Bharat Bhise Reports on Deep Cuts Announced By Major US Carriers

Bharat Bhise expresses concern as American Airlines and Delta Air Lines announced cost-saving measures, including severe flight cuts, as the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic continues to rampage on.

Delta announced a 25% reduction on its international flights, while its domestic capacity is decreased by 10-15%. With much uncertainty in the air, the airline has also temporarily halted its financial prospects for the year. Other U.S. airlines have also taken this route.

American Airlines is set to cut its summer international flights by 10%, a clear indication of how the airline executives are preempting the business impact of the COVID-19. It also announced a 55% reduction to its overseas flight capacity as demand for travel to Asia plunges. Bharat Bhise explains this may be because the COVID-19 originated in Wuhan, China, late last year and has quickly spread to its neighboring countries Singapore, Japan, and South Korea.

American Airlines has already suspended flights to mainland China for the past several weeks and has extended that until October. It also announced a cut by 7.5% of its domestic capacity in April. These decisions follow similar courses of action made by JetBlue and United last week.

Meanwhile, President Donald Trump announced that his administration is actively working with the industries hit by the virus, which include airlines, cruise lines, and hotels. However, nothing specific was mentioned about what kind of aid would be provided.

Bharat Bhise notes that as more cases of the virus are being diagnosed in the country, bookings have plunged greatly with the trend likely to get worse, as predicted by Delta CEO Ed Bastian at the J.P. Morgan Industrials Conference. Incidentally, the event was turned into a webcast following increasing business precautions to contain the virus’ spread.

Despite the downturn of events, Bharat Bhise hopes that people will look at the brighter side, especially as an immense decrease in fuel prices will help limit the damage.