Air Malta in top flight for reliability

Air Malta is officially Europe's best performing airline, with passengers less likely to lose their bags or have their flight cancelled compared to any other company, according to a new report.

The quarterly report compiled by the Association of European Airlines says that just 3.2 Air Malta passengers for every 1,000 travellers arrive at their final destination without their luggage.

At the other end of the luggage conveyer belt, British Airways delays 28 bags per 1,000 passengers, the worst performing airline, says AEA. The figures pile on the misery for BA after it was fined £270 million (Lm180) on Wednesday for price-fixing fuel charges.

A total of 28 airlines provided punctuality figures to the Brussels-based AEA, and 23 gave baggage details.

Turkish Airlines was the second best performing airline where baggage efficiency is concerned, followed by Tarom Romanian Airlines.

In terms of the 4,669 flights performed during the quarter, Air Malta ranked top for flight regularity, which measures the percentage of planned flights that are actually operated. A flight may be cancelled due to bad weather, for technical reasons or other operational constraints.

The Maltese airline is middle of the table as far as delays go, though the report gives no information about the cause of delays.

Air Malta's marketing general manager, Brian Bartolo, is extremely satisfied with the results.

"Considering this is an unbiased, independent report, it is definitely a positive result for Air Malta," he said.

The fact that Air Malta operates mainly from a small airport helps to keep luggage in check, though the airline has a large number of inter-lining passengers and also flies to major airports. In the period under review, Air Malta flew over half a million passengers.

Mr Bartolo said the results also confirm the success of Air Malta's code-sharing agreement with Lufthansa.

He added that Air Malta's full transposition to an Airbus fleet by next year should help the carrier's flexibility and possibly cut down on delays.

Where flight regularity is concerned, Alitalia trailed towards the bottom and Icelandair held top position with Air Malta.