Cathay Pacific is asking its 27,000 employees to take three weeks of unpaid leave in the coming months, the latest in a series of emergency measures forced on the embattled Hong Kong carrier by the coronavirus outbreak in China. The airline said Wednesday that it was appealing to all workers to take three weeks unpaid leave between March 1 and the end of June, citing a "significant" drop in demand for flights caused by the virus. "Preserving cash is the key to protecting our business," said the airline, which took similar measures during the global financial crisis and the 2003 outbreak of SARS. Cathay Pacific announced Tuesday that it was slashing flights to mainland China by 90% and making significant reductions elsewhere in its network over the next two months. Taken together, the total number of flights will be reduced by 30%. <br/>
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Qantas said an employee has been stood down for spreading misinformation about the safety of working on flights from China amid the coronavirus outbreak, but the Transport Workers’ Union said the man was simply providing advice to colleagues on their rights. The airline on Saturday announced it would suspend its two direct services to mainland China from 9 February due to travel restrictions imposed by other countries in the wake of the health crisis. A Qantas employee – who is also a delegate of the TWU – was stood down on Sunday pending an investigation. A source said the worker told other employees it was not safe to work on flights arriving from China, going against the advice of health authorities. Employees have been provided with additional safety equipment. “The TWU knows full well that the risk of aviation workers contracting coronavirus as a result of working on an aircraft originating from China is very low,” Brown said Thursday. Brown said additional protective measures were being put in place on flights from China to further reduce the risk of employees contracting coronavirus. The union has called on Qantas to re-instate the worker, who is a trained health and safety representative.<br/>
Qatar Airways is in talks to buy a 49% stake in Rwanda’s national carrier as the Gulf airline looks to grow its presence in one of the world’s fast-growing aviation markets. Qatar Airways CE Akbar Al Baker Wednesday said he was negotiating to buy a stake in the state-owned airline, pointing to Africa as a region with big growth potential. It comes just weeks after the Doha-based carrier agreed a deal to buy a 60% stake in Rwanda’s new Bugesera International Airport, located in the capital Kigali, which Al Baker said would have capacity for 10m passengers. “In Africa, there is a big demand for air travel which today is very poorly connected, so we always look at opportunities in our field to do investments similar to what we have done in the past,” said Al Baker. He added that the attraction of Kigali was its “location, the stability of the country and the very favourable business environment that exists in that country”. Al Baker said the airline would take “our time to negotiate” the deal with RwandAir. He also noted that Qatar Airways was still interested in buying a stake in India’s IndiGo, but said it was waiting for the right “atmosphere” for it to do a deal.<br/>
The coronavirus epidemic will have a only a marginal impact on global travel demand and the airline industry is healthy enough to absorb any economic slowdown in China, the CE of BA parent IAG said Wednesday. Dozens of airlines have suspended flights to China in response to the worsening health emergency that has killed close to 500, while a meeting of international aviation officials in Singapore was cancelled. “The aviation industry is very robust. We may see some marginal impact,” IAG CEO Willie Walsh said. BA has suspended flights between London Heathrow and Beijing and Shanghai, which Walsh said represented around 1% of the airline’s capacity. There had been no impact on the group’s other airlines. Walsh said he did not expect the virus to deter people from travelling. Asked if the industry was healthy enough to absorb a downturn in China’s economy, he said: “without question” adding that airlines were more capable of responding to economic shocks than in the past. Qatar Airways, which owns a minority stake in IAG, has also cancelled passenger flights to China, though its CE said that was because other countries had placed entry restrictions on those who had recently visited China.<br/>