WASHINGTON, March 25, 2019 – Airlines for America (A4A), the industry trade organization for the leading U.S. airlines, is expecting an all-time high of 158.2 million passengers – 2.59 million per day – to fly globally on U.S. airlines between March 1 and April 30. This marks a 4.3 percent increase from the same period last year when 151.7 passengers took to the skies. Because of this record-high spring season, domestic airlines are adding 129,000 additional seats per day across their networks to accommodate 106,000 more daily passengers.

“Low fares, abundant air service and a healthy economy continue to attract a record number of travelers to the skies,” said A4A Vice President and Chief Economist John Heimlich. “We’re in a period of unprecedented access to air travel – flyers of all income levels have a wide array of products and providers to choose from when traveling from one city to another or one country to another.”

In 2018, U.S. airlines transported record passenger and cargo volumes. Department of Transportation (DOT) data through the third quarter of 2018 showed inflation-adjusted airfares falling to new lows, as airlines across the spectrum added capacity faster than the economy and competition intensified in tens of thousands of domestic city pairs.

More Americans Are Taking to the Skies than Ever

As the U.S. economy continues to grow, Americans are taking to the skies and reporting high overall satisfaction with their flight experience.

In 2018, according to A4A-commissioned research by Ipsos Public Affairs, 87 percent of Americans reported having flown in their lifetimes, up from 81 percent in 1997 and just 49 percent in 1971. Nearly 50 percent reported having flown at least once in the past year, up from 39 percent in 1997. A majority of Americans reported they are traveling by air for personal reasons (72 percent), including vacations. The research also showed that overall flyer satisfaction in 2018 remained above 80 percent, with even higher levels for those enrolled in a trusted traveler program such as Global Entry or TSA PreCheck.

U.S. Airlines Continue to Invest in Products, Employees and Airports

With growing demand, U.S. airlines are taking steps to ensure that passenger satisfaction remains high from check-in to touchdown, with increased levels of staffing, product enhancement and collaboration with airport partners.

From 2010 to 2018, U.S. airlines invested 75 percent of operating cash back into the product, while retiring debt and returning cash to shareholders. Nearly $121 billion was used to enhance the product and improve the passenger experience, with new airplanes and ground equipment, improved facilities, complimentary in-flight entertainment options, upgraded security lanes at airport checkpoints, innovative technology as well as more gourmet food and beverage choices.

December 2018 marked the 62^nd consecutive month of year-over-year U.S. passenger airline employment gains. In 2018, on average, the industry employed 438,000 full-time equivalent workers – up nearly 16 percent from 2010 – with competitive pay and benefits in career-track jobs.

Airport investment is booming across the country, with numerous capital projects completed, underway or approved at a significant number of small, medium and major U.S. airports. From 2001 through 2017, U.S. airports spent $165 billion on capital improvement projects, and tens of billions of dollars in additional airport projects are underway or approved at airports around the country.

A4A has long advocated against raising taxes on the flying public, citing the many highly-funded resources available to airports for new projects, including $3.3 billion in revenue from the Passenger Facility Charge (PFC) in 2017 alone, more than $14.5 billion in unrestricted cash reserves and investments and the funds available through the Airport and Airway Trust Fund (AATF), which has an uncommitted balance of nearly $7 billion, growing to a record $8.7 billion by the end of 2020. Airports, thanks to these funds and other financial investments from airline partners, have no need to increase the tax burden on travelers who choose to fly.

U.S. Airlines Report Strong 2018 Operational Performance

Even with record high passenger volumes in 2018, U.S. airlines reported solid operational performance for the year, including the lowest rate of involuntary denied boardings -ever recorded, down to 0.14 per 10,000 passengers. The rate of customer complaints fell for a third straight year, with less than 1 complaint to DOT per 100,000 passengers. Baggage handling also remains improved since 2015, with reports of 2.78 mishandled bags per 1,000 passengers. Amid difficult severe weather in 2018, which the FAA reported rose 18 percent from 2017 alone, the on-time arrival rate fell to 79.4 percent.

U.S. airlines recovered $0.73 in revenue for every $1.00 increase in operating costs, including a 58 percent year-over-year increase in fuel costs. 2018 expenses rose faster than revenues, reducing the industry’s pretax profit margin to 8.2 percent, just over half of the U.S. average of 15.2 percent.

Lehigh Valley International Airport is again hosting an event to help people with autism or other developmental disabilities navigate taking a flight before they get to the airport to travel.

The airport in Hanover Township, Lehigh County and the Arc of Lehigh and Northampton Counties are hosting their fifth annual “Wings for All” event at 9 a.m. May 11th.

