Flight attendants: Bartenders or bad cops?

Hard-working airline crews juggling conflicting responsibilities


Given the agitation among both paying customers and the uniformed personnel, should the airlines formally and forcefully reaffirm the authority of flight attendants?
By Bill Briggs


msnbc.com 

In an era of “current threat levels,” and within a tense flying environment that gives new meaning to “cabin pressure," is it smart to ask airline crews to juggle such outwardly conflicting responsibilities?


Flight attendants have recently demanded and won heftier federal fines for unruly customers, and have been officially designated “first responders” — someone certified to provide pre-hospital care in a medical emergency — by the Department of Homeland Security.
Yet they are earning less and sleeping less, harder-worked and higher-stressed — all while tending to a seemingly rising number of passengers who board toting an edgy “sense of entitlement,” according to associations representing both U.S. airlines and flight attendants.


While the trade groups carefully veer around the central question — does fluffing pillows and dishing pretzels erode a cabin crews’ vital onboard authority — one former flight attendant believes that’s precisely the psychology taking root in the minds of some fliers.


“Yes, in a way, the service that people see day in and day out does make people forget and it does undermine the ... responsibility that the crew members have for the safety and well being of the passengers,” said Carolyn Paddock, a Delta Air Lines flight attendant for 17 years.

At times, it is difficult to balance being helpful and a good host, and then having to police people,” added Paddock, who left Delta about three years ago, launching InFlightInsider.com, a website offering tips on traveling smart and stylishly.

But as flight attendants shove massive snack carts through the aisles, they offer passengers just a tiny glimpse of jobs that have gained deep complexity since Sept. 11 — jobs that pay an average of $35,000 a year, according to Corey Caldwell, spokeswoman for Association of Flight Attendants-CWA, a labor union representing more than 50,000 flight attendants at 22 airlines. "However," Caldwell noted, "most newly hired flight attendants and those who have only been at their carrier for just a few short years often make less than $20,000 a year."


What [travelers] never see, and what they’re not supposed to see,” Paddock said, “are the inner workings of what it takes to make a flight safe, secure, and work well.”


So what happens behind the curtain? “In the interest of your safety, I cannot reveal what goes on,” Paddock said. “But trust me when I tell you that there is more that meets the eye ... What I can say is the crew is making assessments. Who are the passengers most likely to help in an emergency? Who is acting or looks suspicious? Who looks unwell? Are they unwell enough to fly? Who is sitting next to that little unaccompanied minor and is she OK sitting next to that passenger? ... At times, being underestimated works to the crew's advantage.”


That “underestimation” — or, put bluntly, lack of respect — also reflects what flight crews see on the clock and off, at their hotels, at the mall, on the freeway, or in their neighborhood grocery store: a self-involved, me-first mentality, said David Castelveter, vice president of communications at the Air Transport Association of America. (The ATA is the nation’s oldest and largest airline trade group.)

“More than ever before, there’s a sense of entitlement in society and that’s what creates the challenges for these flight crew members,” Castelveter said. “At the end of day, we’re in the customer service business and the old adage ‘the customer is always right’ is still the norm. But we have to find that balance between the customer being right and [a flier who] does something that creates a potential hazard or inconvenience for another passenger.”


Msnbc.com contacted three domestic airlines to discuss the state of flight attendant authority. Southwest spokesperson Paul Flanigan said he would not discuss whether the Slater incident indicated that U.S. airlines, in general, needed to re-examine or address the command or clout held by flight attendants inside the cabin. "We, to date, have declined all media inquiries regarding the JetBlue incident," he said, and referred questions to ATA. United and JetBlue, meanwhile, did not respond to interview requests on the topic.


“It’s absolutely a rising factor,” said Beth Blair, a Southwest Airlines flight attendant until 2004 and now a travel writer whose job has put her in the sky as often as three times a month. “There are the people who are always looking for anything free. For example, passengers assume they deserve a complimentary upgrade just because a seat is available or they should be granted a free drink because their flight was slightly delayed.”
When such accommodations are not met, some passengers “simply stew in their seats while others react with an outburst which may or may not make the news,” Blair added.
The worst offenders? “Frequent fliers,” Blair said. They are “most likely to break safety rules such as cell phone use or not paying attention to safety briefings.”

Amid these ill-mannered trends — and following Slater’s famous meltdown last week (which may or may not have been sparked by bad passenger behavior) — has the time come for airlines to take pre-emptive action? Must they formally remind passengers of who is in charge in the cabin, and that it’s a federal crime, now punishable by a $25,000 fine, to disobey or interfere with flight attendants?
The question comes with two critical caveats. First, due to post-9/11 union concessions that helped keep airlines in business, flight attendants are paid about 30 percent less than they were before the attacks and they are working about 40 percent more. Fatigue and stress among flight crews are both high, industry experts acknowledge. Couple that with the anxieties many passengers are carrying: strenuous security checks, fewer flight options, jam-packed planes and general worries about terrorism.


“I’m not sure I would say [they must take] official steps,” said Caldwell of the Association of Flight Attendants-CWA. “On a whole, the traveling public understands the role of flight attendants. [But] it certainly doesn’t hurt to remind them again — that flight attendants are certified safety professionals who are required to enforce federal aviation regulations.”


Primary responsibility is to ensure the safety of the traveling public," ATA's Castelveter said. "If any passenger is interfering with the duties of the flight crew member, it's a federal crime."
Caldwell concedes, however, that she can envision a day when the service slice of the flight crews’ job is substantially reduced and attendants ride purely to keep the peace and enforce the safety rules.


“That’s definitely a possibility,” Caldwell said. “If you look at the current business model that airline management has sort of set up, yeah that could be a possibility.”
Although, she added, flight attendants always will remain the face of the airlines and, as such, “there will always be just that little customer service angle. It’s the flight attendants who are in the steel tube at 40,000 feet with the passengers.”


Perhaps some airlines ultimately will find the need to designate certain flight crew members as “hospitality” attendants and others as “safety monitors” — both squads with clearly separate duties, perhaps even wearing different attire. That’s unlikely to occur until the economy rebounds, said flight-attendant-turned-writer Blair.


“I think an onboard safety team is a great idea because it does give the crew members a specific role,” Blair said. “I’m not sure, though, if the airlines will see it as practical or financially feasible.”


Still, fliers already recognize that the “service” elements offered by flight crews are dwindling as pillows and blankets become scarce, and as beverages and snacks are cut or switched to pay-only, pre-boxed meals.


Other flight attendants, pilots and I used to joke that one day vending machines would replace the galley,” Blair said. “It seems like we may be heading in that direction.”

