Fed: Qantas, Ansett prepare for Y2k but passengers numbers down

AAP General News (Australia)
12-29-1999
Fed: Qantas, Ansett prepare for Y2k but passengers numbers down

(Eds, this story has also moved on Finance wires)



By Peter Mitchell and Angela Macdonald-Smith

SYDNEY, Dec 20 AAP - Australia's two largest airlines have spent more than $140 million
between them preparing for Y2k, but both are unable to give assurances operations will
be millennium bug free when the clock ticks to midnight.

And Australian skies will be unusually sparse during the critical hours of the new
year period, with consumers choosing to remain grounded.

Qantas Airways Ltd said it could not guarantee the Year 2000 readiness of any external
organisation, admitting that some of its critical service providers (CSP) would "not be
compliant by 31 December, 1999".

"Assessment is continuing of these critical service providers, particularly foreign
airports and airspace control authorities," Qantas said in its latest Year 2000 readiness
statement.

However, the airline said its business was "unlikely to be significantly disrupted
through the Year 2000 transition by the failure of a critical service provider".

Qantas terms CSPs as a service provider which, "if disrupted, may seriously impact
the operation of the airline". CSPs include airports, computerised booking systems, aircraft
and engine manufacturers and fuel suppliers.

A Qantas spokesperson told AAP the airline would not have any scheduled domestic flights
in the air as midnight strikes in the five Australian time zones.

Qantas, however, will have 13 international aircraft operating outside Australia at
midnight ADST and 10 international aircraft, 23 domestic and 13 regional aircraft in the
air at midnight Greenwich Mean Time.

Qantas said it would have about 13 per cent fewer international flights during the
five day period between December 29 and January 2.

Domestically, Qantas will have about 178 flights on December 31, about 27 per cent
less than last year. On January 1 it will have about 150 flights, about 37 per cent lower
than last year.

Ansett has suspended scheduled passenger flights from 11 pm on December 31 to midday
on January 1.

Ansett spokesman Nick Slater said Ansett would not normally fly during the curfew period
at major airports between 2300 and around 0630, but that it has suspended flights for
longer, until midday, due to lack of passenger demand during those hours.

"From our booking data it is not cost effective to operate the small amount of flights
over that period," Mr Slater said.

He said it seemed most people had decided to put off their travel plans for a day or
two, which was the "sensible thing to do."

As a result, however, Ansett had record passenger traffic scheduled through the January
2-4 period, and continued to be extremely busy throughout the first half of January, meaning
that any post-Y2K disruption to services would be serious, Mr Slater said.

"Serious to our bottom line and for our customers," he said.

"Any operational disruption (to Ansett's targeted midday Jan 1 resumption of flights)
will be costly and inconvenient," Mr Slater added.

Mr Slater said Ansett had invested heavily to try to ensure its business was Y2K compliant
and that it would have no problems in the supply chain.

Qantas has spent $105.5 million on preparing for the year 2000 rollover while Ansett
has invested between $40 and $50 million over the past three years.

"We have done an incredible amount of work to minimise the risk of disruption," Mr
Slater said, noting that $45 million of an around A$100-150 million profit business is
"a huge amount".

Even so, he said it was only possible to say the airline is "reasonably confident"

that it will be unaffected throughout the period.

Of the total spend, a large proportion had been spent on IT, mostly involving the setup
and operation of an IT "test bench", a laboratory environment where simulated date changes
can be carried out on computer systems.

Ansett had to remediate a "handful" of things out of the some 14,000 items tested,
and found no difficulties with any safety critical systems, Mr Slater said.

Minor problems were found in other systems, such as aerobridges, which link the aircraft
to the terminal building. While the bridges would still have worked, the computer data
would have been corrupted due to a Y2K-related issue, he said.

Key Ansett personnel will staff command centres around the country, which will coordinate
and manage efforts over the transition period.

Qantas chief executive James Strong said the manufacturers of the aircraft used by
Qantas had formally advised the industry that there were no safety or airworthiness issues
relating to the compliance of their planes.

"We are taking a wide range of operational steps to ensure continuing safety and to
maintain normal operations during the year 2000 transition," Mr Strong said.

AAP pm/ams/sh

KEYWORD: Y2K AIRLINES

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