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IATA reported (29-Sep-2026) global air demand in CTKs increased 4.4% year-on-year in Aug-2026 and 5.3% for international operations. Capacity increased 0.1%. Details include:

• Asia Pacific airlines recorded 4.3% growth in air cargo demand in Aug-2026. Capacity increased 1.2%;
• North American carriers recorded 6.6% growth in air cargo demand, the "strongest performance of all regions". Capacity decreased 2.5%;
• European carriers recorded 4.1% increase in demand and capacity decreased 3.5%;
• Middle Eastern airlines recorded 1% increase in demand, "the weakest of all regions". Capacity increased 3.3%;
• Latin American and Caribbean carriers recorded 5.1% increase in demand and capacity increased 3.3%;
• African airlines recorded 3% increase in demand and capacity increased 14%;
• Air cargo performance diverged across major trade lanes. Asia-North America recorded the strongest growth, followed by within Asia, Europe-North America and Europe-Asia. In contrast, Gulf-linked corridors remained "disrupted by the conflict in the Middle East";
• IATA noted the following factors in the operating environment:
  • Global trade increased 6% in Jul-2026, extending the run of consecutive monthly expansions to 33 months on a year-on-year basis;
  • Jet fuel prices rose 8.3% month-on-month in Aug-2026 and were 79.2% higher year-on-year;
  • The Global Manufacturing Output Purchasing Managers' Index increased 0.3pp to 53.0, while the New Export Orders Index rose 1.4pp to 51.4. Both indicators remained supportive of air cargo demand. [more - original PR]

Airbus completed (29-Sep-2026) the first test flight with A350F (MSN 700) aircraft. The flight lasted four hours and 10 minutes, reaching an altitude of 25,000ft. The second A350F prototype (MSN 701) is at an advanced stage of final assembly and is scheduled to enter the paint shop "in the next few weeks". The aircraft is powered by Rolls-Royce Trent XWB-97 engines and features a range capability of up to 8700km, as well as a payload of up to 111 tonnes. Airbus confirmed 115 orders from 14 disclosed customers for the aircraft type at the end of Aug-2026. [more - original PR - Airbus] [more - original PR - Rolls-Royce] [more - original PR - Rolls-Royce - II]

Azul EVP marketing & people Jason Ward, speaking at the CAPA Airline Leader Summit Latin America & Caribbean, stated (10-Sep-2026) "We have over 800 daily departures and we fly to over 120 cities in Brazil. We also have flights to the US and to Europe". Mr Ward continued: "We focus very much on having a great operation and on-time performance in Brazil, we have an advantage there". He noted: "If your operation is not flowing well, it doesn't matter how nice you are, how cool the tools are and all that... your core business has to be the number one priority". Mr Ward added: "Each day we look at how the fleet launch was and what are the indicators that show what lines of flying are going to be the most difficult and how can we get ahead of that". [more - CAPA TV]

Airlines Association of Panama president Carlos Conde, speaking at the CAPA Airline Leader Summit Latin America & Caribbean, stated (10-Sep-2026) "I believe that the big change is in maybe two, three or five years. It's not the people looking for a flight, it's their AI agent looking for a flight". Mr Conde continued: "Airlines need to feed that and to understand that to get more reliable and profitable", noting: "It's a game changer". He concluded: "I think that people more commonly will use AI, you know, to make decisions, to plan a trip, to book a flight", adding: "The fundamentals of the business is the same, but the thing that we're going to change is how to use the AI to improve your decisions". [more - CAPA TV]

ALTA CEO Peter Cerda, speaking at the CAPA Airline Leader Summit Latin America & Caribbean, stated (10-Sep-2026) the air travel sector is "still treated as a cash cow industry" by some governments in Latin America and the Caribbean. Mr Cerda continued: "We're still treated as if we were an industry of the rich instead of considering air transportation as really a public mode of movement in our region, because of the lack of other modes of transportation, [such as] high speed rail, good highway systems...". He called on governments in the region to follow the example set by Panama and recognise the necessity of aviation, stating: "You need it. You need it socially. You need it economically". [more - CAPA TV]

BermudAir chief commercial officer (CCO) John Pepper, speaking at the CAPA Airline Leader Summit Latin America & Caribbean, stated (10-Sep-2026) "AI is only as good as the context that you give it. And so you've got to have a data portfolio that backs that up". Mr Pepper continued: "The learning curve and the speed at which these models are pacing and producing and being able to execute content is incredible". He stated: "It's not necessarily in the AI companies' best interest, at least with current compute, to go to every individual airline's website to do that transaction", noting: "From an inference standpoint and from a cost standpoint, it's better for them to go to Skyscanner or Google Flights or another aggregator to do that transaction because you can do one search and get those results back and process that in an easier fashion". Mr Pepper added: "And so that has the potential to undo a lot of what's been done over the last 20 years". [more - CAPA TV]