Covid-19; Impact on the aviation industry

MJohnston

Podge_irl wrote: »

Where did you see this? First I'm hearing of it and I'm in Switz!

https://twitter.com/followdpts/status/1249347060618452992?s=21

john boye

murphaph wrote: »

I wonder if ironically for Boeing this could be a lifesaver. It will suppress orders for the neo, giving Boeing precious time to sort out the issues with the max. Maybe.

A bit more extreme but I wonder if they'd cancel the entire max program if they got enough cancellations.

TheDriver

zone 1 wrote: »

im the same TFS but it depends on borders been open are we allowed will aircraft be flying. talk is not much happening till at least sept according to mirror today

Could go either way. Spain is surprisingly letting certain people out to work and 10 weeks is a long time. I wouldn't be surprised either way.

MJohnston

TheDriver wrote: »

Could go either way. Spain is surprisingly letting certain people out to work and 10 weeks is a long time. I wouldn't be surprised either way.

There's a big gap between a country loosening restrictions for their own citizens, and reopening international travel. It seems pretty likely that we're going to require measures like 2-week quarantines on international arrivals, at a minimum, until a vaccine is available. As reliant as somewhere like Spain might on tourism, a second wave would be even more devastating than closing their air borders for the rest of the year.

bk

I'm expecting that many countries will lock down international travel as we come into the summer months. I suspect we will see a surge in imported cases into countries and as a result, every country will come under political pressure to keep out the possibly infected.

Just look at China today, 108 new cases today, 98 of them imported from outside China!

I suspect countries will lift internal restrictions, but will highly restrict travel.

I know folks are desperate to get back to work and desperate to go travelling, but the reality is I don't think travel and international tourism will return to normal until a vaccine is in place and widespread.

BTW As for Boeing, it will get bailed out by the US government. Too important to their economy and a major military contractor. Airbus too will get EU support, though in better shape then Boeing.

MJohnston

bk wrote: »

I know folks are desperate to get back to work and desperate to go travelling, but the reality is I don't think travel and international tourism will return to normal until a vaccine is in place and widespread.

I think the key is that most people are just desperate to get back to some kind of socialising and getting the kids out of the house. The reopening priorities are creches/schools, then less essential services, then offices. International travel is very far down that list, especially if it becomes the case that we can 'staycation' and we get a decent bout of warm weather.

Inquitus

murphaph wrote: »

I wonder if ironically for Boeing this could be a lifesaver. It will suppress orders for the neo, giving Boeing precious time to sort out the issues with the max. Maybe.

Not so sure, it would enable people to switch from the Max and get an A320 Neo much quicker as there will be a lot of A320 cancellations which could remove significant delays, the main reason Airlines remained committed to the Max is there was a 4-5 year waiting list for the Airbus plane.

TheDriver

MJohnston wrote: »

I think the key is that most people are just desperate to get back to some kind of socialising and getting the kids out of the house. The reopening priorities are creches/schools, then less essential services, then offices. International travel is very far down that list, especially if it becomes the case that we can 'staycation' and we get a decent bout of warm weather.

I'd say schools will be last before international travel. Hundreds of kids packed into classrooms

MKelly1122

I thought kids didn’t act as carriers of it? Boeing will be fine and can fall back on a bailout.

Irish Steve

MKelly1122 wrote: »

I thought kids didn’t act as carriers of it? Boeing will be fine and can fall back on a bailout.

Very much the opposite, Kids can and have carried it without showing any symptoms, hence the concern, and the reason for closing the schools first, all too easy for the kids to get it, take it home, and it's only when the older members of the family go down with it that they discover the kids were the carriers.

Gael23

Pat Dunne wrote: »

If it in Spain don’t be making plans just yet.
The Spanish government are talking about a phased return to large scale tourism and this might be Sept at the earliest.

It’s in Italy, even worse!

JohnC.

Comhra wrote: »

I would be very wary of going to Spain (or Italy) in the near or medium future, even if travel is resumed. I would be very nervous about the presence of Covid-19 in tourist resorts cities or any place with movement of people. I imagine it will be very difficult to completely eradicate the virus in say, the next 6-9 month time-frame. Too much risk.

Not just that, but if it did start to increase again, the lockdown could return very rapidly and people risking holidays will be going through all that again.

Podge_irl

MJohnston wrote: »

https://twitter.com/followdpts/status/1249347060618452992?s=21

Cheers. Not seen that reported anywhere - the focus is on the proposed steps to start lightening the restrictions on April 26th. Interesting.

