not involve members of the alliance in the conflict, Jens Stoltenberg has insisted Ukrainian strikes anywhere inside Russia using Western-donated F-16 aircraft would not be an escalation of the conflict and would not make NATO member states parties to it, according to the military bloc’s Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg. He was asked on Thursday whether restrictions should be imposed on how Kiev can use the US-designed fighter jets. Several European nations intend to provide…

SINGAPORE – Singapore’s competition watchdog has assessed that ANA Holdings’ proposed acquisition of Japanese cargo airline Nippon Cargo Airlines (NCA) will not result in a substantial lessening of competition within any market in Singapore. The Competition and Consumer Commission of Singapore (CCCS) said on May 24 that it arrived at this conclusion after a six-month review, which also took into account public feedback. The commission launched the review after ANA and NCA submitted an application on Dec 7, 2023, arguing…

ISTANBUL: A FedEx Airlines Boeing cargo plane landed at Istanbul Airport on Wednesday without its front landing gear deployed and managed to stay on the runway, Turkey’s transport ministry said, adding that there were no casualties. The Boeing 767 aircraft, flying from Paris Charles de Gaulle Airport, informed the traffic control tower at Istanbul Airport that its landing gear failed to open and it landed with guidance from the tower, the ministry said in its statement. Airport rescue and fire…

A whistleblower who accused a Boeing supplier of ignoring manufacturing defects on the 737 Max died on Tuesday. The former Spirit AeroSystems employee Josh Dean, 45, died after contracting a sudden illness, according to reports by family members on social media, The Seattle Times reported on Wednesday. Josh’s aunt, Carol Parsons, told the outlet that Dean went to the hospital after he had trouble breathing some two weeks ago. His mother is said to have written on Facebook that he…