Austrian Airlines is now preparing to reorganise its fleet to reflect the COVID 19 fall in demand in demand, with 18 DHCs, all seven A319s and three older B767s to be taken out of service by 2022.
Austrian’s restart plan includes a fleet of around 60 aircraft in 2022, nine of which will be long-haul aircraft.
Flight operations of Austrian Airlines have been temporarily at a standstill since March 18, 2020 as a consequence of the coronavirus crisis with employees of the flag carrier continuing to be on short-time work.
Austrian currently predicts a 25-50 percent drop in demand for 2020 with a maximum of 75 percent of the pre-coronavirus level is expected by the end of 2021. Austrian Airlines Executive Board member Andreas Otto said, “The entire airline industry is pessimistic. We have to assume that we will reach the ‘pre-corona level’ again in 2023 at the earliest.”