Tenzor07

MKelly1122 wrote: »

I thought kids didn’t act as carriers of it? Boeing will be fine and can fall back on a bailout.

Children are vectors for the Virus and can infect others.

Boeing hasn't accepted any government bailout and aren't in negotiations for one currently.

MJohnston

TheDriver wrote: »

I'd say schools will be last before international travel. Hundreds of kids packed into classrooms

Nah, if you look at the patterns most other countries are following or planning, schools/crèches are some of the earlier reopenings.

TheDriver

MJohnston wrote: »

Nah, if you look at the patterns most other countries are following or planning, schools/crèches are some of the earlier reopenings.

Which is surprising. I find it interesting that lots of countries are lifting or planning lifting restrictions including hard hit countries such as Spain.

Cookiemunster

TheDriver wrote: »

Which is surprising. I find it interesting that lots of countries are lifting or planning lifting restrictions including hard hit countries such as Spain.

You can only stay in lockdown so long before the economy collapses. Some sort of happy medium is going to be the future, not a continous lockdown with no end date in sight.

zell12

Newstalk currently discussing the empty skies in Europe/busy skies in US

"aviation is the mode which has spread this pandemic around the world"

bk

Tenzor07 wrote: »

Boeing hasn't accepted any government bailout and aren't in negotiations for one currently.

They are, they are getting $17 Billion out of the 2 Trillion stimulus package in the US. They are also getting other indirect bailouts via military contracts, long been a controversial method to prop them up.

You are correct in that the CEO is trying to avoid giving the government actual equity in the company in return for bailout. However if things get much worse, they won't have much choice.

Blut2

MJohnston wrote: »

Nah, if you look at the patterns most other countries are following or planning, schools/crèches are some of the earlier reopenings.

TheDriver wrote: »

Which is surprising. I find it interesting that lots of countries are lifting or planning lifting restrictions including hard hit countries such as Spain.

Kids if infected are either asymptomatic or get very very mild symptoms. And people under 50 are only very very rarely hospitalized, and almost never die. So the current theory is that given we need to get to approx 60% of society infected before we get herd immunity, then letting children and their comparatively young parents get infected first is a good way to get us a decent chunk of the way towards that number safely.

Irish Steve

So if we are going to try and build herd immunity, it might be an idea to make sure that the hospitals have the capacity to properly cope with the rest of the population without collapsing under the load, given the significant numbers over 50, or are you thinking that they don't matter in the global scale of things?

Right now, the whole reason for the lockdown is to make sure that we don't see the sort of numbers of deaths that are happening in a number of countries that were even less prepared for this, and we're not there yet, the numbers of Intensive care beds are still very marginal, as are the number of respirators available, and PPE issues are nowhere near resolved yet, if everyone has to start wearing masks when they are outdoors, the numbers needed are going to be way above anything that's been available up to now, and right now, the problems are that nursing homes and residential care locations are seeing a massive surge in cases and fatalities.

We are far from flattening the curve, today's deaths make grim reading, 41 in the last 24 hours.

I for one don't want to spend the next 12 months in virtual lockdown while some of the rest of the world get back to the new "normal", whatever that may be, but as things look from my corner of the ring, I'm not going to have a lot of options.

This is far from over, and I just hope that the relevant people making the decisions don't panic, what we for sure do not need for quite some time yet is a return to massive numbers coming in through the airports and bringing yet more cases with them.

Blut2

Unfortunately with a vaccine at best 18 months away, and a full economic lockdown unsustainable for much longer, the only solution to "beat the virus" anywhere in Europe is going to be herd immunity. Thats why states across Europe are already relaxing lockdown measures this week, despite the deaths still clocking up - theres just no way to contain this virus fully now that its out there. The economic lockdown just bought us time to rapidly expand our healthcare facilities as best we could, to try to minimize future capacity issues as much as possible. But it didn't, and couldn't, solve the crisis - it just helped reduce the number of casualties to come.

Given that the question then becomes how best to achieve herd immunity while minimizing deaths. Which is why governments are aiming to spread the virus first if at all possible in younger, less at risk, age demographics if they can. Over 70s, or those younger but with underlying health conditions, will by necessity of their risk status have to stay cocooned for far, far longer than the rest of society.