Families can register for the event here.

“Wings for All” is a national airport rehearsal program produced by The Arc of the United States, and is designed for people on the autism spectrum or those with other intellectual or developmental disabilities.

The event is very popular, and more than 200 people have participated over the years. The event is a collaboration between The Arc, Allegiant Air and the Lehigh-Northampton Airport Authority, which operates the airport.

Participants practice parking in the airport lot, checking in at a ticket gate, going through TSA and waiting to board. Organizers do not avoid crowd situations, in the hopes families can see potential triggers before they plan a trip.

The participants board an Allegiant plane and sit through the flight instructions, about 15 or 20 minutes on the plane. Afterwards, there is a reception.

Last year, officials debuted the new sensory room off the Wilfred M. “Wiley” Post departure concourse at LVIA, for passengers with intellectual or developmental disabilities, such as autism.

It has specialized flooring, low-frequency lighting, a mounted projector and other sensory equipment.

Sarah Cassi may be reached at scassi@lehighvalleylive.com. Follow her on Twitter @SarahCassi. Find lehighvalleylive.com on Facebook.

There is an old piece of advice that prevails when it comes to air travel: If you dress professionally, arrive early, and enquire ever so politely, you might just be that lucky person who gets bumped from the doldrums of economy class to the perks of premium, business, or first class. 

However, if you’ve been on a plane in the last decade, you might’ve noticed: Air travel has changed quite a bit. The glamour and personalized service has been replaced by algorithms, surcharges, and a de-bundling of even the most basic of services. Free upgrade? A more realistic aspiration might be a free ginger ale after takeoff.

“Airlines have their upgrade process down to a science,” Emily McNutt, global news editor for the aviation website The Points Guy, told Quartz. “Just because you’re wearing a suit doesn’t mean you’ll get an upgrade when you approach the gate agent. Because of things like airline elite status, upgrades often happen for those who are most loyal to the carrier.”

BUDAPEST, Hungary – The alleged ISIS commander charged here last week with taking part in 20 beheadings obtained a special refugee passport in Greece that gave him air travel access to much of Europe, according to Gyorgy Bakondi, a senior advisor to Hungary’s prime minister’s office.

The revelation about the bestowal of such refugee benefits on an accused ISIS commander raises questions about terrorist exploitation of the so-called refugee “right to travel” embossed in a 1951 international treaty, allowing those approved for refugee status to move about freely in Europe and elsewhere.

It remains unclear exactly which refugee passport program might have been used by “F. Hassan,” as the Hungarian government has dubbed the 27-year-old Syrian now under arrest in Budapest. Bakondi wasn’t sure.

New United Nations-European Union Passports for Refugees Program in Greece

But Hassan likely was a beneficiary of the new “European Qualifications for Passports for Refugees” program, which the United Nations Human Rights Commission and European Union’s Council of Europe implemented in Greece in late 2017 and expanded last year. According to its website, the program enables passport recipients to travel to eight countries in Europe and also Canada; the United States is not among the listed countries.

Recipients are chosen based on education levels, language proficiency, and work experience as a means to improve chances to match such candidates to specialized employment.

A Reuters news report quoted Hungarian prosecutors as saying that Hassan traveled to a number of European countries prior to landing in Hungary, although those countries were not identified and his activities in them were not detailed.

Bakondi told PJ Media the suspect did use his real name to apply for refugee status after traveling to Greece among migrants leaving Turkey. But he almost certainly too would have been required to truthfully state on refugee applications whether he had been involved with terrorist groups or fought in Syria.

Greek authorities eventually granted Hassan refugee status, which entitles migrants to obtain refugee travel documents. Hassan eventually landed at the airport in Budapest last December with an unidentified woman whom Hungarian authorities found to be carrying a false passport, Bakondi said.

The woman was deported to Greece because of the false passport, but Hassan was prosecuted and convicted of human smuggling, given a suspended 18-month sentence, and ordered expelled for three years.

While he was awaiting deportation in a Hungarian center, Belgian intelligence provided Hungary with informant-based information that Hassan had committed atrocities as an “emir” on behalf of ISIS, to include personally cutting off the heads of victims, Bakondi said.

How did Hassan Evade United States-Assisted Vetting in Greece?

The arrest of Hassan also raises the question of whether Greece, as a key refugee transit country, is properly vetting higher risk migrants for potential ties to ISIS before granting refugee status and conferring its benefits. The United States has reportedly been assisting Greece, to some extent, in vetting incoming migrants and refugees to determine whether any are terrorists.

