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OSLO (Reuters) – Norwegian Air <NAS.OL> has cancelled orders for 97 Boeing <BA.N> aircraft and will claim compensation from the U.S. plane maker for the grounding of the 737 MAX and for 787 engine troubles that hit its bottom line, the Oslo-based carrier said on Monday.
The airline cancelled 92 of the 737 MAX jets, five 787 Dreamliners and so-called GoldCare service agreements related to both aircraft, just as Boeing on Monday began a crucial set of flight tests of the 737 MAX in an effort to gain regulatory approval for it to return to the skies.
“Norwegian has in addition filed a legal claim seeking the return of pre-delivery payments related to the aircraft and compensation for the company’s losses related to the grounding of the 737 MAX and engine issues on the 787,” the airline said.
Norwegian did not specify the amount it would seek to claim from Boeing, which it had been in talks with about compensation, and was not immediately available for comment.
Boeing said it was working with Norwegian on a path forward in a challenging time as it was with other operators but it would not comment on commercial discussions.
The problematic Trent 1000 engines, used on the Dreamliners, were made by Rolls-Royce <RR.L>, which Norwegian has been in a dialogue with about compensation. Monday’s statement did not say whether Norwegian would file a legal claim against Rolls-Royce.
The European budget carrier, which revolutionised transatlantic travel by offering cheap fares, was struggling before the COVID-19 pandemic brought the airline industry to its knees.
One reason was the grounding of the 737 MAX in March 2019 following the second of two fatal crashes that together killed 346 people. Norwegian had 18 MAX passenger jets in its 163-aircraft fleet at the time.
Originally a small regional airline in Scandinavia, Norwegian made its breakthrough on the global stage with a multi-year order in 2012 for up to 372 aircraft, of which 222 were from Boeing and 150 from Airbus <AIR.PA>.
(Reporting by Gwladys Fouche and Terje Solsvik; Additional reporting by Eric M. Johnson in Seattle; Editing by Leslie Adler and Christopher Cushing)
FILE PHOTO: Norwegian Air Sweden Boeing 737-800 plane SE-RRY lands in Riga International Airport in Riga
DUBLIN (Reuters) – Brazilian low-cost carrier GOL, which has 130 of Boeing’s grounded 737 MAX jets on order, expects to be flying the jet by April and hopes to secure a compensation deal within months, chief financial officer Richard Lark said on Monday.
“We at GOL are planning April” for the jet’s return to service, Lark told journalists. He said he expected to finalize a deal with Boeing within months that would “make investors whole” for losses associated with the delivery delays.
(Reporting by Conor Humphries; editing by David Evans)
FILE PHOTO: An employee works near a Boeing 737 Max aircraft at Boeing’s 737 Max production facility in Renton
(Reuters) – American Airlines Group Inc <AAL> said on Monday it had reached a confidential agreement with Boeing Co <BA> to address damages the airline incurred in 2019 due to the ongoing grounding of its fleet of Boeing 737 MAX aircraft.
American, the largest U.S. airline, said the compensation will be received over several years. The airline will use more than $30 million of the compensation for the airline’s 2019 employee profit-sharing program.
American said it does not expect any material financial impact of the agreement to be realized in its fourth-quarter 2019 earnings and it will continue talks regarding compensation for damages related to the MAX grounding beyond 2019.
The Association of Professional Flight Attendants, which represents American Airlines’ 28,000 flight attendants, said it welcomed the news about compensation, and was evaluating the details.
Boeing said it does not comment on discussions with airlines.
Boeing’s best-selling 737 MAX has been grounded since two fatal crashes in five months killed 346 people. The company is halting production this month. A number of airlines have struck confidential settlements with Boeing in recent weeks.
(Reporting by David Shepardson, Editing by Rosalba O’Brien)
An American Airlines Boeing 737 Max 8, on a flight from Miami to New York City, comes in for landing at LaGuardia Airport in New York
FILE PHOTO: Michael O’Leary of Ryanair at the Four Courts in Dublin
BERLIN (Reuters) – Ryanair <RYAAY> is prepared for further delays to the delivery of its Boeing <BA> 737 MAX airliners, its chief executive Michael O’Leary told German magazine Wirtschaftswoche, adding that he would only discuss compensation after the aircraft had been delivered.
The 737 MAX airliner has been grounded since March following two crashes which claimed 346 lives.
One of the world’s largest airlines, Ryanair has ordered 135 of the jets.
“We were meant to have 58 planes by the summer,” O’Leary said in the interview, extracts from which were published on Friday. “That went down to 30, then 20, then 10 and the latest is maybe only five. It’s possible we’ll only get the first jets in October 2020.”
