December 1st 2021

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March

Airline lobby group, the International Air Transport Association (IATA), announced this month that its annual general meeting would be postponed by three months to the first week of October to give industry delegates the best chance possible to meet face-to-face. Read More »

The gathering of airline executives, planned for Boston and hosted by JetBlue, had been set down for late June. However, it was becoming more apparent as the weeks and months passed, that international travel restrictions governments across the globe had put in place in response to the pandemic were unlikely to be lifted by the June meeting.

As Association of Asia Pacific Airlines (AAPA) director general, Subhas Menon, remarked in the month, international passenger demand remained “close to a standstill”.

Cathay Pacific reported a net loss of HK$21.6 billion (US$2.8 billion) for calendar 2020, from a HK$1.7 billion net profit in the prior year. Revenue tumbled 56.1%. “Market conditions remain challenging and dynamic,” Cathay Pacific Group chairman, Patrick Healy, said. “Capacity would be less than 50% of pre-COVID-19 levels in 2021, making it difficult to predict when travel restrictions would be relaxed.”

AAX, which was attempting a corporate restructure with its creditors, said its net loss widened to 174.3 million ringgit in the final three months of 2020. It was the medium-haul LCC’s seventh consecutive quarterly loss.

In China, the three largest airline groups – Air China, China Eastern Airlines (CEA) and China Southern Airlines – reported a combined net loss of 37 billion yuan for calendar 2020, a sharp turnaround from a combined net profit of about 12 billion yuan in 2019.

In other Mainland news, CEA was formally confirmed as the launch customer for the C919 after signing a purchase agreement for five of the Commercial Aircraft Corporation China Ltd (COMAC) narrow-bodies.

Taiwan’s China Airlines (CAL) joined the list of airlines to retire the 747-400 passenger aircraft from the fleet. Given COVID-19 restrictions, the final flight, operated by B-18215 as CI2747, was a five-hour round trip that took off from Taipei Taoyuan Airport and circled Japan’s Mount Fuji before returning to the Taiwanese capital. While CAL has withdrawn the 747-400 passenger aircraft from service, the SkyTeam alliance member continued to operate the freighter variant of the iconic jumbo.