Sunday, 22 January 2017

Post Trump,- Closed skies?



In aviation terms the biggest question coming out of Donald Trump's victory is how much he will listen to the bleats of the US pilots' union ALPA and the legacy carriers about,-in old British union terms, the bread and butter being taken out of their mouths by foreign airlines,especially the Gulf ones, Will non reciprocated links be cut back? If so, American cities to whom the foreigners have brought a plethora of new links to the world will lose them and their customers will just have to fly via wherever US carriers choose to fly and just as far as they go. For points beyond whatever gateways are left they would have to find whatever connections they could. The beneficiaries would be the US and European legacy airlines, but particularly the latter as they could offer a range of worldwide onward connections which the Americans couldn't. The big losers would be be the newcomers.

 Alternatively will the interests of these cities and of Boeing from whom the foreigners continue to buy large fleets, especially of widebodies, and of the inbound tourism industry prevail?

We should know at least the initial position before long.