At least one international group is expressing concern over the proposed increase in U.S. air passenger fees. The World Travel & Tourism Council has condemned the proposed US$25 billion "raid" on airline passengers as "confused and counter-productive" and called on the U.S. to rethink taxing an industry that is one of the drivers ofU.S. economic recovery.

The proposal is to raise $25 billion over 10 years through changes to the Aviation Passenger Security (APS) fee. APS is currently levied at between $2.50 and $5. Under the proposals, the current range will be replaced with a minimum $5 fee, with annual incremental increases of 50 cents from 2013 to 2017, to $7.50 in 2017. Of the $25 billion, at least $15 billion will be used for general taxation purposes, rather than passenger security.

Says David Scowsill of the WTTC:

"We fully support the U.S. Administration's efforts to reduce its debt burden, but do not believe it is good economics to raid $25 billion from an industry that is a driver of growth and recovery at a time when President Barack Obama is keen to create millions of jobs through the $450 billion American Jobs Act.

"Travel and tourism currently contribute more than $1.3 trillion or 9 percent of total U.S. GDP, generates 9 percent of its total exports and supports 15 million jobs. Taxes on travel and tourism tend to do more harm than good economically, as higher charges discourage high-spending visitors. Indeed, the U.S. administration recognizes that each and every visitor contributes $4,000 to the economy.

"The WTTC believes that this plan has a laudable objective but it is confused and likely to be counter-productive. We urge the Obama Administration to send this plan back to the drawing board with instructions to promote an industry which will drive economic recovery and job creation—not damage it."

Says Roger Dow of the U.S. Travel Association:

"Any increase in travel fees should be directly reinvested in improvements to our nation's travel system and infrastructure. We strongly oppose the Obama administration's proposal to take money that should be used to improve the travel process and instead divert it for non-travel purposes."

Brussels Airport welcomed 8.6 million passengers during the first six months of 2011, a 12.1 percent growth year on year compared to 7.7 million in the first half of 2010. Minus the ash cloud that grounded millions of passengers worldwide for days at the end of the spring holiday in 2010, the growth figure would stand around 8 percent, which still stands above the European average. 

Transit traffic at Brussels Airport has received a sizeable boost in the past few months, but inter-European business traffic, low-cost traffic and long-haul fights are rising sharply, too. The driving force behind this growth is largely the development of Brussels Airlines and the hub activity of its partner airlines within Star Alliance, the worldwide alliance of airlines of which it is part. 

For instance, Thai Airways International has now announced that as of Nov. 17 it will fly Brussels-to-Bangkok direct three times a week. The political climate in some Arab and African countries affected a number of routes flown direct out of Brussels Airport, but weighed to a limited extent on the overall result of the airport as many holiday passengers simply opted for a different destination. While the impact of the problems in Japan had serious consequences for traffic from, to and within Asia, the effect of this for Brussels was limited.  

It may get easier to go through security in U.S. airports this fall. According to the U.S. Travel Association, the TSA will launch a trial trusted traveler program for some passengers. 

Once a voluntary background check is passed, customers would be able to go through security with their shoes on and their laptops safely tucked in bags. It's like a dream come true.  

“We are extremely pleased to hear Administrator Pistole plans to implement a trial trusted traveler program as early as this fall,” said Roger Dow, president and CEO of the U.S. Travel Association. “U.S. travelers will greatly appreciate TSA’s responsiveness on this issue.”

I like Dow's optimism; however, how security theater plays out these days, I'm taking a wait-and-see approach before patting the TSA's back.

The International Air Transport Association (IATA) further downgraded its 2011 airline industry profit forecast to US$4 billion. This would be a 54 percent fall compared with the $8.6 billion profit forecast in March and a 78 percent drop compared with the $18 billion net profit (revised from $16 billion) recorded in 2010. On expected revenues of $598 billion, a $4 billion profit equates to a 0.7 percent margin.

“Natural disasters in Japan, unrest in the Middle East and North Africa, plus the sharp rise in oil prices have slashed industry profit expectations to $4 billion this year," said Giovanni Bisignani, IATA’s director general and CEO. "That we are making any money at all in a year with this combination of unprecedented shocks is a result of a very fragile balance. The efficiency gains of the last decade and the strengthening global economic environment are balancing the high price of fuel. But with a dismal 0.7 percent margin, there is little buffer left against further shocks.” 

The cost of fuel is the main cause of reduced profitability. The average oil price for 2011 is now expected to be $110 per barrel, a 15 percent increase over the previous forecast of $96 per barrel. For each dollar increase in the average annual oil price, airlines face an additional $1.6 billion in costs. With estimates that 50 percent of the industry’s fuel requirement is hedged at 2010 price levels, the industry 2011 fuel bill will rise by $10 billion to $176 billion. Fuel is now estimated to comprise 30 percent of airline costs—more than double the 13 percent of 2001.

