Australian flag carrier announced Qantas announced on 26 May it was “rebalancing” its domestic capacity due to price hikes in fuel. The airline said Australian domestic “continues to perform well”, but it will cut domestic flying levels for July and August with capacity moving from 107 percent of pre-COVID levels to 103 percent.
“These additional reductions will progressively flow into industry booking and reservation systems in the coming days,” Qantas said, adding “these adjustments are not expected to materially impact customers due to the large number of flights on most routes; those impacted will be contacted directly and offered different options. In practical terms, these changes will generally lead to a higher seat factor on flights across the group.”
Qantas also said it continues “to see strong demand” on international routes as it moves toward the northern summer peak and more countries relax COVID-related border restrictions.
The group’s international capacity remains unchanged at just under 50 percent of pre-COVID levels by the end of the fourth quarter of FY22 and rising to around 70 percent by the end of the first quarter of FY23, Qantas said.
Qantas also announced that flights from Perth to London (QF9) resumed on 23 May, with one return flight per day operating through the Western Australian gateway after operating through Darwin since November last year. QF1 will reroute from Sydney-Darwin-London to operate Sydney-Singapore-London from 19 June and switch from a 787 back to an Airbus A380 service. Qantas will also welcome a third A380 back from storage, which will return to service from 6 June on the Melbourne-Los Angeles route.
Following recent relaxation of New Zealand border restrictions, Qantas and Jetstar’s Tasman flying has ramped up significantly, including: Flights resumed from Australia to Queenstown and Wellington, and additional routes to Christchurch; Qantas has doubled frequency on flights to Auckland from Melbourne and Sydney and is operating some flights from Brisbane with A330s; Jetstar has restarted flights on all Australia to Auckland markets and will restart on remaining Christchurch, Queenstown and Wellington markets in the next few weeks.
As Japan starts to relax its borders restrictions, Qantas announced that Jetstar will resume flights from Cairns-Tokyo (Narita) from 20 July and Cairns-Osaka from 26 July and Qantas will resume Sydney-Tokyo (Haneda) services from 12 September, and from Melbourne and Brisbane to Tokyo (Haneda) from the end of October, using A330s.
Air New Zealand CEO buys NZ$1 million worth of shares
Air New Zealand CEO Greg Foran has bought 1.46 million Air New Zealand shares worth NZ$1 million, according to disclosures filed with the stock exchange. Foran previously held no shares in Air New Zealand, although he does hold 2.3 million in rights which can be converted to shares. Air New Zealand disclosed that directors and senior managers also bought shares recently. Among those were chairperson Therese Walsh, director Dean Bracewell, chief people officer Nikki Dines, chief customer and sales officer Leanne Geraghty and chief operational integrity and safety officer David Morgan. Air New Zealand’s share price has dropped considerably since late March, when it announced a NZ$2.2 billion recapitalisation plan to help repay its debts and improve liquidity.
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