The perfect storm making long-haul travel more expensive

Engine shortages, airspace closures and Boeing delays are hitting the pockets of air passengers

Would all passengers please return to their seats and fasten their seatbelts. Your flight is about to become significantly more expensive.
A recent report by the Office for National Statistics found that airfares rose by 22 per cent between July and August 2024. Flight tickets usually go up during this period, but the ONS said that this was the second-largest month-on-month rise since 2001. 
The squeeze on intercontinental flights intensified this week after British Airways announced the cancellation of hundreds of long-haul services over the winter due to problems with its Rolls-Royce jet engines. 
The flag carrier has delayed the launch of its services to Kuala Lumpur, halved frequencies to Qatar, and suspended services between Gatwick and New York JFK.
The issue is that BA’s Boeing 787 Dreamliner engines have suffered excessive wear and tear, but Rolls-Royce has failed to supply enough replacement engines to keep them all in the skies. This is due to “supply chain constraints… affecting the whole aerospace industry,” according to a Rolls-Royce spokesman.
Many of the thousands of affected passengers will be placed on alternative BA flights, or on routes operated by partners such as Qatar Airways. But a reduction of services means the same number of passengers are vying for fewer seats, which is causing steeper fares ahead of the already expensive Christmas period. Unfortunately for passengers, this is just one lightning bolt in a growing storm of problems facing the aviation industry in 2024.
It is now two-and-a-half years since Russia closed its airspace to airlines from dozens of countries (including the UK) in the wake of its invasion of Ukraine. The airspace shutdown means that carriers travelling from Europe to east Asia need to take alternative routes to their usual flightpath over Siberia.
Ian Petrechenik of flight-tracking website FlightRadar24 says: “Most airlines with flights between Europe and Asia have shifted their flights south to avoid Russian airspace. Instead of heading east through Russia and then south to destinations in Japan, South Korea, China and elsewhere in south-east Asia, flights now first travel south to cross via Turkey, central Asia, China and Mongolia.
“Travelling eastbound, this adds approximately one hour of flying time. On the return trip, flights can now take up to three hours longer.”
Longer flights mean more than just a couple of hours of inconvenience for passengers. They mean more fuel, sometimes more crew members, and may also affect an airline’s ability to use a certain aircraft for a route. Fares cannot remain static in these conditions. A study by the German Aerospace Center found that seats on flights between Europe and Asia above the 50th latitude have increased by an average of $43 (£33) since the Russian airspace closure.
The rollout of the Boeing 777X, first scheduled to grace our skies in 2020, has just been delayed by another year to 2026 because of certification and testing delays. The situation has been exacerbated by the strike action of more than 33,000 Boeing engineers, ongoing since September 14.
Boeing has received 481 orders for the 777-9 (one of the 777X models), including from Emirates, Qatar Airways, British Airways and Lufthansa. Emirates put in an order of more than 150 of the jets a decade ago, and the airline’s president has hit out at the continuing delays.
“Emirates has had to make significant and highly expensive amendments to our fleet programmes as a result of Boeing’s multiple contractual shortfalls, and we will be having a serious conversation with them over the next couple of months,” said Tim Clark in a written statement.
The delayed delivery of new planes can have a trickle-down effect on ticket prices. Earlier this year, Michael O’Leary, the chief executive of Ryanair, said fares would be 10 per cent more expensive owing to the delayed delivery of 57 Boeing 737 Max aircraft, for example. Tallying with this figure, aviation consultant Robert Mann told American broadcaster CBS that aircraft production issues could spike domestic US airfares by as much as 10 per cent.
Airfares could nudge up even further after the Budget is delivered on October 30. Telegraph Travel’s chief consumer and culture editor, Nick Trend, says: “Could the cost of holidays go up as a result of the Budget? It seems likely.”
Potential areas that could hit passengers include a rise in air passenger duty, a tax which raises £4.5 billion per year and would be viewed as an easy revenue-earner for the Government. Another could be the introduction of a jet fuel tax. Currently airlines do not pay tax on the 11.1 million tons of fuel that they buy each year. The lobbying group Transport and Environment estimates that a new tax could take between £400 million and £5.9 billion annually: “The cost of any such tax would certainly be passed on to passengers,” predicts Trend.
With a shortfall of engines, delayed aircraft, and tightening airspace – plus the high price of jet fuel, the looming introduction of SAF, and global pilot shortages – it seems that the price of flying is only going in one direction.