SARS crisis sideswipes Asian airlines HONG KONG (AP) =97 While airlines around the world battled insolvency and=20 fretted over the war in Iraq, Asian-based carriers rode out the industry's= =20 latest downturn a bit more smoothly. Then along came SARS. Asia's aviation= =20 industry has been pitched into what some are calling its worst crisis ever,= =20 with thousands of flights canceled, passengers scared to fly and those who= =20 do fly facing delays in some airports as they undergo mandatory checks for= =20 fever or symptoms of severe acute respiratory syndrome. An executive at=20 Hong Kong's Cathay Pacific Airways recently warned that the carrier was=20 hemorrhaging $3 million a day and might have to ground its entire passenger= =20 fleet next month if traffic kept falling. Cathay quickly tried to back away= =20 from such a dire warning but admitted it may have to consider further cuts= =20 on top of the 42% of its fights already canceled for now. Analysts say it's impossible to know how badly the industry will be hit.=20 "The best scenario is two months of pretty severe pain, and the worst=20 scenario is, well, your guess is as good as mine," said Peter Harbison,=20 managing director of the Sydney-based Center for Asia-Pacific Aviation. "It= =20 depends on what happens with SARS." As the SARS crisis escalated last month the World Health Organization noted= =20 with alarm that the disease was spread by air travelers and then dealt Hong= =20 Kong a heavy blow as it advised people to stay away from the former British= =20 colony for now. Cathay and Dragonair have cut back operations so severely that the Airport= =20 Authority that runs Hong Kong's Chek Lap Kok airport warned that its core=20 business was threatened. Other regional carriers are slashing costs as they= =20 try to wait out the storm, while U.S.- and European-based carriers are=20 trying to minimize damage with quick cuts in flights to the worst affected= =20 regions. Continental Airlines, based in Houston, Texas, has scrapped its=20 five-times-a-week nonstop services between Hong Kong and Newark but says=20 they will take off again on June 4. "Hong Kong is a financial hub and New=20 York is a financial hub. The demand is huge," said spokeswoman Bessy Hui.=20 "Corporate clients are just postponing their trips. We see it as a=20 temporary suspension." The other U.S. carriers serving Hong Kong are=20 United, which is now in bankruptcy, and Northwest. They've also been=20 cutting back Eagan, Minnesota-based Northwest Airlines cut capacity by 12%= =20 on March 21 due to the war and canceled three flights =97 two roundtrips= from=20 Tokyo to Hong Kong and one Osaka-Honolulu roundtrip =97 due to the war and= SARS. United announced a 12% cut in its flight schedule for next month on top of= =20 an 8% cut for April, suspending a total of 105 U.S. and 24 international=20 flights as of May 5. Cuts on routes to Hong Kong, Tokyo, Taipei, Singapore= =20 and Sydney were due to the sharp drop-off caused by the spread of severe=20 acute respiratory syndrome, or SARS, it said. Despite the major troubles SARS is handing Cathay, analysts said the=20 carrier remains strong and it got a boost on Thursday when route licensing= =20 officials here said it could resume services into China after more than a=20 decade out of the lucrative and growing market. Dragonair, partly owned by= =20 Cathay, had fought hard against the proposal. A downturn like the one now=20 hitting the industry could cripple a weaker airline. But with stable=20 freight traffic and cash reserves of about 13.6 billion Hong Kong dollars=20 ($1.74 billion), Cathay "is very strong," says Richard Stirland, director=20 general of the Association of Asia Pacific Airlines, based in Kuala Lumpur.= =20 "It's got a minimal debt load compared to other airlines around the world,"= =20 Stirland said. Mainland Chinese carriers, in the midst of a=20 government-mandated restructuring, have been only partially sheltered from= =20 SARS by their limited reliance on international routes. Shanghai-based=20 China Eastern Airlines said Thursday it was cutting flights to Hong Kong=20 and Japan by 30%, and shifting aircraft onto domestic routes that company=20 secretary Luo Zhuping hopes can be sustained. China Eastern has seen an=20 "obvious drop" in traffic to Hong Kong and the United States and other=20 overseas destinations, Luo said. Elsewhere in Asia, Japan Airlines saw its= =20 "bread-and-butter" group tour business dry up virtually overnight as travel= =20 agencies canceled tours to China following the WHO and government warnings,= =20 said company spokesman Geoff Tudor. JAL has diminished hopes for the=20 "golden week" national holidays coming up in early May. "This year, it's=20 not going to be a 'golden week,' Tudor said. "On an Olympic scale, it's=20 more going to be a 'bronze week."' Singapore Airlines, which has its own=20 local SARS outbreak to contend with, last week cut 206 trainee jobs and=20 reduced flights for the third time in as many weeks. In Vietnam, which has= =20 also been hit by SARS deaths and restrictions on its travelers in some=20 countries, the director general of Vietnam Airlines, Nguyen Xuan Hien,=20 predicted a 25% drop in passengers this quarter. *************************************************** The owner of Roger's Trinbago Site/TnTisland.com Roj (Roger James) escape email mailto:ejames@xxxxxxxxx Trinbago site: www.tntisland.com Carib Brass Ctn site www.tntisland.com/caribbeanbrassconnection/ Steel Expressions www.mts.net/~ejames/se/ Site of the Week: http://www.pscutt.com TnT Webdirectory: http://search.co.tt *********************************************************