Starting in 2014, hundreds of thousands of migrants from 103 countries began pouring into Greece on their way to more prosperous EU countries, often along the so-called “Balkan Route” that leads from Greece to Hungary. U.S. homeland security agencies, starting in 2018, provided equipment and training to Greek security agencies to begin collecting biometrics information such as fingerprints and retinal scans at at least 30 common points of refugee entry.

In 2015, Hungary closed its borders and built fencing, prompting other countries in the region to do the same, effectively reducing the overland migration flow along the route to a trickle. But its airports would remain vulnerable to those given lawful refugee status.

On Global Guard for Escaping ISIS Fighters and Sympathizers

The global intelligence community and Western law enforcement have been on heightened alert since the collapse of the ISIS quasi-state in Syria and Iraq sent tens of thousands of fighters and sympathizers fleeing, many to Europe, where some have committed a number of terror attacks.

Kurdish rebels and Iraqi forces have been capturing thousands of ISIS fighters and their families as the caliphate succumbed to brute military encirclements before and since the October 2017 fall of Raqqa, the putative capital. Others are presumed to be holed up in remnant pockets surrounded by hostile paramilitary forces.

A few senior leaders have been caught in intelligence dragnets or killed in airstrikes; others are presumed to have escaped to places farther away while the getting was still good. Some ISIS commanders were recently caught posing as war refugees about to embark on a rickety boat to Greece.

Follow Todd Bensman on Twitter @BensmanTodd

The relationship between Boeing and the Federal Aviation Administration, which has set the global standard in aviation safety for decades, will come under unprecedented scrutiny this week after two deadly airline crashes.

Both accidents involved a Boeing jet green-lighted by the U.S. regulator, which relied heavily on safety assessments made by Boeing employees.

In a startling break from the past, other nations and airlines grounded the Boeing 737 Max en masse after the second fatal crash this month while the same model of plane continued to carry tens of thousands of passengers a day in the United States.

This week, Congress joins the investigation into Boeing and the FAA. On Wednesday, the Senate aviation subcommittee will examine how the FAA oversees safety in the commercial aviation industry.

The acting FAA chief is scheduled to testify. So is the Transportation Department’s inspector general, who is conducting a separate probe of the FAA’s decision to approve the Boeing 737 Max aircraft, the type of plane that crashed in Indonesia in October, and then in Ethiopia two weeks ago.

The U.S. House plans to hold its own hearings and The Associated Press has reported that the Justice Department is also investigating.

At the very least, it looks like Boeing and the FAA are going to be under more intense scrutiny for some time.

For decades, the FAA has relied heavily on safety certifications performed by employees of aircraft manufacturers, whose work is overseen by the FAA.

The FAA defends this delegation of work, saying it improves safety by involving more skilled professionals into the review of what companies do. Agency officials stress that the last fatal crash of a U.S. airliner took place a decade ago.

Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., called the FAA arrangement with manufacturers “safety on the cheap,” and said he wants to know more about the role that Boeing employees played in the FAA’s decision to certify the Max.

The agency concedes that it doesn’t have resources to keep pace with growth in the aviation industry. Outside experts say the FAA is overmatched — it can’t pay enough to attract and keep people with the technical expertise to regulate such a complex industry.

“It’s a money thing, and they don’t have the money to do all the kinds of oversight,” said Todd Curtis, a former Boeing Co. safety engineer and creator of airsafe.com, a website that focuses on airline safety.

With the Max, Boeing created an automated flight-control system that had never been used before; it can direct the nose of the plane down if sensor readings indicate the plane may be about to stall, or lose aerodynamic lift from the wings. The interaction between pilots and that automated system is now at the center of the investigation into both crashes.

According to published reports, high-ranking FAA officials were unaware of Boeing’s stall-protection system called the Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System, or MCAS. Lawmakers are likely to ask who within FAA knew about the software and whether they failed to grasp its significance.

Flight safety regulators worldwide have followed the lead of the FAA for decades, but not this time. China, whose airlines have more Max jets than any other country, grounded the plane one day after the crash in Ethiopia. Others including the European Union and Canada followed quickly, citing a need for caution. That left the U.S. standing alone in allowing passengers to keep flying on the Max.

President Donald Trump announced the grounding of the Boeing plane on the afternoon of March 13, three days after the crash in Ethiopia. The FAA said the planes were being parked because of “newly refined satellite data” and evidence collected at the crash site. Satellite information showed the planes that crashed had similar flight paths — erratic rates of alternately climbing and descending almost immediately after takeoff.

Acting FAA Administrator Daniel Elwell said the agency grounded the plane as soon as it had data to support the decision.

Lawmakers will want to know whether the FAA’s delay exposed tens of thousands of passengers to unnecessary risk.