“We have built enormous efficiencies over the last decade," Bisignani said. "In 2001, we needed oil below $25 per barrel to be profitable. Today, we are looking at a small profit with oil at $110 per barrel."

Robust economic conditions have given airlines some scope to partially recover higher fuel prices. This is reflected in an increased yield growth forecast of 3 percent for passenger traffic (double the previously forecast 1.5 percent) and 4 percent for cargo (up from the previously forecast 1.9 percent). The problem is that higher travel costs are now weakening price-sensitive demand, and airlines are not expected to be able to offset higher costs with increased revenues.

The key risk to this outlook is a weakening of global economic growth. High energy prices will certainly have a slowing impact on this growth. However, the impact will be mitigated by two factors. First, while high oil prices previously triggered recessions, today’s economies (which generate a unit of GDP using just half the energy required in the mid-1970s) are less sensitive. Second, the corporate sector is cash-rich, business confidence is high and world trade continues to expand at around 9 percent annually. The International Monetary Fund and others have raised global growth projections, which would indicate a recovery in demand growth to the historical 5.6 percent level for the second half of 2011. IATA’s forecast for continued, albeit lower, airline profits despite $110 a barrel oil prices, is dependent on a strong economy to generate sufficient revenues to partially offset higher fuel costs.

According to Brett Snyder, CNN.com's travel columnist, airline legroom is an elusive thing, as most of you tall folks may well know.  Even short people like me have legroom issues when flying, so I can't imagine how uncomfortable it is for tall people. 

There isn't really a good way to know which seats are the best for legroom, as most airlines don't publish that information. They only list "seat pitch" dimensions, which is the "distance between one point on a seat and that same point on the seat behind. If you start measuring at the front of the seat bottom cushion, then you would stop at the front of the cushion in the seat behind (or in front, for that matter)."  Confused?  Even with this knowledge, there are no actual legroom measurements, so it's hard to know.  

Some airlines in general have more legroom than others (JetBlue, Southwest, some Delta planes). Some airlines are also starting to charge for extra legroom. So good luck trying to find the best legroom-friendly airline for your next trip. He recommends checking the seat maps (which may or may not be helpful) or checking with the gate agent. 

Here's what Air France had to say following the recovery of the black box from flight AF447, which crashed into the Atlantic Ocean on June 1, 2009, killing 219 passengers and 12 aircrew. 

"On the eve of second anniversary of the AF447 tragedy, Air France and its staff are turning their thoughts to the families of the passengers and crew and wish to express their full solidarity. The perserverance of the authorities, Airbus and Air France has led to the flight recorders and parts of the aircraft being found after a two-year search. The French Accident Investigation Bureau (BEA) is now able to reveal the sequence of events leading to the crash of flight AF447 from Rio to Paris on 1 June 2009. 

"This description of the facts therefore replaces the assumptions that have been made over the past two years.It appears that he flight deck crew was monitoring the changing weather conditions and thus altered the flight path, that the initial problem was the failure of the speed probes which led to the disconnection of the autopilot and the loss of the associated piloting protection systems and that the aircraft stalled at high altitude. 

"It also appears that the flight captain quickly interrupted his rest period to regain the cockpit. The crew, made up of three skilled pilots, demonstrated a totally professional attitude and were committed to carrying out their task to the very end and Air France wishes to pay tribute to them. 

"All the data collected must now be analyzed. It will only be at the end of this complex task, which requires patience and precision, that the BEA will be able to establish the causes that led to the disaster. We can already see that the authorities, the manufacturer and the airline have taken measures to avoid the repetition of such an accident. Air France hopes that everyone has the patience to wait for the interim report that the BEA will publish in a few weeks, no doubt along with additional recommendations. The safety of the global air transport industry will be even stronger."

Google has now added flight information to its search results. 

"If you have a particular destination in mind, you can now quickly find out which airlines serve that specific route and when they fly," wrote Petter Wedum on Inside Search. "For example, if you search for flights from San Francisco to Minneapolis, you’ll see a selection of non-stop flights and the airlines that offer them. To see a full timetable, click on 'Schedule of non-stop flights.'"

Wedum says that searchers can also see all the destinations with non-stop flights from a particular airport. 

"If you’re in Buffalo, New York, and need ideas for a weekend getaway, search for 'flights from Buffalo' to see popular travel destinations from Buffalo," he wrote. "By clicking 'Show all non-stop routes,' you can get the full list of destinations, and from there, you can click to get more flight details."

The feature currently only works for non-stop flights. I'm sure, though, that Google will waste no time to include connecting flight information in the future. 

Less means more to savvy travelers when they compare the generosity of frequent flier programs. Low-fare airline customers will be pleased by the ezRez Reward Seat Availability Survey. GOL, Southwest Airlines, Air Berlin and Virgin Australia filled the top four slots in reward survey results for 2011. 

