The constant delays of aircraft deliveries worsened during the pandemic and continue to happen to this day, in various ways, but with a common justification from the major airlines: issues with suppliers, which were only detected at the time of assembling the plane.
The Boeing 777X is one of the major examples, as the aircraft should have been in commercial service a few months ago, but its anticipated entry into commercial flight is now set for early 2025.
Qatar Airways, in fact, will be the first to fly with the aircraft, but the company’s annoyance is still evident and its CEO, Akbar Al Baker, pointed out the problem that, according to him, was caused by the manufacturers themselves.
“They, Airbus and Boeing, are saying that they are working hard to restore the supply line to normal, and I know they are doing it. The problem is that they can’t do much, because they don’t have control. I believe that the big mistake both manufacturers made was trying to outsource several jobs that they performed internally, just to save money, and now we see this backfiring on them,” the CEO of Qatar Airways stated in an interview with Richard Quest on CNN.
Some manufacturers have even announced the purchase of supplier companies or changing some of them as a way to prevent future mistakes.
Australia’s “Betrayal”
The controversial fight between Qatar Airways and Qantas was also commented on by Al Baker, who complained about the treatment from the Australians. The conflict revolves around the constant requests from the Arabic company to expand flights in Australia and the recurrent rejections from the local government, claiming that this would cause imbalance, as the routes would be dominated by foreign companies.
On the other hand, Qantas shows no signs of wanting to expand routes to the Middle East, which to many sounds like a collaboration between the Australian government and the national airline, which naturally benefits from less competition and, consequently, higher fares.
However, Australian consumers have criticized the airline, which laid off employees during the pandemic to hire contractors and sold tickets for flights that were already canceled, causing a crisis in the company that led to the premature departure of its CEO.
In the interview with CNN, Al Baker stated that “we were quite surprised by the rejection, it is quite unfair, especially after a time when we have supported Australia a lot, repatriating Australian citizens and also evacuating personnel from the country, bringing medical supplies and parts during the worst period of the pandemic. While their national airline, Qantas, and its partners completely ceased operations, we were there for the people of Australia”.