In an aviation context countries are already announcing that their borders are opening up anytime from May-June, and most airlines are currently planning on flight capacity increasing from May on-wards: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1cRgtHZ4sRPj4BdcJa2y09SKaG8SRrLLtntHSegfmmoU/htmlview

So I would expect aviation traffic to begin increasing rapidly from June on-wards. Not to pre-crisis levels, but certainly to many multiples of where its currently at.

Kcormahs

Any word from the Irish Government on helping the airlines in this country?
Lufthansa group is getting a bailout from 4 different countries where they have markets
Af/klm getting 6bn bailout from France and Holland
Talks of alitalia and tap being nationalised by their governments shortly
US3 getting a massivr state aid by US gov

No word on helping either Aer Lingus or the IAG group from anyone? LH group and AF/KLM are private too....
Would the government buy Aer Lingus or even Ryanair back/ nationalise if they didnt manage to sustain the operation anymore?

Spanish Eyes

Looks like Costa del Back and Tan for a while so. BACK I said, lol.

Tenzor07

bk wrote: »

They are, they are getting $17 Billion out of the 2 Trillion stimulus package in the US. They are also getting other indirect bailouts via military contracts, long been a controversial method to prop them up.
You are correct in that the CEO is trying to avoid giving the government actual equity in the company in return for bailout. However if things get much worse, they won't have much choice.

They aren't accepting it, what will happen is if there's too many stipulations tied to the agreement of a government loan, they will take out loans with interest instead.

If things get much worse as you say they still have choice!
Boeing could lay off 90% of staff if they wanted, keep the production lines closed as they are now, basically go into hibernation for the next 2 years, the company would survive, and restart production in 2022 albeit with low rates of production, however this would match demand.

Tenzor07

Kcormahs wrote: »

Any word from the Irish Government on helping the airlines in this country?
Lufthansa group is getting a bailout from 4 different countries where they have markets
Af/klm getting 6bn bailout from France and Holland
Talks of alitalia and tap being nationalised by their governments shortly
US3 getting a massivr state aid by US gov
No word on helping either Aer Lingus or the IAG group from anyone? LH group and AF/KLM are private too....
Would the government buy Aer Lingus or even Ryanair back/ nationalise if they didnt manage to sustain the operation anymore?

Why would the Irish taxpayer bail out IAG, a Spanish multinational?

RA have €4 billion in the bank, probably more than Ireland has at the moment!

Nationalising an airline such as Ryanair would basically destroy it, so doesn't make sense at all.

Kcormahs

Tenzor07 wrote: »

Why would the Irish taxpayer bail out IAG, a Spanish multinational?

RA have €4 billion in the bank, probably more than Ireland has at the moment!

Nationalising an airline such as Ryanair would basically destroy it, so doesn't make sense at all.

Austrian brussels airlines etc are all under the german market too but those countries are giving them a bailout
Plus it was the Irish gov who created Aer Lingus and its first owner until not too long ago

Even if they have liquidity at present, that wont last forever. If abroad there are talks of nationalising airlines and bailouts like in the US, why would they Irish gov let the two main airlines die away? They are both important to the country specially EI with its cargo etc

Tenzor07

Kcormahs wrote: »

Even if they have liquidity at present, that wont last forever. If abroad there are talks of nationalising airlines and bailouts like in the US, why would they Irish gov let the two main airlines die away? They are both important to the country specially EI with its cargo etc

In this current crisis what once seemed crazy can now seem normal, so I mean governments could take a stake in AL with loans from the ECB bank, or whatever financial vehicle they're calling it, just to keep some of the vital routes to the UK and EU open, what that looks like I don't know, 50%? More? Would IAG want this, or raise the price to the irish taxpayer?

As for Ryanair, are you serious, O'leary would rather sell the fleet for scrap on the open market than let any government have a controlling stake in it...

Kcormahs

Tenzor07 wrote: »

In this current crisis what once seemed crazy can now seem normal, so I mean governments could take a stake in AL with loans from the ECB bank, or whatever financial vehicle they're calling it, just to keep some of the vital routes to the UK and EU open, what that looks like I don't know, 50%? More? Would IAG want this, or raise the price to the irish taxpayer?

As for Ryanair, are you serious, O'leary would rather sell the fleet for scrap on the open market than let any government have a controlling stake in it...

Only for Europe and UK? No USA?

As for Ryanair yeah you are right although you never know

Tenzor07

Kcormahs wrote: »

Only for Europe and UK? No USA?

We do more trade with UK/EU than USA and there's still U.S carriers flying into Ireland, I mean travel is going to be shadow of itself until this virus has a widely available cure or effective treatment for all.