Dear Colleagues,
The recent power outage at London Heathrow imposed enormous costs on airlines in terms of passenger care and assistance, estimated at GBP60-100 million. This incident immediately reminded me of the 2024 outage impacting Lima Airport in Peru, which was caused by a circuit in the electrical system, resulting in the closure of the airport and flights being diverted to other airports in Peru and in neighboring countries such as Chile, Colombia and Ecuador. These type of incidents highlight a systematic flaw as current consumer protection regulations leave airlines on the hook for situations completely outside of their control and do not provide any incentives for other actors in the value chain to put in place measures to ensure resilience.
IATA has stepped up its calls for shared responsibility. Consumer protection regimes such as EU261 and Canada’s APPRs do not work because they simply punish airlines without doing anything to improve network performance. Authorities across the Americas should not attempt to copy the failed European and Canadian approaches, a topic we will further discuss at the upcoming Wings of Change Americas Conference in Bogota on June 25 and 26.
In addition, airports and other airline partners, whether ground handling or software providers, must have sound and tested contingency plans in place. To address the quality of ground operations, IATA integrated IATA Safety Audits for Ground Operations (ISAGO) registered and accredited service providers into the complimentary IATA ONE Source platform, highlighting companies who have achieved certification of excellence and compliance capabilities, such as CEIV Pharma, Fresh, IEnvA, and others.
On the sustainability front, IATA announced the creation of the Civil Aviation Decarbonization Organization (CADO) to independently manage the upcoming Sustainable Aviation Fuel (SAF) Registry, ensuring transparency and trust among stakeholders. Participation will be free until April 2027, after which it will be operated on a cost recovery basis.
From an economic perspective, IATA’s latest passenger data shows a 2.6% increase in global demand compared to February 2024. North American carriers saw a 1.5% decline in demand, with capacity down 3.2% and a load factor of 78.9%. Latin American airlines experienced a 6.7% increase in demand, with capacity up 9.9% and a load factor of 81.7%.
In regional news, the Confederation of Unions in Argentina has announced a General Strike for April 10, with over 40 unions participating, including key aviation unions. This will impact services at all airports in Argentina and IATA is working with ANAC and airlines to prepare accordingly.
As usual, please find below the latest IATA activities across the Americas. Please let me know if you have any questions or ideas for follow up. Thank you for your support.
Peter Cerdá
IATA’s Regional Vice President, The Americas
Americas Focus: Archive
2025: 01-2025 (pdf) 02-2025 (pdf) 03-2025 (pdf)
2024: 01-2024 (pdf) 02-2024 (pdf) 03-2024 (pdf) 04-2024 (pdf) 05-2024 (pdf) 06-2024 (pdf) 07-2024 (pdf) 08-2024 (pdf) 09-2024 (pdf)
2023: 01-2023 (pdf) 02-2023 (pdf) 03-2023 (pdf) 04-2023 (pdf) 05-2023 (pdf) 06-2023 (pdf) 07-2023 (pdf) 08-2023 (pdf)
2022: 01-2022 (pdf) 02-2022 (pdf) 03-22 (pdf) 04-22 (pdf) 05-22 (pdf) 06-22 (pdf)
2021: 01-2021 (pdf) 02-2021 (pdf) 03-2021 (pdf) 04-2021 (pdf) 05-2021 (pdf) 06-2021 (pdf) 07-2021 (pdf)
2020: 01-2020 (pdf) 02-2020 (pdf) 03-2020 (pdf)
2019: Jan 2019 (pdf) Feb 2019 (pdf) May 2019 (pdf) #04 Version (pdf) #05 Version (pdf) #06 Version (pdf)
2018: Jan 2018 (pdf) Feb 2018 (pdf) Mar 2018 (pdf) Apr 2018 (pdf) May 2018 (pdf) Jun 2018 (pdf)
Jul 2018 (pdf) Aug-Sep 2018 (pdf) Oct-Nov 2018 (pdf) Summary 2018 (pdf)
2017: Q4 2017 (pdf) Q3 2017 (pdf) Q2 2017 (pdf) Q1 2017 (pdf)