Carrying on in a sea of troubles

The importance of aviation during one of the Middle East’s worst bouts of conflict for 30 years was summed up by AACO secretary-general Abdul Wahab Teffaha as he moderated a panel of airline CEOs during the organisation’s annual meeting.

What helped him to keep going in the crisis, he said, was the sight of aircraft continuing to land and take off from Beirut’s Rafic Hariri International Airport, providing vital connectivity for Lebanon. Seeing the airport still operating in the face of such adversity was the only thing that gave him “a glimmer of hope” in the situation.

Maintaining those international links was also the critical mission of Middle East Airlines (MEA) the airline’s chairman told the meeting.

MEA’s top priority had been to continue to serve Lebanon and keep the airport open, Mohamed El-Hout said. Although there had been risk in operating into Beirut during the crisis, it had been a calculated risk, he said.

AACO’s Teffaha said that, with Israeli military aircraft continuing their assault, Beirut-based AACO’s staff had continued preparations for the annual meeting despite the nightly explosions of bombs and missiles.

“The office never closed in Beirut. Luckily we're all OK, we're all fine, we're all sane, which is the most important thing. Obviously, this episode is extremely stressful for anyone who is living in such an environment where buildings are being destroyed, people are dying and so on.

AACO’s meeting was held in the calm of the Jordanian side of the Dead Sea, with executives clearly able to see Israel, less than 10km across the water.

After MEA, Royal Jordanian (RJ) has been the airline worst affected by the conflict, despite Jordan maintaining its traditional calm. Misplaced fear that Jordan is caught up in the fighting has seen tourist numbers to the country plummeting; for example, visitor numbers to the ancient city of Petra are down to 20 per cent of normal, one tourism official confided.

Despite the turmoil, RJ was pressing ahead with both route and fleet plans, said CEO Samer Majali.

The airline is opening several new destinations and the Amman-based carrier is continuing to take deliveries of aircraft as part of a major fleet rollover.

RJ’s experience in operating in difficult regions was demonstrated in October through its restart of flights to the Libyan capital Tripoli and the company’s plans to start flying to Benghazi in the east of the country. Aden, in Yemen, will also soon feature on the carrier’s route map once again.

And in the midst of the year-long conflict, RJ opened new routes to London Stansted and Manchester in the UK, re-opened services to Berlin and Düsseldorf in Germany and is scheduled to start services to Stockholm, Sweden.

Majali said that much of RJ’s ability to cope with the problems was down to the fact that it had lived through similar events several times in recent decades.

While most airlines had to handle the 2008 recession and the pandemic, Jordan’s geographic position had meant that it had also been at the centre of two Gulf wars and the periodic flare-ups between Israel and its Arab neighbours.

While acknowledging the tragedy and gravity of the recent conflict, he made the point that “We’re used to dealing with this stuff.”

Aircraft deliveries to RJ have also continued over the year – notably, five of a batch of eight Embraer E195 E2s, “Which is a major cost saving” compared to both their E170 and E190 E1 predecessors and several elderly Airbus A320s, which the Brazilian aircraft has replaced on several surprisingly long routes, such as the five-hour sector between Amman and Amsterdam Schiphol.

This has helped offset the increasing costs imposed by having to fly longer routes around the conflict zone on Jordan’s doorstep. Unable to fly over Israel, diverting over Syria took an extra 20 minutes; over Egypt, an extra 30.

Aircraft deliveries also featured in comments by a senior Emirates executive at the annual meeting, who foresaw even longer delays before the first of the airline’s planned Boeing 777Xs arrives in Dubai.

The long-delayed new 777 model has caused huge frustration to Emirates’ president Sir Tim Clark, who has delivered a series of increasingly-sharp public demands that the US aircraft manufacturer improves its performance. The 777X should have started to arrive in 2020, but the latest estimated delivery date is 2026.

However, even that timescale could prove to be inaccurate said Emirates’ CCO, Adnan Kazim. Speaking on the sidelines of the meeting, he said that factors such as the almost eight-week autumn 2024 strike at Boeing, combined with the discovery of a cracked thrust link in one of the 777 flight-test aircraft’s GE9X engines, could mean deliveries slipping even further.

“We don’t have any timeline on whether it will be mid-2026 or even 2027,” he said. Boeing currently believed it would deliver the first aircraft some time in Q3 2026, “but there are a lot of unknowns going on.”

On the positive side, he said, the first Airbus A350-900 would enter service in January 2025.

Emirates plans to use its 65 A350s for both regional services to secondary destinations around the Gulf, Europe and the Indian subcontinent, and also for ultra long-haul missions to the Americas and Australia.

Initial destinations will include European cities including Edinburgh, Lyon and Bologna, Gulf destinations including Bahrain, Kuwait and Oman, and Indian locations such as Mumbai and Ahmedabad.

Emirates will use two versions of the Airbus A350 – a ‘regional’ version with 312 seats, followed by the ultra-long-range variant with 290 seats and a crew rest area. Both versions will have a three-class configuration comprising business, premium economy and economy.

The aircraft is important for Emirates as it is the first new type to enter the inventory since 2008 and allows a more economical aircraft to operate on routes too ‘thin’ for the larger Boeing 777-300ER and Airbus A380.