© 2011 msnbc.com

Hang up and fly right: More evidence of in-flight interference



By Rob Lovitt, msnbc.com contributor


Maybe you really should turn off your cell phone when the flight attendant tells you to. No, really.


According to a confidential report obtained by ABC News, interference from cell phones and other personal electronic devices (PEDs) may, in fact, present serious safety concerns for aircraft.


The report from the International Air Transport Association (IATA), the global industry trade group, surveyed commercial pilots and crewmembers and cited 75 incidents in which the respondents believed PEDs may have created electronic interference that impacted flight systems.


Twenty-six incidents affected flight controls, while 17 affected navigation systems and 15 affected communication systems. Thirteen, says ABC, produced “engine indications” and other warnings. According to respondents, activated electronic devices caused GPS and altitude-control readings to read incorrectly and change rapidly.


“It could be that you were to the right of the runway when in fact, you were to the left of the runway,” Dave Carson of Boeing told ABC.


Although the report doesn’t confirm that the incidents were caused by PEDs, it does note that in several instances, instrument readings returned to normal after crewmembers made passengers turn off their devices.


"We can't say categorically that these devices cause interference," IATA spokesman Chris Goater told msnbc.com, "but there are enough anecdotal reports from pilots to raise the question."


Finding that direct link may only get more difficult, especially as the number and variety of PEDs increase and airplanes rely more heavily on “fly-by-wire,” or electric systems that may be more susceptible to interference than the mechanical systems found in older planes.


“The upshot is that those PEDs emit energy that could interfere with the signals from the control column to the control surfaces,” said aviation safety consultant Steve Cowell of SRC Aviation LLC. “There’s quite a bit of shielding, but it’s also possible that it may not be enough.”

Saving Boeing's Bacon



By Rich Smith
June 9, 2011

Newsflash: Air India may just have saved Boeing's (NYSE: BA ) bacon.

As you know, Boeing's just about ready to deliver its first 787 Dreamliner to inaugural airline customer All-Nippon Airways. On the surface, that's good news, but two days ago, I described how it could turn into bad news for Boeing. As the company begins deliveries of the long overdue aircraft, the official amount of delay could become "fixed in time," permitting lawyers to draft their complaints and begin demanding penalty payments from Boeing.

Already, 787 suppliers like Spirit AeroSystems (NYSE: SPR ) have begun demanding penalties from Boeing. Now its customers are hitting up the company for payouts, too. One customer in particular, Air India, has publicly charged that Boeing's tardiness cost it $1.32 billion in lost revenues. If AI decides to seek redress from Boeing, it could imperil the 787's ability to earn a profit.

Or not

That's why this morning's news is so very good for Boeing. Citing a cash-crunch and consequent inability to pay for new planes, Air India is reportedly planning to ask Boeing to delay delivery of its 787s even more. The decision isn't official yet, but if this is the way it goes, it would echo a similar postponement by Delta (NYSE: DAL ) announced last year. And it would be great news for Boeing, for two reasons:

First, by stepping out of the receiving line for 787s -- however briefly -- Air India will allow other customers to move ahead. Thus customers such as AMR (NYSE: AMR ) and United Continental (NYSE: UAL ) could receive their 787s earlier than expected. This will make for both happier customers and lower penalty payments for Boeing.

And speaking of penalties, Air India alone is said to be seeking $840 million worth of 'em for its $1.32 billion revenue loss. This amounts to 10.4% of the value of AI's $8.1 billion 787 order. It's a number big enough to wipe out Boeing's 9.4% operating profit margin on commercial aircraft, and transform the 787 from "most successful airplane ever" into "Boeing's biggest loser."

Foolish takeaway

Worst case, by initiating a delay of its own, Air India should permit Boeing to offset some of the penalties it owes for late delivery to one customer, and reduce the risk of paying penalties to customers like AMR and United. Best case, Air India could undermine its case for demanding penalties at all -- and give Boeing a fighting chance at earning a profit on the 787.

Will Air India follow through, and delay delivery? Add Boeing to your Fool Watchlist and stay informed.

AMR Is Said to Be in Talks With JetBlue Airways to Widen Booking Agreement



By Mary Schlangenstein - Jun 9, 2011 10:59 AM MT
 
American Airlines and JetBlue Airways Corp. (JBLU) are in talks to add more cities outside the U.S. to their joint booking and frequent-flier agreement, two people familiar with the discussions said.


An expanded accord would help AMR Corp. (AMR)’s American fill more seats on international flights from New York and Boston, and let JetBlue win domestic passengers by offering destinations it can’t reach with its own planes, said the people, who declined to be identified because the discussions are private.


New York is home to JetBlue’s headquarters and biggest base and American’s chief East Coast hub for trans-Atlantic flights. American is fighting for market share there after being eclipsed by the merger of United and Continental airlines and Delta Air Lines Inc. (DAL)’s purchase of Northwest Airlines.
“If they want to be a bigger player, they are going to need more presence and more feed,” said James M. Higgins, an analyst with New York-based Ticonderoga Securities LLC. “JetBlue is a way to get that.”

There is no timeline for Fort Worth, Texas-based American and JetBlue to decide on broadening their 15-month-old interline agreement, the people said.
The existing accord lets each airline sell tickets on specific partner flights and check bags on a full itinerary, with the revenue going to the flight’s operator. JetBlue travelers can book on American to 15 foreign cities from New York and Boston, while fliers to the two destinations on American jets from abroad can reach 26 U.S. cities via JetBlue.
JetBlue’s Interest


While those JetBlue airports aren’t in competition with markets served by American, JetBlue would like to expand the relationship to cities where the carriers do compete, one of the people said. JetBlue’s main U.S. airport is New York’s Kennedy, where American serves destinations such as London and Paris.

Spokesmen for American and JetBlue declined to comment on the talks.


“American and JetBlue continue to explore opportunities to expand commercial cooperation where it makes sense for both airlines,” American’s Sean Collins said. Alison Croyle, a JetBlue spokeswoman, said the airline would like to add more cities outside the U.S. to the agreement.


Deeper ties between the carriers may lead to an eventual merger, possibly in about two years, said Ticonderoga’s Higgins, who recommends buying JetBlue and holding AMR.


‘Further Cooperation’


“It definitely furthers cooperation between them,” Higgins said of the current discussions. “If the benefits to AMR of the JetBlue tie-up are as good as I think they’ll be, I also believe it increases the odds there may be a merger down the road.”


The challenge for American is to first resolve contract talks with its three largest unions, Higgins said. The current labor negotiations date back as far as September 2006, when bargaining began with pilots.

