Australian Aviation News August 2024

A summary of the latest news from the Australian Aviation industry. New routes, new planes, everything aviation in Australia.

9th August 2024 – Qantas temporarily reroutes Perth to London flight via Singapore

With concerns that war could break out in the Middle East, Qantas have made the decision to re-route the Perth to London flight via Singapore to avoid that airspoace.

Read more about the decision for Qantas to reroute Perth – London flights.

8th August 2024 – Alan Joyce payout has been reduced by Qantas board

The Board at Qantas have decided to cut the payout of former CEO of Qantas by almost $10 million dollars due to irreversible damaged caused to the reputation to the company. Alan Joyce retired in September 2023 after spending 15 years at the company and earning over $125 Million during that time.

Read more about the reduction in Alan Joyce’s payout.

6th August 2024 – Air Vanuatu recommencing flights to Australia

After Air Vanuatu grounded all their flights between Vanuatu and Australia back on Thursday 9th May 2024, this week their liquidators have announced they will resschedule charter flights. The liquidator EY, will annouce the start dates of the flights in the very new future.

Read more about the annoucement for Vanuatu Air flights to Australia.

3rd August 2024 – Countdown till Gold Coast Pacific Airshow 2024

Just 3 weeks until the start of the Gold Coast Pacific Airshow 2024 which will be running from 16th – 18th August 2024.

See more details about the Coast Coast Pacific Airshow 2024.

3rd August 2024 – Busiest year on record for Gold Cold Domestic Airport

The last financial year FY24 has seen the highest number of domestic passenger numbers at Gold Coast Airport. With over 5.6 Million passengers flying in/out of Gold Coast and seeing the Gold Coast – Sydney and Gold Coast – Melbourne on the top 5 busiest routes in the country.

Experts are saying, the cost of living crisis is seeing families head to the Gold Coast for a holiday rather than head overseas.

Also on the international route between Gold Coast to Auckland saw an 8% increase in passenger numbers.

Read more about the Gold Coast increased passenger numbers.

2nd August 2024 – New flights out of Cairns International Airport:

Cathay Pacific will recommence flights between Cairns Airport and Hong Kong Airport starting in December 2024. Cathay Pacific will use their 2 class configured A330 plane on this route.

Read more about Cathay Pacific flights to Cairns.

Also AirAsia Indonesia will begin flights between Cairns Airport and Bali Denpasar airport later this month, August 2024.
Read more about the AirAsia flights to Cairns.

2nd August 2024 – Large growth in passenger numbers at Adelaide Airport for 2024 Financial Year.

Adelaide airport has recorded an impressive growth in both domestic and international passengers passing through the airport. At the end of FY24, Adelaide airport recorded over 8.5 million passengers, of which 7.58 million were domestic passengers (an increase of 7% compared to the previous year) and just under 1 million passengers, (958,000) and increase of 37.1% compared to FY23.

The main driver in the massive increase in international passengers were due to the increase seat numbers on both Singapore Airlines and Qatar Airways which now use larger planes (Qatar switched to using B777 increasing seats numbers by 71 seats per flight). Also Jetstar saw an increase in the seat numbers by 25% using their new Airbus A321Neo aircraft for their flights to Bali.

See all the stats for passengers numbers at Adelaide airport.

1st August 2024 – It’s been a tough week for REX (Regional Express) Airline. Earlier this week their shares on the ASX Australian Securities Exchange went into a trading halt. On Wednesday an announcement was made that they had been put into voluntary administration, with EY Australia (previously known as Ernst and Young) appointed to look into the finances of the airline to see if the company can be salvage. Flights between the capital cities Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane on the B737 planes, have been grounded and ticket sales halted. Their regional routes continue to operate. The regional routes are operated by Rex’s smaller twin prop Saab 340B planes.

Virgin Australia Airlines and Qantas have stepped up to help passengers stranded by the grounding of the Rex Airliens B737s. Read more on this Sydney Morning Herald article.

1st August 2024 – Qantas have a massive Red Tail Sale with 450,000 seats discounted to loads of different International destinations. Some outstanding fares include return flights from Sydney to Singapore for only $749, Sydney to Bangkok return for $879 and Sydney to London return for $1799.

Check out all the sales prices on Qantas’ Red Tail Sale page.