In contrast to other airlines, including Turkish, Southwest Airlines <LUV> and Germany’s TUI <TUIFY>, which have already agreed compensation with Boeing, O’Leary added that he would only discuss compensation after the planes were delivered.
(Reporting by Thomas Escritt; editing by Thomas Seythal)
FILE PHOTO: Boeing 737 Max aircraft at Boeing’s 737 Max production facility in Renton
ISTANBUL (Reuters) – Turkish Airlines and Boeing have come to an agreement concerning compensation for certain losses caused by grounded and undelivered Boeing 737 Max aircraft, the Turkish airline said on Tuesday.
The statement to the Istanbul stock exchange did not specify the value of the deal. The airline has 24 Boeing 737 MAX planes in its fleet. The 737 MAX has been grounded since March after two crashes in Indonesia and Ethiopia killed 346 people within five months.
(Reporting by Ceyda Caglayan; Editing by Daren Butler)
OSLO (Reuters) – Norwegian Air <NWARF> hopes to agree compensation from Boeing <BA> by year-end over the grounding of the 737 MAX, the airline’s acting CEO said, as it counts the costs of having 18 of the aircraft grounded since March.
“The dialogue (with Boeing) has been ongoing since summer and we hope to come to an understanding before the end of the year,” acting Chief Executive Geir Karlsen said in a podcast made on Dec. 11 and released by brokerage DNB Markets on Dec. 18.
Norwegian has 92 737 MAX aircraft on order.
“It’s about compensation and also about a new schedule of plane deliveries, as Boeing obviously can’t deliver in line with the contract … it’s a huge challenge for Boeing, and at the same time we also want the best possible outcome for ourselves,” Karlsen said.
(Reporting by Terje Solsvik, editing by Gwladys Fouche and Jason Neely)
DAR ES SALAAM/JOHANNESBURG, Aug 24 (Reuters) – South African authorities impounded an Airbus 220-300 aircraft leased by Tanzania’s national flag carrier following a court application by a retired farmer who is owed compensation by the Tanzanian government, the farmer’s lawyer said.
The plane had been scheduled to fly from the Oliver Tambo International Airport in Johannesburg, South Africa, to Dar es Salaam, Tanzania on Friday, but was seized on an order issued by the Gauteng High Court in Johannesburg, Tanzania’s transport ministry said in a statement on Friday.
Roger Wakefield, of Werksmans Attorneys, said his client, an elderly farmer who asked not to be named, was owed $33 million, including interest, in compensation from the Tanzanian government after his land in the country was expropriated several decades ago. The farmer was subsequently awarded the compensation in an arbitration, he said.
Wakefield said the only way Tanzania could secure the release of the plane was if it put up security or paid the debt.
A Tanzanian government spokesperson was not immediately available for comment.
Calls to the High Courts in Gauteng province went unanswered outside of usual business hours.
Speaking by phone to Reuters, Wakefield said the plane was impounded in line with South African and international laws allowing for an asset owned by a foreign entity to be attached to a case related to a foreign arbitration award.
The plane was chosen because there is evidence it is owned directly by the Tanzanian government and its value is commensurate with the amount owed to the farmer, who was born in Namibia, he said.
While the Tanzanian government has acknowledged it owes the farmer money, has previously made some payments and promised to pay the rest, it has not made a payment since around 2014, Wakefield said.
The plane is leased by loss-making state carrier Air Tanzania Company Limited (ATCL).
President John Magufuli has personally taken charge of the revival of the airline, spending hundreds of millions of dollars purchasing eight new planes since 2016.
The airline’s existing fleet, which is leased from the state-run Tanzania Government Flight Agency (TGFA), includes one Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner, two Airbus A220-300 jets and three DHC Dash 8-400 aircraft, formerly known as the Bombardier Q400 turboprop.
ACTL managing director Ladislaus Matindi told Reuters earlier on Saturday that the impounded plane was an Airbus 220-300, and arrangements had been made for its passengers to use another plane for their planned flight.
Tanzania has pinned hopes on the revival of the national airline to turn the country into a regional transport hub and boost the tourism sector, its biggest foreign exchange earner.
In 2017, a Canadian construction firm seized one of Tanzania’s new Q400 turbo-prop planes in Canada over a $38 million lawsuit related to a compensation ruling by the International Court of Arbitration.
The Q400 was released in March 2018 after Magufuli sent the country’s prime minister and attorney general to Canada to negotiate its release. Aviation sources said the government reached a financial settlement to secure the aircraft.
