Airline seat cancellations caused by Iran war top 6m

Over 6 million airline passengers have now been affected by the Middle East conflict, according to industry data, with more than one-third of the seat cancellations on Gulf carriers.

The latest figures from aviation analytics company Cirium show that Qatar Airways has borne the brunt of the cancellations since the hostilities began on February 28, with 741,504 seats lost. It is followed by Emirates at 644,133 cancellations and Etihad Airways at 344,123.

Cirium estimates that almost 2.2 million seats have been lost on Middle Eastern airlines. Its figures are based on an average load factor of 80 percent and an average of 242 seats per flight. It excludes intra-Middle East flights.

Since the start of the conflict more than 98,000 flights were scheduled to fly in and out of the Middle East. So far, more than 52,000 flights have been cancelled.

Despite air strikes, Gulf airlines are slowly building back capacity in their networks.

Emirates is taking bookings to more than 100 destinations, leaving from its base at Dubai International Airport. Abu Dhabi’s Etihad has scheduled 50 flights for departure from Zayed International on Saturday and a further 51 on Sunday.

Flydubai has said it is operating a “limited schedule”.

Qatar Airways plans to fly to 15 destinations on Saturday, Sunday and Monday.

However, a number of international carriers have extended flight suspensions to the region. They include British Airways, Lufthansa, KLM, Virgin Atlantic and Air Canada.