American and JetBlue unveiled their accord two months before United and Continental agreed to the tie-up creating United Continental Holdings Inc. The new United Airlines is the world’s biggest carrier by traffic, ahead of Delta, which overtook American with the 2008 Northwest acquisition.


After sitting out consolidation that included those deals and Southwest Airlines Co. (LUV)’s May 2 purchase of AirTran Holdings Inc. (AAI), AMR is the only large U.S. airline company likely to post a 2011 loss, based on analysts’ estimates compiled by Bloomberg.


Declining Shares


AMR tumbled 27 percent this year in New York Stock Exchange composite trading through yesterday, and JetBlue fell 17 percent on the Nasdaq Stock Market, joining declines for most of the U.S. industry.
While interline accords are common among U.S. carriers, the American and JetBlue linkage is unusual because it connects a carrier that collects travelers at hub airports to one focused on point-to-point flights. Interline agreements are used in cases such as an airline scrubbing flights and being unable to rebook passengers on one of its own planes.


Will Randow, a Citigroup Inc. analyst, expects that the carriers’ current accord may evolve into a so-called code-share arrangement, in which airlines agree to share some revenue for joint bookings, and stop far short of a combination.
Moving JetBlue employees to American’s higher union wage rates would be too costly and blending different aircraft fleets would be difficult, said Randow, who has hold ratings on JetBlue and AMR. JetBlue’s planes are from Airbus SAS and Embraer SA, while American’s main jet fleet is from Boeing Co. (BA)

‘Strong Presence’


“JetBlue’s strong presence at JFK can bolster American’s position and extend their network, which is a good thing,” Randow said. “American’s strategic vision is to solidify that relationship as much as possible.”


JetBlue has 10 interline agreements, two with U.S.-based carriers. It has two code-share arrangements, including one with its largest shareholder, Germany’s Deutsche Lufthansa AG. The code shares allow the international partners to put their designation on certain JetBlue flights.
American also agreed as part of the original accord to give eight pairs of takeoff and landing rights at Washington’s Ronald Reagan National to JetBlue in exchange for 12 pairs at Kennedy. The trade allowed JetBlue to initiate service at Reagan.


JetBlue has focused over the past two years on building its network in Boston and the Caribbean, markets where American has reduced service.

To contact the reporter on this story: Mary Schlangenstein in Dallas at maryc.s@bloomberg.net


To contact the editor responsible for this story: Ed Dufner at edufner@bloomberg.net

Air France black box: Air France Flight 447 was brought down by a combination of faulty speed sensors and confusion in the cockpit, according to a preliminary analysis by French investigators.


One of the two flight recorders from the Rio-Paris Air France Flight 447 which crashed in 2009 is displayed for the media before a news conference at the BEA headquarters in Le Bourget, northern Paris, in this May 12 file photo. Pilots wrestled with the controls of the Air France airliner for 3.5-minutes before it plunged into the Atlantic with its nose up, killing all 228 people on board in 2009, French investigators said on May 27.




By Christa Case Bryant, Staff writer / May 27, 2011


A preliminary report on the Air France Flight 447 crash in the Atlantic Ocean two years ago suggests that while some equipment malfunctioned, the pilots’ inability to respond properly to key instruments sent the plane into a 3.5-minute plunge that killed all 228 people aboard.


Air France Flight 447 wreckage (but no black box) found in Atlantic Air France crash prompts changes in Airbus speed sensors Air France crash: Probe into two other A330 incidents The findings by France's Bureau of Investigations and Analyses, based on data recently recovered from the Airbus 330’s black boxes, bolster early suspicions that speed sensors known as Pitot tubes had iced over and malfunctioned. This was a problem on Airbus planes that Air France had been aware of at the time of the crash, which occurred en route from Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, to Paris.


But the findings indicate that it wasn't the malfunctioning speed sensors alone that brought the plane down. They also suggest that pilots had enough information at their fingertips to determine what was happening, suggesting that they were not experienced or not prepared to deal with the sudden crisis that developed two hours into the transatlantic flight. Cockpit displays remained accurate and the engines remained fully functional and responsive to the pilots throughout the flight.


When a plane such as the Airbus 330 in question gets conflicting information from various speed sensors, the autopilot and auto-thrust systems shut down – handing control over to the pilot.


That’s precisely what happened two hours and 10 minutes after Flight 447 left Rio, less than 10 minutes after the captain had left the cockpit for a routine break. He was quickly called back to the cabin to try to help the copilots respond to repeated warnings as the plane stalled, and began falling toward the ocean.


However, it was a 32-year-old co-pilot – the least experienced of three pilots on board – who was at the controls until the final minute of the flight. The plane hit the ocean 4-1/2 minutes after the autosystems disengaged, falling at a rate of nearly 11,000 feet per minute.


The Air France pilots apparently tried to bring the nose of the plane up when it stalled, contrary to the conventional wisdom that pushing the nose down will help increase airspeed and bring an aircraft out of a stall, according to an aviation expert quoted by Bloomberg.


“The question is why the pilot kept giving nose-up inputs when the plane was in a stall,” said Paul Hayes, director of safety at Ascend Worldwide Ltd., a London-based aviation consultant company. “You should put the nose down to recover speed.”


Air France praised the professionalism of the pilots in the final moments of the flights, but numerous reports suggest that the airline had failed to give them the training necessary to respond to such a crisis at high altitude – a fault it is now trying to remedy with new training procedures.

Delta bag fees for soldiers ignites backlash



Delta Air Lines' $2,800 in bag fees for Army unit returning from Afghanistan ignites backlash


Reacting to public outcry, Delta said Wednesday, June 8, 2011, it will allow members of the military to check four bags for free. The news came after two Army soldiers returning from Afghanistan complained in an online video that Delta charged their unit a total of $2,800 when some of them checked a fourth bag.(AP Photo/Paul Sancya, file)

Joan Lowy and Joshua Freed, Associated Press, On Wednesday June 8, 2011, 7:00 pm EDT


WASHINGTON (AP) -- Delta Air Lines hastily changed its baggage fees for troops Wednesday after a YouTube video showed soldiers complaining that they had to pay $200 apiece to check extra bags as they made their way home from Afghanistan.


The video was posted Tuesday and was viewed almost 200,000 times before it was removed the next day by the person who put it up. By Wednesday afternoon, a Facebook page called Boycott Delta for Soldiers had sprung up, and the airline was backpedaling and apologizing to the soldiers.


In the video, titled "Delta Airlines Welcomes Soldiers Home," two Army staff sergeants say their unit was told it would cost $200 apiece to check a fourth bag on a Tuesday morning flight from the Baltimore-Washington airport to Atlanta -- a total bill of more than $2,800.

