Swiss International Air Lines (SWISS) plans a three-month trial together with an external partner of using artificial intelligence (AI) to conduct its passenger count during the flight boarding process. The digitalization of the passenger count procedure is intended to enhance security and simultaneously ease the workload of the airline’s cabin personnel. To these ends, on selected SWISS flights from Zurich between April and June, a camera will be temporarily installed in the cabin for the boarding process, to record passengers as they embark and determine their total numbers.
The recordings will be used solely to train the AI application in the boarding process. It must be able, for instance, to distinguish whether a passenger is carrying an infant in their arms, and must also function faultlessly even in challenging lighting conditions. Results will be constantly analyzed throughout the trial phase to steadily improve the AI’s reliability. In view of the new approach’s trial nature, the cabin crew will also conduct a parallel passenger count using the established manual procedure on the flights concerned.
Data security and data protection assured
SWISS attaches the highest importance to data security and data protection. All the recordings made will be processed in full compliance with the strict European (GDPR) and Swiss (FADP) data protection provisions, and will then be deleted. The data recorded will be used solely for passenger count purposes. No persons will be identified from them. In addition, only visual images will be recorded, and only in the aircraft door area. No further recordings (such as audio) will be performed.
Passengers on the flights concerned will be informed of the trial before they embark. After the trial is concluded, SWISS will analyze the results and then decide on the further course of action as well as on a possible introduction.
Swiss International Air Lines (SWISS) is to offer its customers a totally new and more personalized ‘SWISS Senses’ air travel experience from 2025 onwards. The centrepiece of the new customer product is an entirely redesigned cabin for the airline’s long-haul aircraft fleet. SWISS unveiled its new cabin interiors to the public today.
“This is the most comprehensive cabin renewal in the history of our company,” says SWISS Chief Executive Officer Dieter Vranckx. “As a premium airline, we want to pay due and full regard to our customers’ desire for more individuality. And with this extremely high-quality product, we can continue to meet all our high aspirations.”
The totally redesigned long-haul cabin features a timeless colour scheme and top-quality materials. The warm and muted tones such as claret, anthracite and beige convey a particular sense of comfort and calm. The new concept also extends to SWISS’s first-ever suites, which will be offered in SWISS First and parts of SWISS Business. All seating classes will also feature new Human-Centric Lighting which helps alleviate jet lag’s effects. A new state-of-the-art inflight entertainment system with bigger screens and connection options for the customer’s own personal devices will also be provided in all seating classes.
“With ‘SWISS Senses’ we’re making our customers’ air travel an even more personal and more sensual experience,” adds SWISS Chief Commercial Officer Tamur Goudarzi Pour. “With its deep devotion to detail, our new long-haul cabin will give our passengers a particular feeling of warmth and well-being – a cosy and comfortable yet also functional environment in all our travel classes.”
Swiss First
SWISS First: privacy assured
The new SWISS First suites offer their guests total privacy with closable sliding doors, a spacious personal wardrobe, a large seat table, seat heating and cooling, a wireless charging station and a screen display that is as wide as the suite itself. The cabin’s centre suite can also be configured to suit two persons travelling together. The suites’ warm colours and wood features convey a strong sense of comfort and calm within top-quality surrounds. An advanced and spacious new washroom has also been developed for the new SWISS First cabin. The facility draws its inspiration from the famous spring in Vals in Canton Graubünden: a slate-black exterior, and a green interior that alludes to the spring’s fresh and cooling water.
Swiss Business
SWISS Business: aisle access from every seat
The totally redesigned SWISS Business cabin is intentionally conceived to meet a wide range of wishes and needs. In addition to ‘classic’ Business Class seats, the new cabin offers various further seating options such as double seats for passengers travelling together. Selected seats can also be closed off with a sliding door. All the new SWISS Business seats feature seat heating and cooling and a wireless charging station. The cabin’s top-quality materials in claret and anthracite help convey an extremely cosy and intimate ambience throughout.
Swiss Premium Economy
SWISS Premium Economy: tried-and-trusted retained
The highly popular SWISS Premium Economy Class with its greater seat comfort and superior cabin service will remain an integral feature within the new air travel experience. SWISS was the first airline in the Lufthansa Group to introduce the new Premium Economy seat which, with its 48-centimetre width and its almost one-metre pitch, has set new industry benchmarks.
