Rome - Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi lashed out Saturday at unions representing Alitalia employees, saying their opposition to a government plan to save the troubled state-controlled airline is politically motivated.
Berlusconi was speaking a day after a group of private Italian investors, CAI, broke off talks with the unions who reject an estimated 7,000 job cuts as specified in the cost-slashing rescue plan.
Madrid - The Spanair MD-82 passenger plane that crashed in Madrid on August 20, killing 154 people, already had problems with wing slats that help provide takeoff lift, El Mundo reported Saturday.
The Spanish newspaper said the technical logbook showed that two days before the crash, defects had been detected twice within a few hours in the mechanism operating slats in the wings' leading edges.
Already 11 days before the crash a defect had been registered. In all three cases, pilots had reported that the slats had not deployed properly.
Rome - An Italian government-approved plan to save Alitalia was in disarray Friday with the collapse of talks between unions representing employees and a group of Italian investors seeking to take over the troubled state-controlled airline.
Following a week of unsuccessful talks with the unions, the grouping of investors, CAI, said in a statement Friday that "conditions to continue negotiations do not exist."
CAI blamed the unions for not "not recognizing the dramatic nature of Alitalia's situation and of the need for the profound break with the past that the rescue plan calls for."
Kochi (Kerala), Sept 11 : Jet Airways will celebrate Onam, the popular harvest festival of Kerala on flights, by serving specially prepared Onam Sadya for all its domestic and international passengers travelling on flights out of Kochi and Kozhikode on September 12.
Passengers will be treated to delectable Onam meals such as Kalan (raw banana cubes cooked with curd, coconut paste tempered with curry leaves and south Indian spices), Erussery (raw banana and yam cooked with coconut corrainder paste and pulses), and Ela Ada (rice flour cake spread on banana leaf steamed with banana, jaggery and grated coconut stuffing).
Frankfurt - Lufthansa disclosed Thursday plans to upgrade its services operating out of Italy, but denied that the move was prompted by the maladies of its Italian rival Alitalia.
The German airline is to use six Airbus jets instead of the smaller Embraer planes it originally ordered for the new flights set to begin in February 2009.
A Lufthansa subsidiary, Air Dolomiti, will carry passengers direct from Milan's Malpensa Airport to Barcelona, Brussels, Madrid, Paris and other cities, said the group in Frankfurt.
To date, Air Dolomiti has mainly operated feeder flights to Lufthansa's Frankfurt and Munich hubs.
Dublin/London - A Ryanair aircraft was Thursday forced to make an emergency landing minutes after take-off from Dublin airport in Ireland, the budget airline said.
A spokesman said the back of the plane struck the runway as it took off and the pilot returned to the airport as a precaution. He described the occurrence as a "tail-strike" which was "quite common."
"As a precautionary measure the aircraft returned with oxygen masks deployed and landed safely in Dublin," he said.
All 148 passengers disembarked normally and the flight later took off for London-Stansted airport. No-one was injured.
Rome - Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi lashed out Saturday at unions representing Alitalia employees, saying their opposition to a government plan to save the troubled state-controlled airline is politically motivated.
Madrid - The Spanair MD-82 passenger plane that crashed in Madrid on August 20, killing 154 people, already had problems with wing slats that help provide takeoff lift, El Mundo reported Saturday.
Rome - An Italian government-approved plan to save Alitalia was in disarray Friday with the collapse of talks between unions representing employees and a group of Italian investors seeking to take over the troubled state-controlled airline.
