Airline News
MH370 found? MAS delays fleet decision
August 3rd 2015
Malaysian Prime Minister, Najib Razak, last Friday said the flaperon washed ashore on Reunion Island was “very likely” from a B777. "This is the first positive sign that we have located part of [MH370]," added Julie Bishop, Australia's foreign minister. Read More »
On Saturday, the flaperon arrived in France, where Malaysian and French experts are examining it, along with a suitcase discovered nearby. "I believe that we are moving closer to solving the mystery of MH370," said Abdul Aziz Kaprawi, Malaysia's deputy transport minister. "This could be the convincing evidence that MH370 went down in the Indian Ocean." Scientists say there are several plausible scenarios in which ocean currents could have carried debris from the plane to Reunion. "Over the last 16 or 17 months, any floating debris would have dispersed quite markedly across the Indian Ocean," said Martin Dolan, chief commissioner of the Australian Transport Safety Bureau, which is leading the search for MH370 which disappeared in mysterious circumstances on March 8, 2014, with 239 passengers and crew on board during a routine flight from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing.
Meanwhile, at Malaysia Airlines headquarters in Kuala Lumpur, the carrier has delayed its planned September 1 fleet decision by up to twelve months and instead asked creditors to consent to an interim sub-lease agreement, two sources with knowledge of the talks told Airfinance Journal.
Malaysian Airline System (MAS) intends to sub-lease its 97 passenger aircraft comprising 19 A330s, 13 B777s, 57 B737s and two B747s to a newly created company Malaysian Airlines Berhad (MAB). Banks and lessors with exposure to Malaysia Airlines were asked last month to consent to the proposal. Initially, the carrier had intended to make a decision on which aircraft to transfer to MAB and which to return to creditors by September 1. Now, the entire fleet will be sub-leased to MAB from MAS and operated by this new entity for a period of six to 12 months, with the possibility of extending the sub-lease. "The can has been kicked down the road basically as far as the lenders and lessors have been concerned," said one of the sources. Meanwhile, MAS cockpit crew has told This Week in Asia-Pacific Aviation that the ageing B777 fleet would be scrapped by early next year, while the carrier still tries to sell its six A380s on the second hand market.
After Christoph Mueller took over as new MAS chief in May, the carrier has terminated a large number of routes, including Frankfurt, Istanbul, Male and Brisbane, while significantly reducing frequency on key trunk routes such as Adelaide, Bali, Delhi, Manila, Jakarta, Mumbai, Hong Kong, Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, Sydney, Melbourne, and Perth. As such, capacity to Australia will be cut by 42% from August, followed by North Asia (-26%) and Europe (-18%). The reductions will render the new MAB a de facto regional carrier, given its limited long-haul exposure with only four daily services exceeding ten flying hours (2xHeathrow, 1xParis, 1xAmsterdam).