GOL, which calls itself the largest low-cost and low-fare carrier in Latin America, topped the rankings with an unmatched level of reward bliss—an astounding 100 percent of survey queries yielded two or more reward seats. And US-based Southwest Airlines matched its 2010 standing with a survey result of 99.3 percent reward seat availability. The average among the six low fare airlines in the survey was 85.6 percent—significantly above the 62.9 percent calculated for the other 18 carriers in the survey group.

While traditional airlines are more stingy with rewards, they do offer other benefits such as entry to airport lounges, upgrades to premium cabins and access to worldwide flight networks. But survey results also show adding more global partners doesn’t equal more reward opportunities. It’s true, travelers living in major hubs such as Atlanta, London and Hong Kong might have little choice beyond joining the hometown program. But many other consumers can weigh reward, accrual, and upgrade features and choose a program on a range of merits. 

The ezRez Reward Seat Availability Survey is based on 6,720 booking queries made by IdeaWorks at the websites of 24 frequent flier programs during March and early April. 

"Total Availability” represents the frequency of queries that produced one or more available flights for a roundtrip pair of travel dates. A minimum of two seats was required for each outbound and inbound reward reservation query. The 100 percent result for GOL reflects the fact that each of the 280 outbound and return date queries provided a minimum of one flight in each direction with at least two available reward seats.  

“Consumers continue to feel the pinch of a difficult economy. They expect tangible rewards for their loyalty to an airline,” said John Swanciger, chief commercial officer for ezRez Software. “Rewards of all types, such as air travel, hotel accommodations and retail merchandise, are the tools airlines use to fill that expectation. Social media has made the frequent flier world less of a mystery and savvy travelers have a better awareness of which airlines truly reward loyalty and frequency of travel.”  

The results for 2011 deliver good and bad news for program members. Four airlines experienced significantly improved results from 2010 levels for reward seat availability (10+ points): Singapore Airlines, Turkish Airlines, Delta Air Lines and US Airways. Four airlines saw a drop of more than 10 points from 2010: Air Canada, Alaska Airlines, SAS Scandinavian and AirTran Airways.  

While AirTran fans may mourn the loss of the airline after the Southwest merger, they will truly appreciate Southwest’s generous approach to reward availability. The size of the 2011 survey increased to 24 airlines with the addition of GOL, JetBlue and LAN. Jet Airways was dropped because its traffic no longer places it in the top group. 

Five hundred flights were expected to be canceled today due to clouds of volcanic ash drifting deeper into Europe, according to the Wall Street Journal.

They report that weather forecasters from the Volcanic Ash Advisory Center in London said some ash clouds may reach parts of northern Europe in the next 48 hours (with Iceland and Scotland already are affected).

Ireland-based Ryanair called on air-traffic controllers to reopen airspace over Scotland after it operated a one-hour verification flight up to 41,000 feet in Scottish airspace.

"The absence of any volcanic ash in the atmosphere supports Ryanair's stated view that there is no safety threat to aircraft in this mythical 'red zone,' which is another misguided invention by the U.K. Met Office and the [Civil Aviation Authority]," the company said in a statement. (The Met Office is a Volcanic Ash Advisory Center.)

A spokesman for the Civil Aviation Authority, however, rejected Ryanair's remarks, saying their flight route had been retraced on radar, which indicated that it didn't enter zones with higher concentrations of ash.

In keeping with its ongoing drive towards more environmentally-friendly operations, Singapore Airlines announces the launch of e-Magazines, an electronic version of international magazines, on its KrisWorld inflight entertainment system. In addition to the existing collection of printed publications, the new selection of 20 major magazine titles will offer customers wider access to quality reading materials without additional paper copies being carried on board.

Singapore Airlines will be the first airline to provide this unique feature across its Airbus A380 and Boeing 777-300ER fleets which are equipped with the latest Panasonic eX2 inflight entertainment system.

SilverKris, SIA’s travel magazine; KrisShop, the Airline’s inflight sales catalogue; and KrisWorld, SIA’s inflight entertainment guide; were the first publications to be featured as part of a trial in July 2010. Beginning this month, the selection will be expanded to include international magazine titles such as Bloomberg Businessweek, Wall Street Journal Magazine, Prestige and Elle.

Through a collaboration with SmarttPapers Aviation Pte Ltd, a privately held Singapore-based company, the new application uses a patented file compression technology to compress and transform magazines and newspaper contents into a digital format for integration into the inflight entertainment system.

Singapore Airlines aims to extend this initiative later in the year to other publications, including e-newspapers, e-books, as well as a wider selection of international and local magazines. In addition, this online feature will be progressively introduced on the Airline’s Airbus A330-300 and A340-500 fleets.