Airline axes New York and Los Angeles direct services but agrees A380 reparations
Thai Airways International is abandoning its non-stop services to Los Angeles and New York, which it operates with Airbus A340-500s, due to high fuel costs. Meanwhile, the airline has reached a deal with Airbus to acquire eight A330-300s at a discounted price as part of compensation for the delay to its A380 order.
Thai confirms that it will revamp its five-times weekly non-stop services from Bangkok to Los Angeles and New York Kennedy into one-stop services, and is considering either Seoul or Shanghai for the stopover point, although it gives no timeframe for the move. The confirmation comes in response to public remarks made by the airline's president Apin Sumanaseni.
Although the stopover will enable the airline to pick up passengers, it denies that poor passenger loads are the reason for the change. "The cabin load factor is very good. Before we flew to Los Angeles [via Osaka] using Boeing 747s which have 400-plus seats," which is more capacity than the 215-seat A340-500s used today, it says. The main reason for the change is that the "cost of having direct flights to the USA is very high" in terms of fuel and other costs, it adds.
Thai has three A340-500s in service (plus one on backlog), which it originally ordered specifically for non-stop ultra-long-range services. The flag carrier's first non-stop service to the USA started in May 2005.
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Thai brought the A340-500s to launch the ultra-long-range non-stop flights |
Meanwhile, the carrier says it has decided to retain its A380 order despite the programme delay, and has agreed to allow Airbus to slip delivery "by approximately 21 months" to September 2010. Thai says it decided to stick with the order because the A380s are required "to increase productivity on routes with high passenger traffic, and restraints on increasing flight frequencies such as London, Frankfurt and Paris".
Airbus has proposed compensation for the losses, it says, and has granted various "financial perks" including "a price reduction" on eight A330-300s to replace six A300-600s and two Boeing 747-300s from 2008.
Source: Flight International