The Defense Department typically reimburses such costs, which the soldiers may not have known before they made their displeasure known. The airline said late Wednesday that it would refund the fees if the government doesn't cover the bill. By then, the public relations damage to Delta was done.
In the video, one sergeant, Robert O'Hair, wearing a camouflage uniform and sitting inside the plane, says his fourth bag was a weapons case containing an M4 carbine rifle, a grenade launcher and a 9-millimeter pistol that he had used in Afghanistan.


"The tools I used to protect myself and Afghan citizens while I was deployed," O'Hair says.

With a bite to his voice, the other sergeant -- Fred Hilliker of Allendale, Mich. -- closes the video: "Good business model, Delta. Thank you. We're actually happy to be back to America. God bless America. Not happy, not happy at all. Appreciate it. Thank you."
The soldiers say in the video that they had already endured an 18-hour layover and had Army authorization to carry four bags.


Initially, Delta apologized to the soldiers but didn't change its policy. It posted a blog item attributed to an anonymous customer service representative explaining that Delta allows troops traveling in economy class up to three bags free but charges for the fourth.


As the storm of online complaints about the incident grew, the airline posted a new blog item Wednesday saying fourth bags will now be free for troops traveling in economy class and five bags will be free for those traveling in business class.
In a blog post, Delta said it regretted "that this experience caused these soldiers to feel anything but welcome on their return home." Airline officials declined to answer further questions.

One sergeant in the video said the unit was returning from Afghanistan to Fort Polk in Louisiana. Paul Boyce, a spokesman for Army Forces Command, said the soldiers who made the video weren't available for interviews.
"I don't know if Delta is going to reimburse these individual soldiers or not, but I do know that we would," Boyce said. "In the past, the airlines, if there's been some sort of a misunderstanding, have done that."


At least some of the soldiers traveling on the flight were with an Army Reserve unit based in Oklahoma, Boyce said. He said troops on the plane were returning from a military training center in Kabul. He did not have the name of their unit.


It was not clear why the video was removed from YouTube. The soldiers in the video also did not explain the total bill of more than $2,800 in detail.


It's not unusual for returning soldiers to check weapons when flying on a commercial airline if the weapons have been certified as unloaded, said Joe Davis, a spokesman for the Veterans of Foreign Wars' Washington office, who was critical of the fee.


"A $200 bill for extra baggage by a government-contracted airline is the worst welcome home any soldier could receive," Davis said. He acknowledged the troops would be reimbursed but said, "The shock of even being charged is enough to make most servicemen and women simply shake their heads and wonder who or what it is they are protecting."


The incident underscored how quickly a company's reputation can be tarnished when a Web video, online picture or posting goes viral. And airline passengers have made no secret of their hatred of baggage fees, which have become common in recent years.

The lesson, said Jonathan Bernstein, president of Bernstein Crisis Management Inc., is that companies should let airline workers make decisions in the name of good customer service. In this case, the Delta employee who handled the fee was just following the rules of Delta Air Lines Inc.


"Then those situations never have to escalate into crises," Bernstein said. "They (Delta) end up with a hit on their reputation that they could have avoided."


On YouTube, Facebook and other websites, posts were overwhelmingly critical of the airline, some suggesting that Delta was insensitive to the tough conditions troops face in Afghanistan and that flying them home completely free was the least the airline could do.
At least one congressman joined the fray. Rep. Bruce Braley, D-Iowa, called on Delta to immediately reimburse the soldiers.


"Since being elected to Congress, I have logged hundreds of thousands of miles on Delta -- the only carrier serving my home airport in Waterloo," Braley said in a statement. "If Delta doesn't reimburse these soldiers and reconsider its approach to servicing our troops, I'll have to reconsider using their service."


Other airlines have policies similar to the one that got Delta in trouble. United and American both allow three checked bags for free for active duty military personnel.


Freed reported from Minneapolis. Associated Press writer Kimberly Hefling in Washington contributed to this report.

Plane returns after fistfight between passengers



By JOAN LOWY, Associated Press Joan Lowy, Associated Press – 2 hrs 41 mins ago


WASHINGTON – Government and airline officials say a United Airlines plane with 144 people aboard returned to Washington-Dulles International Airport for an emergency landing escorted by two F-16 fighter jets after a fight broke out between passengers.

Federal Aviation Administration spokeswoman Laura Brown says Flight 990 bound for Accra, Ghana, returned to Dulles in Chantilly, Va., just after midnight Sunday after a fistfight in the cabin.
Government officials confirmed that fighter jets were scrambled from Andrews Air Force Base in Maryland.
United spokesman Mike Trevino said Tuesday that the Boeing 767 dumped fuel as a safety precaution to lighten its weight on landing.


The Washington Post, which first reported the incident, reported that the fight began not long after takeoff when a passenger lowered his seat and a passenger behind him objected.

AMR: We Are Building More Miami's



By Ted Reed 05/31/11
DALLAS (TheStreet) -- American (AMR_) says it is building an international route system for premium travelers, step by step, following the example it set when it took over Eastern's Miami hub in 1989.


The manner in which we are trying to build share is unconventional, in the sense that historically airlines have built franchises through buying them, or built them when the market was soft," said Vasu Raja, American's managing director of corporate planning, in an interview with TheStreet. "But we have done this before (in Miami). We have a line of sight on how we will build five world class hubs, and we have partnerships in place to help us do that."

In part, Raja responded to a recent, critical report by Avondale Partners analyst Bob McAdoo, which said that American loses $1 billion a year by placing too much capacity on routes where competitors are able to produce higher unit revenue by offering less capacity.


While he disputed McAdoo's math, Raja acknowledged that the carrier realizes it takes time to build traffic on new routes and to fully integrate its recently approved partnerships.


Raja sketched out American's global approach, drawing on the evolution of the Miami hub, widely recognized as one of the domestic airline industry's most successful hub operations. As even McAdoo noted, "American clearly has a broad productive hub in Miami." Dominance in Miami has enabled American to dominate an entire continent.


In building trans-Pacific and trans-Atlantic networks, however, American's competitors got a head start. United(UAL_) bought a Pacific network from Pan American World Airways , while Delta (AMR) acquired Northwest in order to get a Pacific network. Continental built a European network at its Newark hub, then merged with United. Both United and Delta also received anti-trust immunity in the trans-Atlantic long before American did, and both have lower labor costs.


