In a live stream on board of Qatar Airways Boeing 777-300ER heading to Farnborough Airshow, the Qatari national carrier CEO gave his honest opinion, as usual, in many issues that faces the industry and his airline dispute with the European manufacturer Airbus.
First, Mr. Akbar Al-Baker told the CNBC news that Qatar Airways never stopped its flight during the pandemic, therefore, Qatar Airways was the only profitable airline in the year 2021. Even though the airline paid more than1.5 billion U.S Dollar in refunds to passengers who their flights were cancelled due to lockdowns.
"We have never left millions of peoples stranded during the pandemic. In actual fact, we carried 3.3 million passengers during the peak of the pandemic from March to June of 2020 safely to their homes." Mr. Al-Baker said.
When asked about airports chaos, Mr. Al-Baker criticized airports executives who didn't anticipate this surge in demand for air travelling.
"Non of those people saw this coming, they should have known! They rely on data, but they don't go to the field to see what is the problem until the.... hit the fan" Al-Baker said.
As for the Airbus dispute, Mr. Al-Baker made it clear that there will be no solution for the dispute outside court. He also said that Airbus has no permanent solution for the surface problem of the A350.
Mr. Al-Baker highly praised Boeing, describing the American manufacturer as "mightier" aircraft maker than Airbus. Mr. Al-Baker said that even though Boeing is facing many difficulties for the time being, but he trusts that Boeing will overcome all the problems.