Coronavirus COVID-19 is continuing to impact on all industries, including business aviation. The biggest story today is that China has reported no new domestic cases for the first time since the virus was identified. There does appear to be a spike in business jet travel as passengers rush to get back before borders close, but once borders shut, aircraft are being grounded.
The Dollar strengthened last night, which may encourage foreign owners to sell aircraft. However, very few transactions are going through this week. “I closed two deals on Monday,” says one Asian lawyer. “But everything else transactional is dead.”
Please send any news or comments to Mike@corporatejetinvestor.com
MAIN STORIES SO FAR:
- Business aviation ‘applies lessons of 2008 crash’
- More country closures
- FAA closes Oklahoma filing window slowing transactions
- Hong Kong Business Aviation Centre has record day for movements on March 18
- WINGX data says there has been a big spike in flights from Europe to China and Hong Kong
VIDEO – HOW UNIVERSAL WEATHER AND AVIATION PRIORITISES AND DISSEMINATES INFORMATION ON COVID-19
Universal Weather and Aviation posted a video on YouTube detailing how it processes the ever-growing stream of information about the Covid-19 pandemic.
It says that it has received over 1,000 messages since it began monitoring the outbreak in December 2019, and discusses how it verifies information before publishing it.
FLIGHTWORX FLIGHT SUPPORT TO CONTINUE DESPITE PANDEMIC
As the pandemic continues the supply of Jet-A could be negatively impacted. Despite the challenges presented by Covid019, flight support solution and fuel supplying firm, Flightworx, are continuing to provide support to clients.
Flightworx said: “With the ongoing global concerns and uncertain times, we understand your operation needs to keep moving with minimal delay.
Flightworx has activated its contingency plan which means we are best suited to keep your operation running and our teams will always be available 24/7.
If you are forced to operate a self isolation campaign and your logistics of operating be that human or software are affected then Flightworx would like to offer you free use of our services for a period of time until you are back on your feet.”
GLOBE AIR SAYS THAT AS EUROPEAN AIRSPACE REMINS OPEN, IT WILL REMAIN OPERATIONAL
Bernhard Fragner, CEO of Austria-based operator GlobeAir said that as European governments show no signs of closing down airspace, GlobeAir will remain operational, although he does concede that some restrictions mean that his team will have to adjust the way they operate.
GAMA AVIATION’S BOURNEMOUTH FACILITY OFFERING COST-EFFECTIVE PARKING AND HANGAR SOLUTIONS
Gama Aviation says that its Bournemouth facility has cost-effective availability for operators looking to park or hangar their aircraft.
“Gama Aviation’s Bournemouth facility is reaching out to support operators requiring parking, hangar and basic aircraft care services whilst they have aircraft on the ground. Scott McVicar, Managing Director, Europe Ground commented: “We have availability and are keen to help those that are looking for more cost effective parking and hangar solutions. In addition, and for certain types, we can offer engine runs and other care packages to keep the aircraft ticking over. This crisis won’t be over tomorrow and we all need to help each other keep our aircraft, people and businesses intact such that they are immediately available when flight restriction are lifted.”
For more information contact Mark Durcan on +44 1202 013782 or https://www.gamaaviation.com/locations/bournemouth/
SIKORSKY SEES ‘NO SPECIFIC IMPACT’ FROM CORONAVIRUS PANDEMIC
Sikorsky’s operations and supply chain are currently unaffected by the coronavirus pandemic, a spokesperson for parent company Lockheed Martin told Helicopter Investor.
As the number of confirmed coronavirus cases in the US reaches 6,413, the Connecticut-based manufacturer is monitoring the development of the pandemic closely. But the company has yet to see a significant effect on its daily operations and supply chain movements.
John Neilson, director of international communications, Lockheed Martin told Helicopter Investor: “There are no specific impacts to our operations or supply chain at this time. We will continue to monitor and coordinate with customers should issues arise.
“We are mitigating any potential impacts to customers and implementing business continuity plans as required, including secure telework for our customer support teams.”
You can read the full story on Corporate Jet Investor’s sister site Helicopter Investor.
BELL HELICOPTER SEES NO DISRUPTION AMID COVID-19 CRISIS
Helicopter OEM Bell’s manufacturing and day-to-day operations have avoided disruption by the coronavirus, a company spokesperson told Corporate Jet Investor.
The development of the Coronavirus pandemic, also known as Covid-19, has so far not impacted the Texas-based OEM’s day-to-day business. But the company is monitoring the situation and affirms the health and safety of its employees is of upmost priority.
“Bell’s top priority is the health and safety of our employees. We’re staying vigilant and closely monitoring the situation and its impact worldwide. Our facilities are operating on their regular schedules, without any disruption to our manufacturing and operations.
“The health and safety of our employees is of utmost priority to our company. Bell has established preventive measure in accordance with CDC [Centres for Disease Control and Prevention] and WHO [World Health Organization] guidelines for employers and continues to provide all the necessary information to our workforce and customers.”
You can read the full story on Corporate Jet Investor’s sister site Helicopter Investor.
RICHARD ABOULAFIA: CRISIS BADLY DAMAGING EQUITY MARKETS
Richard Aboulafia, vice president of analysis, Teal Group Corporation, gave his thoughts on the impacts of the covid-19 pandemic on business aviation.
Aboulafia told Corporate Jet Investor, “Not good, I’m afraid. Whenever a pandemic or terrorism event comes along, there’s an anecdotal upsurge in people considering private aviation. While this makes sense, this has never proven to be sustainable beyond the short-term. Worse, this crisis is very badly damaging equities markets, which are closely linked to business jet demand. Perhaps worst of all, this crisis is hammering fuel prices, which are closely linked to high end business jet demand. Resource-rich countries and energy extraction companies are crucial to large cabin jet demand.”
BUSINESS AVIATION ‘APPLIES THE LESSONS OF THE 2008 CRASH’
Business aviation is applying the lessons learnt in the global financial recession of 2008 and taking early action to try to mitigate the impact of the coronavirus pandemic, also known as Covid-19, according to Christopher Marich, co-founder and global strategy director of My Sky.
“Compared with the situation at the start of the recession in 2008, when people were inactive, we are seeing a much more proactive approach now,” Marich told Corporate Jet Investor. “We are noticing a big increase in contacts from people looking to us for information on how to manage their private aviation costs,” he said.
“This week we have seen less activity than the previous week [as private jet customers responded to the US President’s travel ban],” Marich told Corporate Jet Investor yesterday (Wednesday, March 18th). “Predictably, the aircraft most in demand, both from existing users and new charterers, were the large cabin aircraft with Transatlantic capability.”
Also, once missions are completed, private jet operators are grounding aircraft and asking staff to take leave in a bid to cut costs.
Headquartered in Switzerland, the financial services company offers IT tools, such as artificial intelligence, optical character recognition and machine learning to private aviation industry stakeholders. Clients, ranging from owners, operators and consultants, use the technology to automate time- and money- consuming tasks with the aid of cost bench-marking.
WINGX: EUROPEAN FLIGHTS DOWN 7%
WINGX says that business aviation flights in Europe are down 6.9% in the first 17 days of March, compared with the same period in March 2019.
Of the largest business aviation markets, France has seen the largest fall in departures (12% down) followed by Germany (down 4%). Flights from Spain, the UK and Sweden are up.
Large Jet activity is well down. With Super Light, Super Mid, Very Light and Entry Level flights are up.
“Business aviation is clearly impacted by the Coronavirus, with accelerating declines in the last few days belying the overall 7% drop month-to-date,” says Richard Koe, managing director of WINGX. “We expect flights to dry up next week once restrictions are stricter and the repatriation rush is done. That said, notwithstanding the enforcement of personal travel, we do expect a strong demand for business aviation to fill gaps left by the grounding of airline capacity. By comparison with business aviation, airline flights have declined much more heavily.”
“Airline flights have declined much more heavily”
Paris Le Bourget has seen the biggest drop in activity with flights down by 11%.
Flights within Germany and within Sweden are well up. With internal flights in France and Italy down.
Aircraft management companies have seen a big reduction in flight, with branded charter operators up compared with last March. Private flight departments are also busier.
DASSAULT CANCELS AVIATION PROFESSIONAL CONFERENCE
Dassault has cancelled its 2020 Aviation Professional Conference (APC). The event had been due to take place in June.
“During these times, the health and well-being of our extended Falcon Family is paramount,” said Dassault in a statement. “We’ve come to the inevitable and unfortunate conclusion that this year’s Aviation Professional Conference (APC) scheduled for June 3-4 has been cancelled. At this point, we do not anticipate that we will reschedule this event for 2020.”
MORE COUNTRIES CLOSING BORDERS
It is hard to keep track with the speed at which governments are closing borders today.
- Australia – no entry to non-nationals, 14 day quarantine for citizens
- Myanmar – no foreign nationals
- New Zealand – no entry to non-nationals, 14 day quarantine for citizens
- UAE – From noon, no foreign nationals
It is worth noting that flight crew are often exempt from these bans.
THE CIVIL AVIATION AUTHORITY OF THE CAYMAN ISLANDS ISSUES COVID-19 ADVISORY
The Civil Aviation Authority of the Cayman Islands (CAACI) issued an advisory, following the first case of Covid-19 being detected on the island.
“The Civil Aviation Authority of the Cayman Islands (CAACI) has been monitoring the progress of the Coronavirus/COVID 19 pandemic as it has affected many of the countries associated with the Cayman Islands Aircraft Registry. On Friday, 13th March, the Cayman Islands Government confirmed the first case of COVID 19 with a patient at one of its local healthcare institutions on Grand Cayman. We have been assured that measures were put in place to quarantine this patient to reduce the risk of exposure to others.
The CAACI had proactively put measures in place for restricted travel to higher risk countries in order to protect our staff and business partners. We are also following Cayman Islands Government directives on limiting all non‐essential travel; however, we are committed to providing regulatory oversight to our stakeholders. In this regard we are actively working to provide required audit support remotely and on a case‐by‐case review will arrange a physical visit when it is feasible to support your ongoing operations.
We will continue to monitor this situation daily and make adjustments as necessary to support our valuable clients.
We are also cognizant that many of our clients are working from altered arrangements, whether it be remotely away from traditional offices or on shifts and team; we encourage you to reach out to your primary CAACI representative to share alternative contact details. Likewise, the CAACI staff members will share any additional contacts that you may need. Individual staff emails will continue to be monitored as normal and can be your first line of establishing contact. Additionally you can use civil.aviation@caacayman.com, which will be routed to the appropriate staff member.
We would like to take this opportunity to wish you and your teams continued health as we progress
through these unprecedented challenges over the months to come.”
EXCLUSIVE: WINGX DATA SHOWS EUROPE TO ASIA FLIGHT SPIKE
Speaking exclusively to Corporate Jet Investor, WINGX managing director Richard Koe said that since March 13 there had been a big increase in business aviation activity between Europe and China (including Hong Kong). Koe attributes the rise to Europe closing its borders, and airlines reducing flights.
Koe said that Switzerland and the UK had seen the biggest increases in flights, especially departures from Geneva Airport and London Luton Airport.
WILLIS TOWERS WATSON LAUNCHES BUSINESS AVIATION COMMUNITY GROUP
Willis Towers Watson, the global advisory company, has launched a new business aviation community group called “A Class”, which it says will deliver data, knowledge and solutions to its business aviation clients.
In a release, John Rooley, CEO Global Aerospace at Willis Towers Watson said “As business aviation clients come to terms with the unprecedented risks associated with the Coronavirus pandemic, Willis Towers Watson Global Aerospace is dedicated to supporting them beyond the scope of the traditional insurance transaction. By combining data analytics with a greater understanding of the industry risk landscape and insurance market trends, A Class is a key solution to enable business aviation clients to mitigate risks and maintain their operations in today’s market. Today’s announcement continues to demonstrate our leadership in the aviation sector.”
HONG KONG BUSINESS AVIATION CENTRE HAD ITS BUSIEST DAY ON RECORD YESTERDAY
A spokesperson for the Hong Kong Business Aviation Centre (HKBAC) told Corporate Jet Investor that yesterday was its busiest day on record for business aircraft movements.
Overall, there has been a 50% increase in movements in March, versus movements in February. HKBAC says that is receiving three times the normal amount of enquiries that it would at this time of the year, but cautions that it is already operating at close to capacity.
FAA CLOSES OKLAHOMA WINDOW SLOWING TRANSACTIONS
Jack Gilchrist, founder of Gilchrist Aviation, has an update on the FAA filing window in Oklahoma City. The FAA is temporarily allowing some digital submissions but is no only collecting Temporary Certificates of Registration twice a day. This will slow down aircraft transactions slightly – although demand has also dropped significantly.
CJI: What are the changes?
Jack Gilchrist: Effective as of March 18 at 9:30 a.m. CDT, the FAA Registry has closed the “filing window” in the Public Documents Room. Rather than filing documents in real time through the filing window under the ordinary procedure, the FAA has placed drop boxes near the Public Documents Room to allow the continued submission of documents to the Registry.
Priority submissions, including imports, exports, and submissions needing a Temporary Certificate of Registration (“flywire”) will be collected by Registry staff hourly. Submissions which do not qualify for priority processing will be collected twice daily. If a closing consists only of digitally signed documents, and no document exceeds twenty pages, the FAA is temporarily allowing digital submission of those documents by Public Documents Room licensees, including Gilchrist Aviation Law.
CJI: What is the impact?
Jack Gilchrist: Due to the delay between delivering documents to the FAA for processing and the receipt of the documents by the FAA, we are not able to issue legal opinions immediately at or immediately following filing as we customarily do. To alleviate the uncertainty introduced by the Registry’s temporary procedures, we will provide a written confirmation of the time all documents were deposited with the FAA for processing. Once the deposited documents have been received by the FAA and we are able to verify the time of the FAA file stamp, we will then proceed to issue our filing legal opinion. We expect the delay between depositing documents and confirmation of their filing to range between several hours and one business day. We will know more as the FAA works out this new, temporary procedure.
CJI: What to expect?
Jack Gilchrist: As a result of the Registry collecting priority submissions hourly rather than immediately upon submission, together with additional delays introduced by the temporary procedure, we anticipate longer than usual wait times in receiving Temporary Certificates of Registration and export confirmation wires.
More information:
Jack Gilchrist (pictured): jgilchrist@gilchristaviation.com; 405-252-8811
Chad Gilson cgilson@gilchristaviation.com; 405-252-8880
FT: “CHINA AND HK WEALTHY FLEE CORONAVIRUS IN WEST BY PRIVATE JET”
The Financial Times reports record Hong Kong business aircraft traffic as Asian owners and charter customers fly home to avoid travel bans
The FT says Hong Kong airport is running out of space for jets