It was not until July 2010 that American won approval for its trans-Atlantic joint venture immunized against anti-trust violations. In the Pacific, American has had to build from scratch, after winning approval for an immunized joint venture last year and starting implementation in April. "It is no great secret that we have a smaller Asia network than the others," Raja said.


In this context, it is no wonder that American has about a quarter of the market capitalization of its two peers: at the same time, it seems foolish to assume that American will never approach its two peers' network capabilities.


Miami growth has taught American how to build, Raja said. "It has been so strong for so long because we invested for the long run," he said. "We built relations with community leaders and travel agents and premium travelers. And today, India and China look to us like Miami did 10 years ago."


Among American's recent steps: A code-share agreement with India's Kingfisher Airlines was implemented this year. And last week, JAL said it will launch non-stop Tokyo-Boston service in April 2012. The flight will be operated as part of the two carriers' immunized trans-Pacific joint venture. As a sign of the flight's importance to the two airlines, this is the route JAL has selected to fly its first Boeing(BA_) 787.


Regarding specific routes that McAdoo said were unprofitable, Raja declined to discuss route profitability. However, while McAdoo said Chicago-Shanghai is unprofitable, Raja noted that American began Los Angeles-Shanghai service on April 5: he strongly implied that the airline would not add a second Shanghai route if the first was unprofitable. McAdoo said American flies too many New York/Los Angeles flights, Raja said Kennedy-Los Angeles "is one of the strongest premium fare markets anywhere in the world, we are the preferred airline for premium travel and the cabins are packed."


McAdoo said Dallas-Buenos Aires is unprofitable: Raja said Buenos Aires is among the best markets in South America. McAdoo said some London Heathrow flights are unprofitable: Raja said American operates Heathrow like its other hubs, and needs frequencies to key markets. "At the end of the day, Heathrow is our market, in the same way Dallas or Chicago or Miami is our market," he said.


In general, Raja said, airlines tend to look at revenue per available seat mile on an overall basis, not a route specific basis. He also noted that McAdoo's analysis does not take into account the necessity to compete on fares while building new routes. "We do have some routes out there losing money, but you cannot look at routes in isolation when you're trying to build a hub network," he said. "You can't look at any single route and make month to month decisions on it. We know what it takes to build a network over a long period of time.


"This isn't a math exercise," Raja said.


-- Written by Ted Reed in Charlotte, N.C.


>To contact the writer of this article, click here: Ted Reed

American Airlines wins either way in NBA Finals



It's a slam dunk: No matter who wins, American Airlines has its name on NBA champion's arena


David Koenig, AP Business Writer, On Sunday May 29, 2011, 4:16 pm EDT


DALLAS (AP) -- If you're a basketball fan, you'll hear the name of American Airlines a lot over the next couple weeks.


American slapped its name on the arenas of both teams playing in the NBA Finals -- the American Airlines Arena in Miami and the American Airlines Center in Dallas.


Whether the Miami Heat or the Dallas Mavericks win the championship, American figures to get a lot of TV time. The same thing happened in 2006, when the Heat defeated the Mavericks in six games.
American bought the naming rights to those arenas a decade ago. According to published reports at the time, which American wouldn't confirm or deny, it agreed to pay $195 million over 30 years for the Dallas rights and $42 million over 20 years in Miami.
Stadium-naming rights were a hot commodity then and reached a fever pitch in 2006, when Citigroup agreed to pay $20 million a year to christen the New York Mets' baseball home Citi Field. Sports sponsorships became harder to sell during the recession, and the business hasn't fully recovered.
The Texas Rangers baseball team hasn't found a name sponsor since ending a deal with mortgage lender Ameriquest in 2007. Today, it's still simply Rangers Ballpark in Arlington.


New football stadiums in Dallas and New York still don't have sponsorships. Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones might have missed his best chance when his new stadium hosted the Super Bowl in February. Now, with a looming NFL lockout this fall, there might be no games and no fans to sell to potential corporate name-droppers.


Recent deals have been underwhelming. Miami did a 1-year deal to rename the home of the NFL Dolphins Land Shark Stadium after a beer promoted by singer Jimmy Buffett, then it cut a 5-year agreement with a Canadian company. It's now Sun Life Stadium.


In Jacksonville, Fla., the football stadium had no corporate name for two years after a deal ended with Alltel, a phone company acquired by Verizon. Finally, a local bank ponied up for EverBank Field.


Andrew Zimbalist, a sports economist at Smith College, said the financial crisis and recession hurt the market for naming rights. As consumers cut back, he said, companies questioned ever-higher prices for sponsorships.


"I don't think that the market is collapsing, it's just not as rich as it used to be," Zimbalist said. He suspects that some teams, including the Cowboys, are turning down reasonable offers in hopes that sky-high prices come back.

Marc Ganis, president of Chicago-based sports business consulting firm Sportscorp Ltd., said CEOs may be gun-shy about naming deals after Citigroup was criticized for paying the Mets while getting $45 billion in federal bailout money.


American Airlines considered giving up its Dallas and Miami arena rights in 2003, when it hovered near bankruptcy. Company officials said such a move has not been considered since. American's parent company, AMR Corp., has lost nearly $12 billion in the last decade.
It's hard to determine the value of a company's name on a stadium or arena, but that doesn't stop marketing experts from trying.


Front Row Marketing Services estimates that American Airlines will get more than $10 million per game in national advertising. That's based on the number of times the company's name appears on screen or is mentioned by broadcasters.


But Front Row, which represents venues in naming-rights deals, assumes that a picture of LeBron James dunking is the same as a national advertising spot for American Airlines as long as there's an American logo in the background.


"We don't know if that's right," American Airlines spokesman Tim Smith said of the 8-figure estimate, "but there's value in it, and we're sure it's a large amount."

American has big airport hubs in both Dallas and Miami, and many out-of-towners going to the games will fly on its silver-skinned planes.


"It's great exposure, and it's fun," Smith said. "We've got home-court advantage every game."


Koenig can be contacted at http://twitter.com/airlinewriter

AMR Cancels 20% of Daily Flights as Hailstorms Batter Aircraft



By Mary Schlangenstein - May 25, 2011 1:36 PM MT


American Airlines and American Eagle canceled 707 flights, or 20 percent of their daily schedule, and pulled 89 planes from service after hail battered the carriers’ biggest hub and storms raked across the central U.S.


The cancellations included 326 flights into and out of Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport today as repairs began, and the AMR Corp. (AMR) units are scrapping 188 flights for tomorrow. Getting all the aircraft back in service may take several days, Tim Smith, a spokesman, said in an interview.


