Sydney, June 25, 2026, 06:03 AEST
- Qantas has one A380 set for extra wing inspections, though the plane is in scheduled maintenance. The carrier does not expect this to affect flights.
- Europe’s safety order includes 16 A380s. Five Emirates planes must be checked before they fly again, and the Qantas jet has 25 cycles.
- Qantas shares finished Wednesday at A$10.29, rising 1.6% ahead of Thursday’s Australian market open.
Qantas Airways said one of its Airbus A380 jets will get extra wing checks after an emergency safety order from Europe, but the airline doesn’t expect any impact on its flight schedule. “There is no impact to Qantas flights as a result of the airworthiness directive,” a spokesperson said. The Wall Street Journal
EU regulators say cracks spotted in earlier inspections might hurt the wing’s strength. The wing spar, a key load-bearing beam, is inside the wing. The new directive, active as of Wednesday, applies to 16 aircraft.
Emirates has 15 of the jets flagged for inspection, while Qantas has one. Of the Emirates planes, five need to be checked before flying again. The rest—11 jets—have to be inspected within 25 flight cycles. Each cycle is a takeoff and landing. Qantas’s jet, tail number VH-OQI, is in Dresden, Germany, for heavy maintenance.
Airbus said it will go over the results with EASA to see if repairs are needed or if the plane can go back into commercial service.
Qantas closed Wednesday at A$10.29, rising 16 Australian cents, with roughly 9.8 million shares exchanged. The shares hadn’t traded yet on Thursday. Regular ASX trading is set to start at around 10 a.m. Sydney time.
Fuel prices eased, giving the sector some lift. Brent crude slid under $74 a barrel on Wednesday. Jet fuel averaged $119.17 a barrel in the week to June 19, well below the $170-plus highs seen during the Iran war. Morningstar analyst Nicolas Owens said short-term airline earnings can move counter to fuel, since tickets were sold before costs fell.
Qantas said in April it expects its fuel bill for the second half of fiscal 2026 to come in between A$3.1 billion and A$3.3 billion. The carrier hedged around 90% of its crude exposure with contracts aimed at buffering price swings, but most of its jet-fuel refining margin risk is still unhedged. Qantas also cut domestic capacity for the fourth quarter by roughly 5 percentage points and put plans for a A$150 million share buyback on hold.
A cost or timing hit is still possible from the inspection. EASA called the move an interim action and warned that more orders might come. If an inspector spots a discrepancy, the plane can’t fly again until Airbus repair instructions are followed. A bigger inspection scope or fixes that drag out would cut A380 availability.
Qantas will move part of its long-haul fleet to 12 modified Airbus A350-1000ULR jets for Project Sunrise. Sydney-London nonstop service is set for October 2027, with tickets expected to go on sale in February. “What they are selling is time,” said aviation analyst John Strickland. Qantas wants higher fares from business and premium economy passengers. The airline says the project could add over A$400 million a year to earnings. Reuters
