Cancelling flights that could have carried 200,000 passengers is not something an airline does lightly. But British Airways has chosen to axe three daily long-haul round-trips this winter because of a shortage of serviceable planes.
A reader, Tam Carr, wonders: “Why can’t they utilise the hundreds of mothballed aircraft parked up at the world’s airports? Surely they can be chartered?”
Tam’s point is well worth investigating. You need venture only as far as Lourdes in southwest France to discover dozens of dormant passenger aircraft. Last time I was there, Airbus A380 aircraft were lined up as densely as you would find them at a major hub. But they are going nowhere.
Bear in mind the world’s first double-deck SuperJumbo was delivered only 17 years ago this month, so none of those planes is especially old. They stood alongside Boeing wide-bodied jets of various types and vintages, and a handful of A340 planes looking particularly dilapidated.
A similar scene is replicated at the former military airfield at Teruel in Spain and across the desert airstrips of the southwest US. Most spectacular of all: Southern California Logistics Airport outside Victorville. Even before the Covid pandemic, I saw a string of former British Airways Boeing 747 Jumbo jets growing old beneath the desert sun. (It’s well worth a visit if you find yourself on the most interesting stretch of Route 66 in California, between San Bernadino and Victorville.)
Worldwide, hundreds such planes are standing idle at a time when BA and other airlines are hungry for long-haul aircraft.
“Bring back the Boeing 747,” many former passengers and crew will chorus. But that particular plane has flown for the last time for British Airways. Even without the Covid pandemic, the Jumbo was due to be retired by around now by BA – previously the world’s biggest operator of the type.
While well-maintained older planes are perfectly safe, the cost of keeping them in tip-top condition increases with age. And with four thirsty engines, the extra fuel burn compared with modern “big twins” is economically and environmentally unjustifiable.
Another seemingly obvious suggestion presents itself: surely British Airways could acquire some of the A380s that are sitting around waiting for owners? They, too, have four engines but carry far more…
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