AIRLINES CHANGE COURSE
Jetstar and Qantas cut seats on domestic flights as PM extends China travel ban
MORE turbulence is ahead for the Far North’s tourism sector, with two major airlines downsizing flights out of Cairns Airport, and the Chinese travel ban extending for another week.
Jetstar and Qantas have revealed they will reduce services between Cairns and several destinations across the nation during the off-peak season.
From March, Jetstar will reduce – on average – one return flight per week between Cairns and Melbourne, Sydney, Brisbane, Gold Coast, Darwin and Adelaide. This equates to at least 1200 seats a week.
Qantas will use smaller aircraft on some days of the week, going from an Airbus A330 to a smaller B737-800 on Cairns to Sydney and Brisbane routes.
The change to the smaller aircraft means an estimated loss of 123 seats per flight, 16 fewer business class seats and 107 in economy. Some Qantas cancellations between SydneyCairns
are due to overnight runway works in Cairns.
Some of the changes to the Jetstar flights are designed to absorb the impact of any further industrial action against pilots and other transport workers.
At the start of 2020, the budget carrier cancelled 10 per cent of its domestic flights as a precautionary measure against striking aviation workers.
A Jetstar spokesman described the changes to its Cairns services as “minor adjustments on some of our higher frequency routes to better match demand”.
“Customers will be re-accommodated on the next available flight,” he said.
Queensland Tourism Industry Council chief executive Daniel Gschwind said the route changes were further “devastating” news to FNQ tourism.
“It will already exacerbate what is shaping up to be one of the greatest crises that we’ve faced,” he said.
“While airlines are obviously themselves affected by what we’re facing, this will inflict additional pain on the operators on the ground.
“It demonstrates that we’re facing a long-term challenge here, and a challenge on a scale that we will need to try and attract substantial attention from the state and federal governments.”
A Cairns Airport spokeswoman said the recent changes were not unexpected, given current market challenges.
“Airlines make commercial decisions on an ongoing basis and we look forward to the resumption of capacity as demand increases again,” she said.
“The airlines are maintaining frequency on these services and that’s important for us as a community.” Cairns MP Michael Healy said any reduction in flights out of the airport was a concern.
“I understand that they need to remain economically viable, and they need to allocate assets where they’re making money and where there is demand,” he said. “Obviously there’s nothing else we can do, except accept these (changes).
“But it’s not just us, it’s across the whole entire network.”
He feared the changes may drive up the cost of fares during off-peak periods.
“I think fares are pretty exxy at the moment,” he said.
“This has the potential to do that, but once we get our busy period around Easter, when we’re expected to see strong domestic numbers, hopefully we’ll see some changes made.”