Qantas and Jetstar are gearing up for a busy travel season with additional capacity and new routes to meet the travel demands passengers. The Group anticipates carrying over 4 million travellers during the school holiday period, with top domestic leisure destinations including the Gold Coast and Cairns.
Besides the Group has introduced new international routes like Sydney-Auckland-New York and Perth-Rome that resulted in heavy bookings. Over the past six weeks, Qantas and Jetstar have announced or resumed several routes including Shanghai, Hong Kong, New York, San Francisco, Rome, Honiara, and Wellington.
On the domestic front, the Qantas Group has successfully restored its capacity to pre-COVID levels. Qantas will further increase capacity from Adelaide to Kangaroo Island and Whyalla in South Australia to meet additional holiday demand.
Jetstar, too, is boosting capacity on its Adelaide to Denpasar route with two brand new A321neo LRs stationed in Adelaide. Additionally, the airline plans to increase frequency on several routes, including Brisbane to Auckland and Brisbane to Denpasar.
The Group has recently taken delivery of six new aircraft since the beginning of 2023. Jetstar received its eighth Airbus A321neo, with plans to acquire a ninth in July as a part of the plan to have a total of 18 A321neos by the end of next year. Besides Qantas’ eighth A380 is scheduled to re-enter service in early July following meticulous engineering checks and cabin refurbishment.
Qantas received two new Boeing 787 Dreamliners since late April and is expecting a third Dreamliner next month bringing the total count to 14.
Going ahead, as a part of their fleet optimization strategy three QantasLink 717s have been retired, in anticipation of the arrival of new Airbus A220s later this year.
Qantas and Jetstar remain confident in their ability to deliver the financial performance outlined for FY23 in their May market update.