LAN Chile’s affiliate LAN Argentina, announced Friday in Mar del Plata the beginning of flights to Patagonia and Brazil as part of its regional expansion policy. Ushuaia and El Calafate are the two Patagonian destinations LAN Argentina will be covering as of next week and in early December two daily flights to Sao Paulo, said Damian Scokin the company’s General Manager during a business forum.

Virgin Atlantic Airways has launched new advanced shopping features to virginatantic.com using the Datalex TDP Shopping and Availability Management Solution, enabling an improved customer experience with calendar and price led shopping. Virgin Atlantic website is now utilizing the advanced availability and shopping functionality of the Datalex Travel Distribution Platform (TDP) as part of a five-year partnership between Datalex and Virgin Atlantic Airways.

Several major U.S. airlines have raised fares in some markets by $5 each way, after two unsuccessful efforts to increase prices in recent weeks. American Airlines, Continental Airlines and Delta Air Lines each said on Friday that they raised fares in domestic markets not served by low-cost carriers.

Continental Airlines’ load factor rose 2 percentage points from a year ago to 79.3 percent, setting a record for October, the airline said. Continental said revenue per available seat mile increased between 4.5 percent and 5.5 percent for the month, as demand remained strong in the traditionally weak period for air travel.

Richard Branson’s Virgin Atlantic said earlier this week it was pushing back delivery of its first Airbus A380 super jumbo by four years, giving the plane maker time to sort out problems encountered in wiring the mammoth planes. Virgin said it still intended to take delivery of all six of the $300-million jetliners it has on order, but now would not see its first one until 2013.

Aeromexico, Mexico’s largest airline, today announced its expansion of service from Chicago continues with inauguration of flights from O’Hare International Airport to Guadalajara November 14, providing daily non-stop service to one of Mexico’s great colonial cities. Guadalajara is Aeromexico’s fourth non-stop destination from Chicago, with service already to Mexico City and Durango and the new Leon service beginning November 10.