AIRLINES
KLM success picks up slack for problem-hit French sister
Dutch airline boosts its passenger tally 6.4% in 2016
London — Dutch airline KLM boosted its passenger tally 6.4% in 2016, ensuring that parent Air France-KLM Group also posted a gain despite slumping numbers at sister company Air France, where strikes and a spate of terrorist attacks crimped traffic. KLM added 1.8-million customers in 2016, for a total of 30.4-million, while Air France’s figure slipped 691,000, or 1.4%, to 49.8-million including the Hop regional airline, the group said on Monday. The contribution of KLM, which is based in Amsterdam, helped lift the group’s overall tally 4% to 93.4-million. The gain was helped by a surge of almost 23% at discount unit Transavia, where the passenger count advanced 2.5-million to 13.3-million. Alexandre de Juniac stood down as Air France-KLM CEO in July after failing to force through cost cuts at the French arm in the face of employee opposition. Union hostility has prompted a series of walkouts, most recently in June 2016, when a four-day strike led to the cancellation of 20% of flights...
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