Qantas will resume flying some of its Airbus 380 aircraft from Saturday but it will take "some time" before the entire fleet is in service as it moves to replace some Rolls-Royce engines, chief executive Alan Joyce said.
Qantas will put two of its six A380s back in the air this week but the other four aircraft will stay out of service for the rest of the year as the airline will have to fix 16 engines, or around two-thirds of all engines in service.
Qantas grounded its fleet of six Airbus A380s on November 4th after one of its Rolls-Royce engines partly disintegrated mid-flight, forcing a plane with 466 people on board to make an emergency landing in Singapore.
"Out of abundance of caution we've taken 16 engines that we regard as having a bigger likelihood of having a problem on them and as a consequence those engines will be modified... before they are put back onto aircraft," Mr Joyce told a news conference.
"This is a worldwide fleet issue so it's not just engines Qantas has, it's engines that other operators also have and this is an issue that will have to be resolved for all of the other operators," he added.
Rolls-Royce concluded the incident was caused by an oil fire but said the issue was confined to a specific component and it has since been scrambling to find a fix and replace faulty engines with new turbines.
Mr Joyce said Qantas was not yet discussing compensation issues with Rolls-Royce.
"Our priority is to get all of the aircraft back in the air...and when the time is appropriate, we will have the dialogue with Rolls-Royces."
On top of the two aircraft returning to service, Qantas will take delivery of two new Airbus A380s before the end of the year, giving the airline four superjumbos for the busy Christmas and southern hemisphere summer holiday season.
Mr Joyce last week estimated Rolls-Royce may have to replace as many as 40 engines globally, or about half the engines currently in service on the A380, the world's largest passenger aircraft.
Reuters