Swiss Economy
SWISS Economy: optimum construction for greater seat pitch
The new SWISS Economy cabin will be equipped with new comfortable and functional seats. Thanks to their optimum construction, seat pitch has been increased. Every seat will also feature a more than 13-inch high-resolution screen, and the extensive new inflight entertainment system will help the time aloft fly by. The new seats are further provided with an amenity storage facility and a USB port, and offer additional comfort in the first seat rows.
The new cabin interiors will be installed from 2025 onwards, initially on the SWISS Airbus A330-300 fleet and later on the company’s Boeing 777-300ERs. The new Airbus A350-900s on order will be delivered with their new cabins already installed.
Swiss International Air Lines Boeing 777-300 ER HB-JNJ (msn 62755) PAE (Nick Dean). Image: 941193.
Swiss International Air Lines will resume its passenger services between Zurich and Shanghai on March 3, 2023. One weekly flight is currently planned on the route for the month of March, which will then be expanded to three weekly frequencies from April onwards.
The flights will generally be operated using Boeing 777-300ER aircraft, or alternatively Airbus A340-300.
Shanghai (Swiss)
Swiss suspended its previous scheduled passenger services between Zurich and Shanghai in April 2022 in view of the travel restrictions imposed in response to the coronavirus pandemic, and its services on the route have since been limited to cargo-only flights.
In addition to resuming its Zurich-Shanghai passenger flights, Swiss will also be increasing its service to and from Hong Kong from five to six weekly frequencies in the 2023 summer schedules.
Top Copyright Photo: Swiss International Air Lines Boeing 777-300 ER HB-JNJ (msn 62755) PAE (Nick Dean). Image: 941193.
Swiss International Air Lines has begun installing its new Premium Economy Class on its Airbus A340-300 fleet.
The first such aircraft completed – HB-JMB – departed for Johannesburg on January 24 on its first flight with the new seating class installed. All four of SWISS’s Airbus A340s will be equipped with Premium Economy by April, from when the new seating class will be bookable for the further destinations served.
From the same date, Premium Economy Class will also be newly bookable for SWISS services on the Zurich-Johannesburg, Zurich-Hong Kong and Zurich-Chicago routes.
SWISS has already installed Premium Economy Class throughout its Boeing 777-300ER fleet, whose first aircraft was completed at the end of February 2022. SWISS was the first airline in the Lufthansa Group to introduce the best-in-class Premium Economy seat, which sets new comfort benchmarks with its pitch of almost a metre and its 48-centimetre width.
In other news, Swiss International Air Lines (SWISS) is to conclude its current 20th anniversary celebrations with a very special action: twenty of its advanced Airbus A220-100 and A220-300 aircraft are to be named after Swiss tourist areas and resorts, to help publicize far and wide the sheer variety of Switzerland’s tourist landscape. To this end, SWISS and Switzerland Tourism co-ran a competition last December inviting Swiss tourist destinations to submit their own imaginative presentations on why they should be selected. Over 50 entries were received, which were each assessed by a SWISS judging panel on their creativity, their originality, their authenticity and their connection to SWISS.
“We received so many outstanding and original entries, and it was far from easy to select our 20 winners,” says Anja Beeler, SWISS’s Head of Strategic Communications & Content Creation. “We would like to take this opportunity to thank all our participants for all their creative contributions. And we’re really looking forward to carrying the names of all the varied and unique winning Swiss tourist areas and resorts on our aircraft out into the world.”
The SWISS social media community also selected three favourites from among the 20 winners in a worldwide online poll: Bad Zurzach (AG), Nendaz (VS) and Viamala (GR). Each of these will enjoy its own physical aircraft naming ceremony within a SWISS hangar – two in Zurich and one in Geneva – in the course of 2023.
The winning destinations:
Canton Aargau: Bad Zurzach, Rheinfelden Canton Bern: Haslital Canton Fribourg: La Gruyère Canton Glarus: Braunwald Canton Grisons: Lenzerheide, Val Surses, Viamala Canton Lucerne: Sempach, Willisau Canton Schwyz: Brunnen, Morschach Canton Solothurn: Solothurn Canton St. Gallen: Rapperswil-Jona Canton Ticino: Mendrisio, Verzasca Canton Uri: Andermatt, Rütli Canton Valais: Nendaz, Saas-Fee.
Top Copyright Photo: Swiss International Air Lines Airbus A340-313 HB-JMB (msn 545) ZRH (Rolf Wallner). Image: 955847.
