Qantas has reported an improving operational picture for the airline group. The airline points to the strong demand for domestic across all categories. However, high fuel costs have required the group to “rebalance capacity and fares in response”. The group has cut domestic flying levels for July and August with capacity moving from 107% of pre-COVID levels to 103%.
Qantas reports that group international flights continues to see strong demand as more countries relax restrictions. Group International capacity remains unchanged at just under 50% of pre-COVID levels by the end of the fourth quarter of FY22 and rising to around 70% by the end of the first quarter of FY23.
Qantas will welcome a third A380 back from storage, which will return to service from 6 June on the Melbourne-Los Angeles route.
Following recent relaxation of New Zealand border restrictions, Qantas and Jetstar’s Tasman flying has ramped up significantly, with flights resuming from Australia to Queenstown and Wellington, and additional routes to Christchurch. Qantas has doubled frequency on flights to Auckland from Melbourne and Sydney and is operating some flights from Brisbane with A330s. Jetstar has restarted flights on all Australia to Auckland markets and will restart on remaining Christchurch, Queenstown and Wellington markets in the next few weeks.
As Japan starts to relax its borders restrictions, Jetstar will resume flights from Cairns-Tokyo (Narita) from 20 July and Cairns-Osaka from 26 July. Qantas will resume Sydney-Tokyo (Haneda) services from 12 September, and from Melbourne and Brisbane to Tokyo (Haneda) from the end of October, using A330s.
Strengthening demand for travel to Bali has seen Jetstar restart direct services from all seven Australian cities it flew from pre-COVID and will be close to pre-COVID levels of capacity on the majority of routes by the end of June 2022.
Qantas will increase frequency between Sydney and Manila from five flights per week to six from 20 June increasing to daily from mid-September.
Qantas will resume flights from Sydney to Santiago from 30 October, with four flights per week using its 787s.
Qantas has pushed back the restart of flights between Sydney and San Francisco from 30 July to 30 October.
The Qantas Group will start a seasonal Perth-Rome service from 22 June; flights from Sydney to Bengaluru (Bangalore) from 14 September; while Jetstar will start a Sydney-Seoul service from 2 November and Qantas will start on the route on 10 December, and Qantas will start flights from Melbourne to Dallas Fort Worth from 2 December.