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17th August 2017
Federal Police in Australian were forced to remove two passengers from a Virgin Blue flight over the Easter break because bad weather en-route to Bali had created a need for extra fuel making the aircraft too heavy. The pilot asked for two volunteers to vacate the aircraft although when nobody did, staff were forced to remove the last two passengers to board.
Also over the holiday period some 18 Jetstar flights and 17 domestic and international Qantas flights were forced to leave without passengers’ baggage that had been checked at extra costs to passengers. The airline said that “almost all” baggage had been sent on later flights but was preparing for compensation claims over the Easter period rather than a rise in profit.
Meanwhile, International Lease Finance Corporation (ILFC) has upsized its secured term loan to $1.5 billion from an initial amount of $1.3 billion it received in commitments last month from a group of 15 banks from Europe, Asia and North America. KfW IPEX-Bank joined the group to raise the debt to $1.5 billion.
The facility, arranged by Citi and Credit Suisse as Joint Structuring and Placement Agents, along with BNP Paribas as an additional Joint Placement Agent, will be funded over the next 12 months and will mature in 2018. This transaction enables ILFC to improve its overall capital structure through diversification of funding sources.
The proceeds will be used primarily to prepay existing unsecured and secured bank facilities that would otherwise mature in October 2011 and 2012. Refinancing these existing facilities with the proceeds of the new term loan is expected to maintain the same approximate mix of secured and unsecured debt for the company.
Additionally, the economic terms of the transaction provide ILFC attractive funding at a current interest rate of approximately 3% along with significant flexibility for ILFC’s ongoing business of leasing aircraft.
ILFC has also confirmed its order for 100 A320neo aircraft yesterday – 60 of which will be powered by the Pratt & Whitney PurePower PW1100G engine.