Major airline cancels 20,000 flights as ‘price of fuel doubles’ | World | News

German carrier Lufthansa will join numerous airlines in canceling flights on a large scale in the coming months, removing a planned 20,000 services from its schedule.

The German aviation giant will cut flights between May and October in a bid to save fuel, revealing the sweeping cancellations in a statement published on Tuesday (April 21).

“In total, 20,000 short-haul flights will be removed from the schedule by October, equivalent to approximately 40,000 metric tonnes of jet fuel, which will have doubled in price since the outbreak of the Iran conflict,” a Lufthansa spokesman said in an online statement. he said.

The statement continued: “The planned consolidation of the European network is taking place at six hubs of the Lufthansa Group in Frankfurt, Munich, Zurich, Vienna, Brussels and Rome. Passengers will therefore continue to have access to the global route network, especially long-haul connections.”

“But due to the rise in jet fuel prices, this will be done much more efficiently than before.”

The German airline also canceled around 120 flights per day starting from Monday, April 20. The carrier’s travel plans for the upcoming summer months will be announced “in late April or early May” and “will include optimizations on short-haul offerings for the entire summer season, thus ensuring schedule stability for the flight plan period,” according to the airline’s statement.

The announcement by Europe’s second-busiest airline follows remarks by the head of the International Energy Agency telling the Associated Press last week that Europe has “maybe six weeks of jet fuel left.”

As a result, many airlines are canceling flights and imposing new fares as the escalating jet fuel crisis sends shockwaves through the global aviation industry.

Lufthansa is among more than 30 airlines around the world that say they have been forced to cancel flights or face charges because of Trump’s war in Iran.