The Current State of the Airline Industry is Worse Than You Think
When you think about an industry that has been disproportionately affected by this pandemic, the airline industry will come to mind. Since borders are shut and people are afraid to travel, this industry is virtually dead. As a result, some pilots and flight attendants have to be retrenched. To keep the cost of operation low, they have to be let go. It’s unfortunate that this industry that’s at the height of success due to booming tourism around the world is now facing a terrible crisis. The lack of profit and the retrenchment of employers might already seem bad, but it’s even worse for the industry.
Planes have to keep flying
Airlines are trying to reduce the overall cost of operations, but they still have a problem- the need to constantly fly planes. Imagine flying planes to different destinations but without making any profit. The expenses are roughly the same, but they’re not getting out of it.
Why? Airplanes, like your car, have to be constantly used to guarantee their performance. Otherwise, they will deteriorate. The moving parts will start to have repair issues. Dealing with those problems later will be costlier than just flying the plane constantly. Another issue is that airlines have to keep their routes. In order to land at certain airports, especially the busy ones, they have to pay for their spot. They also need to keep their planes flying there. Otherwise, they could lose it to another airline. Due to the cost, some airlines have decided to just let go of their spots. Others remain hopeful that they can use those spots soon, so they keep paying the fees and flying the planes.
Pilots couldn’t do the job well
Even if things get better in the future and flights get back to normal, there are still problems that will linger. Pilot training is one of them. Pilots have to keep flying to earn more hours and become better at their job. They can no longer do it because there are fewer flights. Others have been laid off and couldn’t practice the profession. If they get back to work, they have to work on retraining. Add to that the pressure this crisis brought to their mental health. Staying mentally healthy is extremely important for pilots. If the terrible situation of the industry is wearing them down, they might have a hard time focusing when they have to work again. Imagine the impact of the stress on pilots to the safety of the passengers.
Fewer competitions
We’ve already heard about some airlines that have filed for bankruptcy. Some of them are huge airlines, and others even have a huge stake from the government. Their closure is terrible for the industry in general. There will be fewer competition and some airlines will feel free to raise the airline tickets as much as they want. Even without this problem, tickets will increase anyway to recuperate overall losses due to this pandemic.
Hopefully, we can still avert this crisis and salvage the airline industry.
Photo Attribution:
1st and featured image from https://davidsuzuki.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/Climate-change-basics-air-travel-climate-change-hero-1024×614.jpg
2nd image from https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2020-04-24/coronavirus-travel-covid-19-will-change-airlines-and-how-we-fly