Winds of almost 70 miles (113 kilometers) per hour and hail as large as 4.25 inches (11 centimeters) in diameter were reported as storms moved through Dallas-Fort Worth last night, according to the National Weather Service. About 10,000 people were stranded overnight at the Dallas-Fort Worth airport, said David Magana, a spokesman for the facility.


Cancellations at American, the third-biggest U.S. airline, “are overwhelmingly driven by a significant group of domestic aircraft being out of service,” Smith said. “We’re thinking that for some number of those aircraft, it could be two or three days to get them repaired and flying again.”



Southwest Airlines Co. (LUV) said it scrubbed a dozen flights from Dallas, where the carrier is based, and grounded eight planes damaged by baseball-sized hail. United Continental Holdings Inc. pulled two aircraft from service out of Dallas- Fort Worth for damage inspections and canceled two flights.


American has completed inspections on about 10 of the 62 damaged aircraft and returned them to service. Twenty-seven planes flown by American Eagle, a commuter carrier, have been repaired and resumed flights, Smith said.


“It looks like a majority of the 62 are going to need some kind of repair,” he said.


Oklahoma Crews


The airline, based in Fort Worth, Texas, flew as many as 50 workers from its Tulsa, Oklahoma, maintenance base, along with tools and parts, to handle repairs. The damaged planes are at airport gates, on tarmacs and even on taxiways, Smith said.


American yesterday grounded 400 flights, primarily at the Texas airport as storms moved into the area.

Southwest, the nation’s largest low-fare carrier, operates from Love Field north of downtown Dallas. Buildings were damaged and trees blown down during the storm.


Damage to the Southwest Boeing Co. 737s was “minimal to moderate,” said Chris Mainz, a spokesman. The first of the repaired planes should return to flying tomorrow, and the rest by May 28, he said.


“The only issue is finding the parts and taking the time to replace or repair,” Mainz said.


American is letting customers traveling through Dallas-Fort Worth today through May 27 change reservations without paying a fee, Smith said.


American and American Eagle have more than 750 daily departures from Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport. AMR operates about 3,600 flights a day.


No damage was reported to the Dallas-Fort Worth airport facilities, Magana said. Cabs and cars parked at the south end of the airport were damaged by hail, he said.


To contact the reporter on this story: Mary Schlangenstein in Dallas at maryc.s@bloomberg.net






To contact the editor responsible for this story: Ed Dufner at edufner@bloomberg.n

Editor...


I was in the storm at DFW last night where 10,000 passengers were stranded due to the intense hailstorm, with hail the size of golf balls. All passengers were evacuted from all aircraft, including mine headed to Dayton, Ohio, at the gates in DFW and huddled around innner areas of the terminal.


Restaurants were jammed and people were frustrated and angry. We finally got a hotel room after nearly twelve hours on duty...remember, we only get paid when the plane is moving and nothing went anywhere last night...thanks goodness people are safe.


Hundreds of cars and trucks sustained hail damage and the DFW operation is slowly coming up to speed as planes and crews and scattered all over the country.


American Cancels Flights After Hailstorm




By Mary Schlangenstein - May 25, 2011 9:03


American Airlines and American Eagle canceled 594 flights, or 17 percent of their daily schedule, and pulled 89 planes from service for possible hail damage after a series of storms raked across the central U.S.


Southwest Airlines Co. (LUV), based at Love Field in Dallas, expects to cancel or delay an undetermined number of flights as it checks eight aircraft for damage, a spokesman said today.


Winds of almost 70 miles (113 kilometers) per hour and hail as large as 4.25 inches (11 centimeters) in diameter were reported as storms moved through Dallas-Fort Worth last night, the National Weather Service said. About 10,000 people were stranded overnight at Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport, said David Magana, an airport spokesman.


“Airlines conducted inspections of aircraft overnight, looking for hail damage,” he said. “Depending on the results, that may have a further impact on flight schedules.”


American and its Eagle regional carrier canceled 262 flights at Dallas-Fort Worth, its largest hub, said Tim Smith, a spokesman for the carrier, in an e-mail. The Fort Worth-based airline yesterday grounded 400 flights, primarily at the Texas airport as storms moved into the area.


American, the third-biggest U.S. airline, couldn’t immediately say how long the aircraft inspections would take or whether any planes had been found with damage, Smith said. The checks include 62 American planes and 27 Eagle aircraft. Both carriers are units of AMR Corp. (AMR)


“We expect to find damage on some aircraft that will have to be repaired, but I don’t know the results of that yet,” he said. Some flights also were canceled because crews and aircraft were diverted to other cities during the storm.


‘Expecting Delays’


Southwest, the nation’s largest low-fare carrier, operates from Love Field north of downtown Dallas. Buildings were damaged and trees blown down during the storm.


“While we were able to launch fully our originating schedule this morning, we are expecting delays and some cancellations as a result of these planes being out of the scheduled operation,” Brad Hawkins, a Southwest spokesman, said in an e-mail.
Southwest is assessing damage to its planes, and some may be out of service until May 28, said Chris Mainz, a spokesman.


American is letting customers traveling through Dallas-Fort Worth today through May 27 change reservations without paying a fee, Smith said.


Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport is American’s largest hub, with more than 750 daily departures by the airline and American Eagle. AMR operates about 3,600 flights a day.


No damage was reported to the Dallas-Fort Worth airport facilities, Magana said. Cabs and cars parked at the south end of the airport were damaged by hail, he said.


To contact the reporter on this story: Mary Schlangenstein in Dallas at maryc.s@bloomberg.net





To contact the editor responsible for this story: Ed Dufner at edufner@bloomberg

Delta Takes Aim at La Guardia Amid Competition



By Mary Jane Credeur and Mary Schlangenstein - May 23, 2011 9:01 PM MT

Delta Air Lines Inc. (DAL) sought federal approval to expand at New York’s LaGuardia Airport, saying industry consolidation has helped clear the way for a trade of landing rights with US Airways Group Inc. (LCC)

Delta wants to take over 132 pairs of LaGuardia flight slots held by US Airways, which would get 42 pairs in exchange at Washington’s Reagan airport. US Airways also would receive rights to fly to Sao Paulo and $66.5 million in cash, the two carriers said yesterday.
The plan, which needs clearance from the U.S. Department of Transportation, replaces a 2009 accord that met objections from regulators and rivals including Southwest Airlines Co. (LUV) A successful deal would allow Atlanta-based Delta to boost market share in New York, where no airline has a dominant position.


