Malaysia Airlines offers to lease A330s from Alitalia

Carrier emerges from turnaround after twin tragedies of 2014, with a load factor of 80%

Malaysia Airlines has offered to lease Airbus A330 jets from Alitalia if the struggling Italian airline is wound up, the Asian carrier’s chief executive said yesterday.

Alitalia is preparing for special administration proceedings after workers rejected its latest rescue plan, making it impossible for the loss-making airline to secure funds to keep its aircraft flying. Workers are hoping the Italian government will step in with an alternative rescue deal.

Malaysia Airlines could take between six and eight Airbus A330s from Alitalia, CEO Peter Bellew told Reuters in Dubai. “I hope Alitalia stays in business but it doesn’t look good to me today. I think it’s hard to see how they are going come back from the pressure they are sitting on at the moment,” he said.

An Alitalia spokesman declined to comment.

Malaysia Airlines is emerging from a turnaround after suffering two tragedies in 2014, when flight MH370 from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing disappeared in what remains a mystery, and then flight MH17 from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur was shot down over eastern Ukraine.

Its load factors — or how full its planes are — averaged around 80 per cent in the three months to March 31, Bellew said.

Malaysia Airlines wants to lease between six and eight A330s or Boeing 777s for use from 2018 and a further seven to nine from 2019, he said, expecting to finalise most of those deals in the next four to six weeks.

This is an increase on the six for 2018 and six for 2019 he told Reuters last month he was interested in. “The world really is awash right now,” Bellew said with regard to spare wide-body aircraft.