Qatar Airways has reportedly halted the deliveries of its Airbus A350s due to a flaw on the surface below the paint on some of its Airbus A350s.
The airline said that the surface below the paint was deteriorating faster than expected. It would not take any more deliveries of the widebody jet until the problem gets resolved. In an interview, Qatar Airways CEO Akbar Al Baker said:
“Qatar Airways continues to experience and has witnessed a condition in which the surface below the paint on some of its Airbus A350 aircraft has been degrading at an accelerated rate.
“We have an issue with Airbus we need to settle, and if we are not able to settle that serious issue we have with them, we will refuse to take any aircraft from them.”
The airline has grounded some of its A350s and said that it requires the underlying root cause behind the deterioration to be fully understood and solved before the delivery of new Airbus A350s.
The Doha based carrier also said that it has begun inspecting its entire A350 fleet more frequently to observe the condition closely. Qatar Airways is the largest operator of Airbus A350 with a fleet of 34 A350-900s and 19 A350-1000s. The airline has a further 23 A350-1000s on order.
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