“It is likely that Delta and US Airways received some indication that the DOT would find the proposal acceptable,” said Jeff Straebler, a debt strategist at RBS Securities Inc. in Stamford, Connecticut. “Given the changed competitive landscape and Southwest’s growing presence in key East Coast airports, we think the DOT is more likely to approve this go-round.”
Southwest gained LaGuardia and Reagan flights from its purchase of AirTran Holdings Inc. (AAI) this month, and it added slots at New Jersey’s Newark airport that United Airlines and Continental Airlines divested as part of their October merger.
LaGuardia Growth


Delta would end up with almost half of the flight slots at LaGuardia, which chiefly serves domestic routes. The carrier’s 2008 purchase of Northwest Airlines helped push its share of passengers to 29 percent at the end of 2010 from 22 percent five years earlier. AMR Corp. (AMR)’s American Airlines slid to 21 percent from 24 percent in the same period.
For Tempe, Arizona-based US Airways, the trade would be a chance to focus on Washington and shrink LaGuardia operations, where it has said it can’t make money. While the government approved the airlines’ 2009 proposal, neither carrier accepted the regulators’ terms for that agreement to proceed.


“We plan to review their application,” said Bill Mosley, a Transportation Department spokesman, who declined to comment further.

Delta fell 28 cents to $11.23 yesterday on the New York Stock Exchange, while US Airways slid 17 cents to $10. They were little changed in extended trading after their agreement was unveiled.


The airlines, the second- and fifth-largest U.S. carriers by traffic, said yesterday they would shed 16 LaGuardia slot pairs and eight at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport to smaller carriers with few or no flights there to help win regulatory approval.


Trade to Grow


That’s fewer than the 34 slot pairs they were told to give up in the Transportation Department’s May 2010 ruling that approved their earlier proposal. Flights are capped at both airports, so carriers have to trade to expand.
Industry mergers, including the Southwest-AirTran deal, have brought in new carriers in New York and Washington since their initial plan was unveiled almost two years ago, Delta and US Airways said yesterday.


“There has been increased competition in that part of the world since the first deal was announced that would help the argument,” said Michael Derchin, a CRT Capital Group LLC analyst in Stamford who recommends buying Delta and holding US Airways. “It will probably be approved.”


Under the original August 2009 plan, Delta sought 125 slots for LaGuardia round-trip flights held by US Airways, in exchange for 42 such slots at Reagan.


‘More Slots’


“We are still interested in more slots, which is good for competition and good for consumers,” said Whitney Eichinger, a spokeswoman for Dallas-based Southwest. “We’ll be analyzing this new deal with that in mind.”

JetBlue Airways Corp. (JBLU), which is based in New York and has its largest operations at the city’s Kennedy airport, didn’t immediately return a call seeking comment.
Delta proposes to take control of US Airways’ Terminal C at LaGuardia and build a 600-foot connector to link the facility to its existing terminal for main jet flights. That project and other upgrades will cost $117 million.
US Airways would need to cut 300 jobs at its Piedmont regional unit and an unknown number of additional jobs if the slot trade goes through, said Todd Lehmacher, a spokesman. Under the plan, US Airways would win the right to operate daily service to Sao Paulo in 2015.


The New York region lacks a dominant carrier, with air traffic spread among LaGuardia, Kennedy and New Jersey’s Newark. United and Continental airlines led the area with 27 percent of passengers in 2010, according to the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey. Delta had 20 percent, and Fort Worth, Texas- based American had 13 percent.


“Approval of this deal will sorely challenge” American in New York, said Straebler, the RBS debt strategist. “United already has the only true hub in the area at Newark. Now Delta would be far larger than American when combining LaGuardia and JFK.”


To contact the reporters on this story: Mary Jane Credeur in Atlanta at mcredeur@bloomberg.net; Mary Schlangenstein in Dallas at maryc.s@bloomberg.net

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Ed Dufner at edufner@bloomberg.net.

The Minutiae of an Airline Merger



James Estrin/The New York Times


Pilots from United and Continental Airlines picketed at LaGuardia Airport in New York this month to mark the one-year anniversary of the announcement of the merger of the airlines.


By JAD MOUAWAD


Published: May 18, 2011



Airline mergers are complex and tough to pull off — witness the troubled marriage of People Express and Continental Airlines in the 1980s or the continuing problems in integrating America West and US Airways six years after their merger. So when Delta Air Lines acquired Northwest three years ago, executives knew they would have to resolve major labor, technology and financial issues.


What they had not fully anticipated were the thousands of tiny details that go mostly unnoticed by passengers but can make the difference between a successful merger and a failed one.


All airlines have their own way of doing things, developed over time and through labor negotiations. All have specific working rules, flying procedures, maintenance schedules and computer programs. And all have their own cultures. Delta always thought of itself as the gracious host. Hence its flight attendants poured the requested drinks. Northwest was the practical carrier; its attendants just handed over the can.


“It was like Noah’s ark out here,” said Peter Wilander, an executive at Delta responsible for in-flight services. “We had two of everything.”

Delta executives agreed earlier this month to discuss the minutiae of the Northwest merger to make the broader point that combining two airlines is an incredibly difficult task. The Delta-Northwest tie-up is now widely seen as a success, and that view laid the groundwork for two other, more recent mergers: United Airlines with Continental last fall and Southwest Airlines and AirTran, which was completed just last week.


“If you look at the history of mergers, the assumption was that you couldn’t do them successfully,” said Richard Anderson, Delta’s chief executive. “Everybody had come to the conclusion that these things are too big, too complex and too unwieldy to manage.”

Delta’s merger with Northwest was announced in April 2008 and closed in October of that year after receiving regulatory and shareholder approval. And yet it still took 14 more months for the airlines to fly as a single carrier, in January 2010.


Delta scored a major point by getting its pilot unions to agree to a common contract by the time the merger closed. Many analysts said this gave the airline a critical advantage by getting a crucial labor group on board from the start.


But that did not put an end to Delta’s labor issues. Flight attendant representatives accused the airline of using intimidation tactics after they lost a bid to unionize the carrier’s work force in November. The matter is under review by the National Mediation Board, which could call a new election.

Meanwhile, flight attendants from Delta and Northwest continue to work under separate contracts, each with their own work rules, and cannot be scheduled to fly on the same airplanes.


And some merger-related work is still going on. The last Northwest plane was repainted only six weeks ago. Delta expects to spend another year completing an inventory of all airplane parts and maintenance procedures into a new database.


Each airline has hundreds of different technologies that book seats, print tickets or dispatch crews that need to be integrated. Failure here can leave thousands of travelers without a seat if bookings are misplaced.

Delta’s chief information officer, Theresa Wise, said the airline had to merge 1,199 computer systems down to about 600, including one — a component within the airline’s reservation system — dating from 1966.


