THE CHAIRMAN AND chief executive of German maintenance company Lufthansa Technik, Wolfgang Mayrhuber, says that he may complain to the European Commission about the low prices which some loss-making, government-subsidised, European airlines and maintenance companies are charging.
Mayrhuber says that he does not mind if a government helps a company in difficulties, but he does mind if the subsidies are used to cut prices. "The trouble is that people have a hangar - what do they do with it? Some are doing work for a price that you would pay to get your car fixed," he says.
Lufthansa recently completed a D check on a Boeing 747 for Lufthansa in just seven weeks. The work included changing a landing gear, carrying out an engine-strut modification, fitting new satellite communications equipment and painting the aircraft. "It would normally take seven weeks just to do the normal D check," says Mayrhuber.
Source: Flight International
