The Week In Travel

NATS, the UK’s main air traffic control organisation, has this week revealed its findings into the technical glitch that caused mass cancellations and delays across the UK. The report found that an issue with the flight plan processing sub-system, the Flight Plan Reception Suite Automated-Replacement (FPRSA-R), was responsible for the system entering a fail-safe mode. CEO Martin Rolfe, who had previously labelled the incident a ‘a one in 15 million chance’ said: “Incidents like this are extremely rare and we have put measures in place to ensure it does not happen again.”

In sustainability news, Lummus Technology has announced that its ethanol-to-sustainable aviation fuel process technology is now commercially available. Lummas claims the process, which combines ethylene, olefin oligomerisation and hydrogenation technologies, maximises SAF production while decreasing carbon emissions, offering a ‘safe’ and ‘reliable’ solution.

In the US, Lufthansa has announced it will serve two new US airports from next summer and is set to double its A380 destinations. The airline will add Raleigh-Durham in North Carolina and Minneapolis, Minnesota to its network increasing its presence in US gateways to 27. Each route will operate year-round with weekly flights to Frankfurt. The carrier will also launch a Seattle-Tacoma International Airport and Munich Airport for the summer 2024 season.

In technology news, industry leaders in vertical flight solutions, Bristow Group and Volocopter have signed a deal to develop passenger and cargo services for eVTOL aircraft in the US and the UK. As part of the agreement, Bristow has placed an order for two VoloCity aircraft, with the option to acquire an additional 78 aircraft in the future.

And finally, we can all relate to not being the happy with our allocated seat on a plane, but Sputnik, a Shiba Inu dog, took this to new levels on an Alaskan Airlines flight this week. Sputnik was able to escape her cage by chewing through the zip-ties and the metal lock that held the gate of the crate closed. Crew members revealed that when they opened the baggage hold, they were shocked to see Sputnik looking at them expectantly as if she was ‘waiting for the red carpet’.