The challenge, she said, was to switch the systems progressively so that passengers would not notice. Ms. Wise, who has a doctorate in applied mathematics, devised a low-tech solution: she set up a timeline of the steps that had to be performed by pinning colored Post-it notes on the wall of a conference room.


A major switch happened when the new airline canceled all Northwest’s bookings and transferred them to newly created Delta flights in January 2010. It required computer engineers to perform 8,856 separate steps stretched out over several days. 

More than 140,000 electronic devices, including printers, had to be replaced. The size of the paper at airport kiosks was even checked to make sure it could print boarding passes for Delta’s new flights.



This sounds insane,” Ms. Wise said. “But each reservation system has its own personality.”


Financially, the merger provided a big boost to Delta’s bottom line. Delta posted its highest profit in a decade last year. But even as the integration into a single carrier was hitting its stride, Delta’s operations struggled.


The airline had the worst record among large carriers for on-time arrivals last year, and it accounted for a third of all customer complaints, the worst of any airline, for categories like service and lost bags, according to the Transportation Department.


When United and Continental announced their own tie-up, in May 2010, they picked a hybrid approach to emphasize that the combination was a merger of equals: the new airline would keep its headquarters in Chicago but would be led by Jeff Smisek, Continental’s chairman, who was a driving force behind the merger. The carrier’s new livery combines Continental’s globe on the tail with United’s name on the fuselage.

United and Continental continue to operate as separate airlines until they receive a single operating certificate from the Federal Aviation Administration by the end of the year. At that point, the new United will overtake Delta as the nation’s largest carrier.


Unlike Delta, however, United has not secured a new contract for all its pilots yet, some of whom recently picketed in front of nine major airports across the country, including Los Angeles International Airport. Mr. Smisek said during a recent conference call that the airline had made some progress in the merger. Passengers can now print boarding passes from either airline at all United and Continental kiosks, and loyalty programs are getting more closely aligned.

“I remain committed to reaching agreements that are fair to our co-workers and fair to the company,” Mr. Smisek said on the call. “And I want to reach those agreements promptly.”


Likewise, Southwest closed the purchase of AirTran on May 2, and quickly appointed a new leadership team to handle the combination.

“All good things take time and change won’t be immediate, many important decisions are ahead, many questions still need answers,” Gary Kelly, the chief executive of Southwest, said in a video statement after the deal closed. “Once integration is complete, we will have one brand, one customer experience, one livery, one operation under a single operating certificate and one mission.”
If Delta’s experience is any indication, it will be a long road for Southwest and United, littered with seemingly trivial questions.

Pilots at Delta, for instance, used to ring the cabin bell four times as they began their final approach, while those at Northwest rang it twice. The merged airline now signals just two times.

Likewise, the food catering operations of both airlines had 8,000 pages of one-line codes describing everything from soda orders to the price of strawberries. Each airline had different codes, however, and paid different prices for everything.


No decision, seemingly, was too small. Before the merger, Delta used to cut its limes in 10 slices while Northwest cut them 16 ways. The lime debate was even mentioned at a meeting attended by Mr. Anderson, the chief executive, who was told it saved Northwest about $500,000 a year. In the end, Delta stuck with its 10 slices. But the airline also realized that it had been loading more limes on its flights than it needed. So it is now carrying fewer limes.

Delta, based in Atlanta, used to serve the hometown drink, Coke. Northwest, Pepsi. “That was an easy one,” Mr. Anderson recalled. The airline stuck with Coke but adopted Pepsi snacks.

One other issue has apparently stumped everyone. Delta and Northwest each used different trash bags in their cabins. Northwest’s was large, held up better and was easy to use. Delta’s was smaller, like a high-end shopping bag. The airline is still working on finding the perfect bag.


The amount of work is boring beyond belief,” Mr. Wilander said. “It is also critical to the airline.”

Black box data from crashed Air France jet said to be intact



 Mon May 16, 9:22 am ET


PARIS (Reuters) – Investigators have pulled data from the black boxes of an Air France jet which crashed in the Atlantic in 2009, boosting efforts to explain what caused the disaster and killed all 228 people on board.


France's BEA air crash investigation agency said on Monday it had managed to transfer all the information stored in devices hauled from the seabed two weeks ago, almost two years after the Airbus A330 vanished in an equatorial storm.


The transfer -- carried out at the weekend and filmed in front of investigators from four countries and French judicial officials -- is the most important breakthrough yet in efforts to find out what caused the mysterious crash.


The BEA brought forward its target date for publishing a new report on the crash by around six months and said it may be able to issue interim findings in the summer.


"The most interesting thing will be to find out what the crew were seeing and understanding and how they were reacting and managing their responses," said Paul Hayes, safety director UK-based aviation consultancy Ascend Aviation.

Flight 447 from Rio de Janeiro to Paris vanished in the storm on June 1, 2009, triggering an international hunt for the wreckage and black boxes that might contain clues.
The recorders were hauled nearly 4 km (2.5 miles) to the sea's surface in early May after a search operation costing $50 million and shipped to Paris, where they arrived on Thursday.
At first it was unclear whether the data would be readable.


The successful data transfer includes all information from the flight data recorder, which monitors aircraft systems, and a loop containing the last two hours of cockpit voice recordings.


The operation took place after the memory cards and chips containing the recordings were dried out in carefully controlled conditions at BEA labs just outside Paris.
The data will now be analysed in detail, the BEA said.


"This work will take several weeks, after which a further interim report will be written and then published during the summer," it said in a statement.


Investigators had earlier said any information gleaned from the black boxes would take months to process and that they did not expect to issue a report until early in 2012.
HOPE FOR ANSWERS


Relatives of some of the 228 people killed in the crash have voiced hope that their two-year wait for an explanation may soon be over.


The next stage of the investigation is expected to focus on whether any systems were at fault, cross-checking with alerts sent out by the aircraft's automatic messaging system, and what information was available to the pilots before the disaster.


Two Lufthansa jets were in the same area half an hour before the Air France crash, the World Meteorological Organization said at the time of the accident, but some passenger aircraft are reported to have taken different routes.


Initial investigations focused on apparently inconsistent readings from the aircraft's Thales speed sensors, as relayed by the aircraft's automatic maintenance message system. But investigators have said no single cause can be identified.


The BEA was expected to make two recordings of the black box data -- one for its own investigation and one for French judges probing whether anyone should be held criminally responsible.


Air France and Airbus, part of the European aerospace group EADS, have both been placed under formal investigation, a step short of charges but which can ultimately lead to trial.


(Reporting by Tim Hepher; Writing by John Irish; editing by Elizabeth Piper)