NEWS: THIS WEEK IN TRAVEL

The transatlantic business-class only airline, Eos, filed for bankruptcy on Saturday, with flight suspended from Sunday.

The airline, which began flying daily services between Stansted & NY JFK in Boeing 757 aircraft configured for just 48 passengers in Nov 2005, had been trying to raise new capital to keep going but negotiations failed, forcing the closure.

Eos lasted just four months longer than its competitor, Maxjet, which launched at the same time but folded last December.

The Spanish low-cost airline, clickair is launching new flights from London Gatwick to Vigo - the first ever direct flights from the UK to Spain's Pontevedra province in South Galicia.

The 3 x weekly (Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday) service will commence on 21 June with seats already on sale starting from €35 one way (£30.00) including all taxes.

Vigo, the largest city in Galicia with a population of 300,000, is attracting an increasing number of business travellers and tourists, says the airline. The area's traditional shipbuilding and fisheries activity coexists with a rich history and culture that predates the Roman conquest. A major natural harbor, Vigo is also a traditional port-of-call for British commercial vessels and sailing yachts after crossing the Bay of Biscay en route to the coasts of North Africa, Gibraltar or the Canary Islands. Unlike other Galician towns, Vigo enjoys high summer temperatures and milder winters owing to the influence of the warm-water Gulf Stream current. The region also boasts beautiful beaches and a very cosmopolitan outlook.

Vigo is clickair’s sixth Spanish route from the UK, and the third from Gatwick, complementing Seville and Bilbao. The airline also flies from Heathrow to Valencia and La Corunna, also in the Galicia region and from Edinburgh to Barcelona.

The U.S. government is ordering airlines and cruise companies to prepare to collect digital fingerprints of all foreigners before they depart the USA, closing a security loophole where visitors outstay the duration of their visa. U.S. officials already collect fingerprints from travellers when they come into the USA.

The airline industry has been fighting the proposal on the grounds that airlines would bear the cost of the security initiative and it is the government's job to collect fingerprints from 33m departing passengers a year, not the airlines.

Although the U.S. should be an attractive destination right now for Europeans and other foreign nationals due to the low value of the dollar, U.S tourism officials are concerned that visitor numbers have been dropping away as national security measures become tighter. The U.S. Department of Commerce reports here were 2 million fewer overseas travellers to the United States in 2007 than in 2000, and any growth since then is tailing off. Since 9/11, foreign visitor numbers have been slowly increasing, but the rate has dropped away. If the rate of increase had remained constant there would have been 10 million more visitors in 2007 than there actually were.

British Airways is boosting services from London to New York JFK by starting daily flights from Gatwick on Monday October 27, 2008.

The new flights mean that the airline will fly 62 times each week from the capital to JFK as the Gatwick flights will operate in addition to 55 weekly flights from Heathrow. The new flights from Gatwick will operate on a four class Boeing 777, with First, Club World, World Traveller Plus and World Traveller cabins.

British Airways will also start new shorthaul routes from Gatwick this October with daily services to Oporto and Valencia.

Second daily services from Gatwick to Alicante and Turin will also be added from the end of October.

Flights to Warsaw will move from Gatwick to Heathrow in October.

The airline is suspending its daily flight from Manchester to New York JFK in October and moving the Boeing 767 aircraft that operates the service to Heathrow.

Delta Air Lines and Northwest Airlines have announced a plan to merge. If the plan goes ahead, the new giant airline will be called 'Delta', consigning the Northwest name to history.

US airlines have been struggling in recent years to keep rising costs under control. Labour and fuel costs in particular have been factors driving the industry towards consolidation. In their merger statement the airlines say their merger "is the most effective way to offset higher fuel prices and improve efficiencies, increase international presence and fund long-term investment in the business."

The proposed merger is subject to the agreement of shareholders.

Longhaul low-cost airline, Oasis Hong Kong Airlines, has called in the liquidators.

The Hong-Kong based airline with a fleet of five jumbo jets flew a daily service from London to Hong Kong with prices as low as £69. The airline had been successfully operating routes to Europe and North America but was hit particularly hard by the rise in fuel costs in the last 12 months.

Oasis was launched in Oct 2006.

P&O Cruises' latest ship, Ventura, has arrived in her home port, Southampton for her naming ceremony on 16th April and maiden voyage on 18 April.

Ventura, the latest of the old 115,000-ton 'Grand Princess' class, was officially 'handed over' by the Fincantieri shipyard in Italy, last week. She will carry up to 3,600 passengers and is designed for the British market (which usually means less casino space, more nooks & crannies for bars & cafes). Ventura will begin her career cruising the Mediterranean.

British Airways' shiny new terminal at Heathrow is now on its fifth day of shambolic luggage handling and flight cancellations. The airline has cancelled over 50 flights today while over 15,000 bags remain parted from their owners, languishing somewhere in the 'state-of-the-art' baggage handling systems that have failed to work properly since Terminal 5 was opened on Thursday.

Yesterday, BA Chief Executive Willie Walsh apoligised again to customers, saying:

"Since Thursday, when Terminal 5 opened, we have made clear that the service we have provided has not been good enough. We apologise sincerely to our customers.

"The baggage system is now generally working better. From time to time problems have developed that were not encountered during the extensive trials. These issues are being addressed as they arise by a team of engineers and IT specialists from BAA and BA.

"A backlog of undelivered bags has built up. This backlog is not affecting the day-to-day operation of the baggage system, and we are making every effort to reunite delayed bags with their owners.

"We have more than 400 volunteers from across the airline supporting this effort."

Despite the catalogue of problems at the £4.3bn terminal, which have forced the cancellation of 250+ flights since Thursday, he says there is light at the end of the tunnel:

"Both British Airways and BAA have invested an enormous amount of time and effort to create Terminal 5. We remain confident that these early difficulties can be overcome, and that the terminal will be highly valued by customers and our staff in the near future and for many years to come."