Several western European-based carriers have begun cancelling services to Ukraine as fears of a Russian invasion mount amid rising tensions. SAS has announced that it will cancel its weekly service between Oslo and Kiev, the Scandinavian group’s only Ukrainian service, on 22 February, avoiding the country’s airspace entirely until a risk assessment is conducted on 27 February. A further decision on whether to resume services will be taken on 1 March, the carrier says. This follows a decision by KLM to indefinitely suspend flights to Kiev on 12 February after the Dutch government reset its travel advice as “code red”. KLM has not flown over the eastern regions of Ukraine and Crimea since 2014. Additionally, all Lufthansa Group airlines, including the mainline and subsidiaries Austrian and Swiss, are suspending flights to and from Kiev and Odessa. The move affects all departures from 21 to 28 February. Swiss and Lufthansa say they are constantly monitoring the situation and will decide on further flights at a later date. In a statement, the European Union Aviation Safety Agency has said it is sharing regular updates on the current Ukrainian situation with the members of the European Information Sharing and Cooperation Platform on Conflict Zones. It notes that “in 2015 already Ukraine had issued aeronautical publications introducing flight prohibitions in the eastern part of Ukraine and over Crimea, which are still in force. Therefore, parts of the airspace over the territories are not used by air carriers.” Despite the moves to pull back from the country, data shows that traffic levels have so far been maintained. Capacity as measured by departing passenger services shows no indication up to 20 February – the last day of data collection – of being impacted by the dispute. It should be noted that the data does count services to Crimea as part of Ukraine, despite the region being controlled and administered by Russia, and this does account for a large slice of activity. Although the impact of the tensions should be seen as carriers pull back from Ukraine, SAS and KLM represent relatively niche positions in the country, with Lufthansa Group being the country’s 10th-largest airline by number of flights, according to Cirium data collated from 1 August to 20 February. Meanwhile, several other carriers have signalled their commitment to Ukraine. Ryanair, which has long eyed Ukraine as a potential growth market and has a significant presence there, has stated its intention to maintain links with the country. Group chief executive Michael O’Leary commented on 16 February that the airline had a “duty and obligation to support the people of Ukraine”, RTE reported. “It is important not to panic,” he said. “People need to get home and people want to leave and fly abroad to the EU – airlines have to provide that service.” Wizz Air, which data shows is the fourth-largest airline serving the country, notes that it has “not made any changes to flight schedules currently”, but is monitoring the situation, and urges passengers travelling to the country to monitor communications from the company. The largest airlines serving the country are local carriers Ukraine International Airlines, SkyUp and Windrose Airlines, data shows. Several of the country’s airlines have said they are being forced to park their leased aircraft outside of Ukraine because of insurance companies’ concerns over the security situation.

Lufthansa has decided not to implement compulsory redundancies for pilots while the airline is seeking ways to reduce staff amid the pandemic. The German airline group says that passenger numbers during the first quarter have been about 50% lower than during the same period in 2020. Voluntary redundancies have been used to reduce mainline captain positions and will now be offered to first officers, the airline says. Lufthansa Cargo pilots aged 55 and over will be offered early retirement plans. Additionally, the airline says, it is in talks with social partners about part-time pilot work agreements to “alleviate existing personnel surplus”. Pilots at former low-cost division Germanwings – its operation was permanently suspended in 2020 – have been offered transfers to Eurowings. Some 80 former Germanwings pilots have been seconded to the mainline. Lufthansa notes that training of new pilots will restart under a new flight school structure later this year.

Airbus is in discussions with all A350 operators about the surface deterioration issue that has led to legal action by Qatar Airways and the airframer’s cancelling of orders from the Gulf carrier. Referring to the issue as the “so-called surface degradation”, Airbus chief executive Guillaume Faury said during a 17 February results briefing: “We have been super-transparent and explained the situation to all operators. “I am happy to say that no other airline other than Qatar Airways sees it as an airworthiness issue. We consider it not an airworthiness issue, and this is also the assessment of EASA.” The European Union Aviation Safety Agency led the A350’s certification campaign. Other international regulators accepted the EU agency’s approval. Qatar Airways previously said it had been instructed by the nation’s civil aviation authority to ground some of its A350s because of the surface deterioration issue. Data shows that 21 of the carrier’s 53 A350s – comprising both -900s and -1000s – are listed as being in storage. Qatar has stopped taking deliveries of further A350s until the dispute has been resolved and, in December 2021, took legal action against Airbus in the UK. Airbus, in turn, disclosed in January that it had cancelled a Qatar Airways order for 50 A321neos. Earlier this month, the airframer revealed its cancellation of two A350-1000 delivery positions after the carrier had not picked up two completed aircraft. Another 21 A350-1000s remain an order for Qatar Airways. Faury denies an accusation that the act of cancelling the A321neo order may have been taken in self-interest as the narrowbody is among the airframer’s most popular product lines – with limited early delivery slots – while A350 orders have been affected by the slump in long-haul traffic amid the pandemic. “It’s not self-service, not at all,” Faury says. “It comes from the contractual situation with Qatar Airways. We are now in a legal dispute, and we have to take steps that are really linked to that very specific situation.” Faury describes the clash with Qatar Airways as “something we don't feel good about. We don't like to be in that situation. “It’s quite a unique situation. It’s a very public dispute and this has been made very public by our customer,” he says. “We have to take steps to protect ourselves and protect the company and that’s basically what we are doing.” Faury adds: “Obviously we continue to try to resolve the situation in a more amicable way, if possible.”