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twoElimination of 2,000 full-time jobs, elimination of 100 aircraft – the known cuts for Deutsche Lufthansa already sounded huge. However, at an internal employee event online, CEO Carsten Spohr said Tuesday that these steps should not be enough to allow the group to recover from the corona pandemic. This is reported in corporate circles.
Ahead of the upcoming board of directors and supervisory board meetings next week, it is now clear that a few thousand more items will be removed and that some 30 more aircraft could disappear from the fleet. Even the premature end of the Lufthansa Group’s large Airbus A380 is a likely option. The group does not officially comment on the scenarios and points out that there is no new resolution.
Two reasons lead to a more skeptical view of the Lufthansa leadership. In the medium term, in view of the recent increase in the number of infections, a slower recovery in air traffic is expected. And in the short term, one complains of a drop in reserves since the federal government’s plan to send people from risk areas to forced quarantine for at least five days starting in October. The German aviation association BDL had already criticized the fact that the forced quarantines would in fact act as another blockade.
“Catastrophic” reserve figures
Spohr is said to have described the October hiring numbers as “catastrophic” vis-à-vis employees. We are talking about 10 percent of the level of the previous year. This means that the original goal of returning to 50 percent of last year’s supply by the end of the year is unlikely to be achievable. For the year as a whole, Spohr is said to have given a value of 25 percent, according to company circles.
Spohr was not alone Tuesday with the complaint about the effect of the restrictions. Hours before his appearance, the head of Easyjet, Johan Lundgren, had complained at an online event organized by the association Airlines for Europe (A4E) about a “big mess” in Europe. “We know from our customer service that this mess prevents customers from booking,” Lundgren said, referring to travel warnings and quarantines for travelers, which vary from one EU country to another.
“Safer than buying”
“The solution cannot be that the airlines go into more and more debt to get out of the crisis,” said the Easyjet boss. Therefore, he asks for incentives to reactivate the business. “Otherwise, we will have a very difficult time on the path that we want to follow,” Lundgren said, referring to the entire industry.
Patrick Ky, director of the European aviation regulator EASA, expressed concern that in the crown crisis, passenger transport was sometimes seen as a risk and no longer an opportunity. This leads to very practical problems, including how pilots can obtain their licenses when they are not actively flying. According to EASA, only 180 of around three million passengers had to be excluded from flights related to the pandemic. Seven cases of passengers with symptoms of Covid-19 are known on board. “That was 0.2 per 100,000 passengers,” Ky calculated and even stated the thesis: “Aviation is safer than all other types of passenger transport and safer than shopping.”
Several types of aircraft on the list.
Spohr has not yet specifically quantified the scope of a possible further downsizing. Media reports, according to which up to 42,000 jobs were threatened, were not true, the numbers were “too high”, they reported from the employee meeting. Although the group is supported by a € 9 billion state aid package, preparations for the cuts have been under way for a long time. You could even sell pieces of the company. In the past, Spohr had only ruled out handing over the majority to Lufthansa Technik’s maintenance division. Currently, the group loses around 500 million euros a month. State aid, which must also be repaid, only provides a buffer of up to 18 months to return to economic normality.
Some series of aircraft are likely to be eliminated entirely; this applies in particular to long-haul models with four engines. They are considered to be less efficient compared to newer twin-engined jets. The 747-8 model aircraft are the only four-engine aircraft that he believes have a future in the group. The fact that he only mentioned the younger version of the Boeing Jumbo with the 747-8 is an indication that the days of the A380, the older version of the 747-400 jumbo, and long-haul A340 jets may be numbered. However, Lufthansa is also negotiating with Airbus, ordering the A350 with two engines, which will then not be purchased but rather leased in advance.
