Europe’s airlines: which one is the next to fail?

Are you expecting more airline failures in Europe in 2019? With dramatic voice, CNN’s Richard Quest put forward this question to five airline CEO’s in the closing debate at last week’s Airlines 4 Europe (A4E) Aviation Summit in Brussels. “Yes!”, was the verbal and non-verbal reply from all of them, easyjet’s Johan Lundgren, IAG’s Willie Walsh, Lufthansa’s Carsten Spohr, Air France-KLM’s Pieter Elbers, and Ryanair’s Michael O’Leary.

Last year saw the demise of amongst others Scandinavia’s Primera, Lithuania’s Small Planet, Cypriot Cobalt, while this year Germania and flybmi have ceased operations. High fuel costs last year are often quoted as the main factor for the financial troubles that pushed airlines out, but the five bosses were surprised that problems have caught out more airlines this year now that fuel has become cheaper again.
Airinsight listened to what the CEO’s had to say on Europe’s state and caught up with some personally: