Boeing and Lufthansa have reached the next major milestone on the 747-8 Intercontinental program with the start of pre-delivery testing of the new airplane at the German flag-carrier’s main operations base at Frankfurt Airport. Lufthansa will conduct a number of tests from today until December 9th to help ensure a smooth integration of the newest member of the 747 family into Lufthansa operations.

Lufthansa has flown its first double daily service to Frankfurt from Gatwick, reconnecting the London with the financial centre of Continental Europe. Guy Stephenson, Gatwick Airport’s commercial director said: “It is great to welcome Lufthansa and strengthen the links between the financial and economic centres of London and Frankfurt.”

Changi Airport has welcomed the launch of a new A380-operated Lufthansa departure from Singapore to Frankfurt, the newest addition to its growing list of A380-connected destinations. With a total of 188 weekly A380 flights to nine major cities Changi Airport is the busiest multicarrier A380 hub in the world.

Lufthansa responds to economic slowdown by reducing growth in passenger traffic for 2012 from nine to three per cent

Troubled carrier bmi has seen losses widen to €154 million during the first nine months of 2011 with owner Lufthansa now weighing its “strategic options” for the carrier. bmi lost €90 million in the period in 2010, but has been hard hit by political turmoil in the Middle East where it has a strong presence.

The Lufthansa Group’s airlines boosted the number of passengers they carried by 8.1 per cent in the first nine months of the year as 80.7 million passengers chose to fly with Lufthansa, SWISS, Austrian Airlines, bmi or Germanwings. The Group increased its capacity by 10.6 per cent and its revenue seat kilometres by 7.9 per cent in the first three quarters of the year. The average passenger load factor per aircraft correspondingly fell by 1.9 percentage points to 77.7 per cent.