(Reporting by Fumbuka Ng’wanakilala in Dar es Salaam and Emma Rumney in Johannesburg Writing by Hereward Holland and Emma Rumney Editing by Angus MacSwan and Frances Kerry)
JAKARTA/OSLO
(Reuters) – Indonesian airline Garuda plans to cancel a $6 billion
order for Boeing 737 MAX jets, it said on Friday, saying some passengers
would be frightened to board the plane after two fatal crashes,
although analysts said the deal had long been in doubt.
The
news came as another 737 MAX customer, Norwegian Air, played down the
significance of a move by Boeing to make a previously optional cockpit
warning light compulsory.
Norwegian
said that, according to Boeing, the warning light would not have been
able to prevent erroneous signals that Lion Air pilots received before
their new 737 MAX plane crashed off Indonesia in October, killing 189
people.
Indonesia’s
national carrier Garuda is the first airline to publicly announce plans
to scrap an order since the world’s entire fleet of 737 MAX planes was
grounded last week, following an Ethiopian Airlines crash that left 157
people dead.
“Many passengers told us they were afraid to get on a MAX 8,” Garuda CEO Ari Askhara told Reuters on Friday.
However,
the airline had been reconsidering its order for 49 of the narrowbody
jets prior to the Ethiopian crash, including potentially swapping some
for widebody Boeing models.
Southeast
Asia faces a glut of narrowbody aircraft like the 737 MAX and rival
Airbus A320neo at a time of slowing global economic growth and high fuel
costs.
“They
have been re-looking at their fleet plan anyway so this is an
opportunity to make some changes that otherwise may be difficult to do,”
CAPA Centre for Aviation Chief Analyst Brendan Sobie said.
Indonesia’s
Lion Air has also said it might cancel 737 MAX aircraft, though
industry sources say it is also struggling to absorb the number of
planes on order.
Both
crashes are still being investigated. But regulators have noted some
similarities between the two, and attention has focused on whether
pilots had the correct information about the “angle of attack” at which
the wing slices through the air.
No direct link has been proven between the accidents.
RETROFITS
Boeing
now plans to make compulsory a light to alert pilots when sensor
readings of the angle of attack do not match – meaning at least one must
be wrong -, according to two officials briefed on the matter.
Investigators
suspect a faulty angle-of-attack reading led the doomed Lion Air jet’s
computer to believe it had stalled, prompting the plane’s anti-stall
system, called MCAS, repeatedly to push the plane’s nose down.
The
Lion Air plane did not have the warning light installed because it was
not compulsory. Ethiopian Airlines did not immediately comment on
whether its crashed plane had the alert.
But
the Ethiopian carrier, whose reputation along with Boeing’s is at
stake, issued a statement on Friday emphasising the modernity of its
safety and training systems, with more than $500 million invested in
infrastructure in the past five years.
The
Ethiopian crash has set off one of the widest inquiries in aviation
history and cast a shadow over the Boeing 737 MAX model intended to be a
standard for decades.
Boeing
did not comment on the plan to make the safety feature standard, but
separately said it was moving quickly to make software changes and
expected the upgrade to be approved by the U.S. Federal Aviation
Administration (FAA) in coming weeks.
Chicago-based Boeing will also retrofit older planes with the cockpit warning light, the officials told Reuters.
Experts
said it could take weeks or months to be done, and for regulators to
review and approve the changes. Regulators in Europe and Canada have
said they will conduct their own reviews of any new systems.
Norwegian
said its 18 737 MAX jets did not have the cockpit warning light, but it
would follow any recommendations made by Boeing and aviation
regulations. The airline said last week it would seek compensation from
Boeing for the cost of grounding its 737 MAX planes, which makes up 11
percent of its fleet.
Since the Ethiopian crash, Boeing shares have fallen 12 percent and $28 billion has been wiped off its market value.
Pressure
has mounted on the company from U.S. legislators, who are also expected
to question the FAA. The company faces a criminal investigation by the
U.S. Justice Department as well.
Several
lawsuits have already been filed on behalf of victims of the Lion Air
crash referring to the Ethiopian accident. Boeing declined to comment on
the lawsuits.
( By Cindy Silviana and Terje Solsvik, Additional reporting by Jamie Freed in Singapore, Bernadette Christina Munthe in Jakarta, Maggie Fick and Jason Neely in Addis Ababa, Tim Hepher in Paris, and Eric M. Johnson in Seattle; Writing by Sayantani Ghosh, Georgina Prodhan and Ben Klayman; Editing by Mark Potter)
