{"id":1042,"date":"2020-09-14T09:35:18","date_gmt":"2020-09-14T07:35:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.aviationadvocacy.aero\/blog\/?p=1042"},"modified":"2020-09-14T09:35:18","modified_gmt":"2020-09-14T07:35:18","slug":"that-was-the-week-that-was-7th-11th-september","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.aviationadvocacy.aero\/blog\/?p=1042","title":{"rendered":"That Was The Week That Was : 7th -11th September"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Its Metaphor Week<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

You do not have to be all that mischievous to think that if there is a god, She has a sense of humour.  This week\u2019s proof?  This week was Metaphor Week!  Who knew?  Metaphor after metaphor tumbled across the week, teaching us patience and the art of finding the humour in what is the worst crisis in the history of aviation.  Indeed, start there, with the word \u2018history\u2019.  As in \u2018the past\u2019, or perhaps \u2018his story\u2019, another gender-specific word play She was playing with.  Because, let\u2019s face it, and as Christine Largarde noted<\/a> a few months ago, female-led countries do seem to be doing the entire Covid thing much better.  Instead, we go back to the past, back in history, in the bizarre hope that will fix the industry.    Do you really think Alitalia would exist in a well-regulated female-run aviation industry?  A very strict \u2018stop your nonsense\u2019 is all we would expect from Jacinta Ardern. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thus, on Monday<\/strong>, there it was, getting still more approval<\/a> for still more aid\u2013 another \u20ac200 million, now that you ask \u2013 to be the first cab of the metaphor rank.  Is there an image of European aviation more metaphoric, more soul destroying than going back to, oh, about 1970, and granting Alitalia more tax payer funds?  This, in one of a huge, seemingly unending number of approvals says all that is wrong.  We are not using the pandemic to reform, to change, to build back better, we are using it to just build backwards.  Backwards in time, backwards in solutions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Which led, inevitably, to Tuesday<\/strong>, when we saw what might be the ultimate metaphor for Europe now.  IATA pleading<\/a> with Europe\u2019s member states to comply with the Commission\u2019s proposals for coordinated border opening.  We (or perhaps it is still She) is playing with a number of words here: Union; Europe; coordination…    A non-European entity of managers begging the European Union to work in a unionised way.  The metaphors write themselves.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

One airline making some hay in this confusion is Wizz Air, the first airline to have an AOC issued by EASA, which is rapidly growing  by reducing its flying by about 25% in a market where the others are reducing their flying by about 50% (everything is relative).  Its CEO, Jozsef Varadi, was Eurocontrol\u2019s first guest on a new series of interviews (yes, Aviation Advocacy is involved too) to be conducted live every second week until the end of the year.  The first one is here<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Varadi was particularly damning of the slot waiver that the airlines, the airports and the coordinators have now signed up to, noting that it stopped him from offering competitive services on a number of routes and at a number of airports.  So Wednesday\u2019s<\/strong> announcement of the launch of its to be annual Strategic Foresight Report<\/a> \u2013 is there a word in that title that does not make the heart beat quicker? \u2013 makes aviation\u2019s developments interesting.  Twitter is awash with soppy farewell messages<\/a> to the B747 but an analysis of the airlines\u2019 future fleets makes two things clear \u2013 they will be smaller and they will be shorter-haul, or to the extent they are long-haul capable, fleets will be using smaller aircraft.  How useful will these preciously preserved slots be then?  How will they be used?  If it is any guide, United Airline\u2019s announcement<\/a> of new routes suggests that it intends going to new destinations \u2013 perhaps in search of a market \u2013 but it is a very in-yer-face message to the sixth freedom carriers.  All we can do is hope for more strategic foresight reviews across the industry.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thursday<\/strong> saw IATA back in the news, announcing that intends increasing the visibility of air cargo infrastructure \u2013 no, not by demanding that it all be painted bright red \u2013 but by launching a platform.  You might think that a cargo platform is a hard stand, or perhaps a cargo shed, but that would be wrong.  Most airlines are in the cargo business only because aircraft are cylindrical.  But if there is revenue to be had \u2013 and at the moment it is a growth area \u2013 they will try to fill the belly with cargo.  This platform, to be called IATA ONE Source<\/a> is to be for cargo what the New Distribution Capability is supposed to be for passengers \u2013 an industry-run booking platform that offers to solve the entire process, start-to-finish.  Except, the specialist cargo carriers amongst IATA\u2019s members are not called \u2018Integrators\u2019 for nothing.  They offer a door-to-door service now.  So what is this?  What it seems to be is a declaration of hostilities between IATA\u2019s members.  Is that metaphorical, or allegorical? <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Friday<\/strong> is traditionally when we draw breath and try to take stock.  But instead, we have Brexit to fall back on.  The aviation industry had thought that Brexit was done and dusted \u2013 there would be an EU-UK Open Skies agreement in the context of an over-arching framework free trade agreement etc etc…  Oh wait \u2013 the British are involved.  Not for nothing did the phrase \u2018Perfidious Albion\u2019 gain traction \u2013 and not recently either.  Wikipedia claims the first uses date from the 13th century!  So, suddenly, if there is no trade deal, we fall back to the status quo ante<\/em> which in this case is, largely, open capacity third and fourth agreements with most, but by no means all, European member states and the UK.  Back to the 1970s we go.  Who says metaphor is dead?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Its Metaphor Week You do not have to be all that mischievous to think that if there is a god, She has a sense of humour.  This week\u2019s proof?  This week was Metaphor Week!  Who knew?  Metaphor after metaphor tumbled across the week, teaching us patience and the art of finding the humour in what […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29,13,15,11,40,21,43,32,44,1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1042","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-air-services-agreements","category-air-traffic-management","category-airlines","category-airports","category-covid-19","category-disaster-relief","category-easa","category-international-civil-aviation-organization","category-regulatory","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.aviationadvocacy.aero\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1042","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.aviationadvocacy.aero\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.aviationadvocacy.aero\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.aviationadvocacy.aero\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.aviationadvocacy.aero\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1042"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.aviationadvocacy.aero\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1042\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1043,"href":"https:\/\/www.aviationadvocacy.aero\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1042\/revisions\/1043"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.aviationadvocacy.aero\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1042"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.aviationadvocacy.aero\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1042"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.aviationadvocacy.aero\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1042"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}