South Island-Aust bubble open but Air NZ says operation ‘not viable’

Green channel flights from the South Island across the Tasman will be delayed for the foreseeable future because of the Australian Government’s Covid-19 quarantine requirements affecting Air New Zealand crew. Last week the Australian government announced quarantine-free travel from New Zealand's South Island would resume from October 20 for double vaccinated people who had not been in the North Island for two weeks. However, Air New Zealand says most of its crew are based out of Auckland, which means the Australian government's crew quarantine requirement is not viable for the airline. Air New Zealand chief customer and sales officer Leanne Geraghty says as a result, only red-zone flights – which require passengers to quarantine for 14 days – from Auckland are flying to Australia. “While we would love to be able to operate quarantine-free flights out of Christchurch, there are a number of operational issues for our airline. The Australian government has stated that our crew need to have been in the South Island for the preceding 14 days before quarantine-free flying. As our main crew group is based out of Auckland, this is unfortunately not viable,” Geraghty says. “For our Aussie neighbours who have been stuck in Aotearoa for the past few months, we are operating two flights per week from Auckland to Sydney from November 5, and from December 1 these services will ramp up to six flights per week. Customers in the South Island are able to transit in Auckland and connect with these services.”<br/>