Two major European operators of Pratt & Whitney PW1000G geared turbofans have highlighted the impact prolonged engine maintenance delays are having on their reputations and bottom lines.
Speaking at the Airline Economics Growth Frontiers event in Dublin on 13 January, the chief executives of Air Baltic and Wizz Air said compensation from the RTX subsidiary alone could not make up for harm to their businesses through having to cancel flights because of grounded aircraft.
Martin Gauss, whose Air Baltic operates 49 PW1500G-powered Airbus A220s, said a recent decision to cut 19 routes and reduce other frequencies from its 2025 summer schedule caused “enormous damage” to its image, especially in its home country, Latvia.
“We had to cancel 4,700 flights because of engine issues. It was tough, especially with the local outcry that was making national news every day,” he says.
Some maintenance delays were announced to the airline “overnight”, with the carrier having little time to react. “Nobody can run an airline with such fluctuations in missing engines,” he says.
While demand is there for its flights, “we are limited in what we can do by limited engines”, Gauss says, adding: “For an airline of our size to have 10 aircraft on the ground going into peak season, it’s a problem.”
The problems for Air Baltic – which has orders that will see it operating a fleet of 100 A220s by the end of the decade – “started just after Covid, when there were not enough spare engines”, says Gauss. “Even though we had bought the recommended number of spare engines, it was not enough.”
Speaking later in the day, Jozsef Varadi of Hungarian low-cost carrier Wizz Air – which flies PW1100G-powered A320neos – described the lack of maintenance capacity and spare parts for the engine as “one of our biggest challenges”, adding: “There is not a properly functioning market…the supply chain does not function no matter who your contract is with.”
Despite the offer of payments from the manufacturer to cover the cost of grounded aircraft, Varadi says: “I am not in the business of being financially compensated. I’m in the business of flying passengers”.
However, both chief executives insist they are happy with the operational performance of the GTF. “It is a good engine when it is flying,” says Varadi.
Gauss adds: “The engine is over-performing on wing. That was the idea behind us investing [in the A220, then the Bombardier CSeries, in 2016]. We want to fly that engine, but we need it to be better. Pratt & Whitney need to understand that this is an impact to an airline that is very different.”
Neither chief executive anticipates the situation being resolved any time soon. “We expect it to be over by 2027,” says Gauss. “That is what Pratt is telling us.”
Varadi is more pessimistic. “Pratt & Whitney are trying their best, but it’s going to be a long process, probably four or five years,” he says.
