Cathay Pacific to cut passenger and cargo capacity
Published:23-April-2009
By Datamonitor staff writer
Dragonair to reduce its capacity by 13%
Cathay Pacific Airways has announced that it will reduce its passenger capacity by 8% and overall cargo capacity by 11% from May 2009, in response to deteriorating business conditions.
At the same time, in a further effort to reduce cash spend, the airline will introduce a four-tier, top down special leave scheme under which staff will be asked to take unpaid leave varying from one to four weeks according to their seniority.
According to the airline, there will be a reduction in flight frequencies or seat capacity to London, Paris, Frankfurt, Sydney, Singapore, Bangkok, Seoul, Taipei, Tokyo, Mumbai and Dubai. At the same time, additional flights will be routed to Denpasar, Sapporo, Bahrain and Riyadh.
Under a special leave scheme, all of the 17,000 staff working for the airline in Hong Kong and overseas will be asked to take unpaid leave of one to four weeks, depending on seniority, over a 12-month period from May 1, 2009 to April 30, 2010.
Dragonair, a subsidiary of Cathay Pacific, will also reduce its capacity by 13%. Flight services to Bengaluru, Busan, Sanya and Shanghai will be reduced, while services to Fukuoka, Dalian, Shenyang, Guilin and Xian will be suspended. The weekly freighter frequency will fall to 84 flights, down from 124 a week during 2008.
In terms of aircraft deployment, the company is negotiating the sale of five aircraft and will park two more of its Boeing 747-400BCF freighters, taking the total to five, and wet-lease one BCF to subsidiary Air Hong Kong.
