South Africans face skyrocketing airfares as Middle East conflict reduces flights
South Africans continue travelling despite the Middle East conflict, but reduced Emirates and Qatar flights are causing major airfare hikes this Easter.
South Africans are pressing ahead with international travel plans despite the Middle East conflict, but fewer outbound flights are sending airfares skyrocketing.
"Two things are hitting, that would obviously be the increase in jet fuel, but that's coupled with capacity constraints driving those prices up. So there are just too few seats to meet the demand of travellers," says Sue Garrett from Flight Centre Travel Group South Africa.
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She says since the US-Israeli conflict with Iran broke out, Emirates and Qatar have reduced their flights, causing a significant travel disruption across South Africa.
"Emirates had 49 flights a week and they're currently down to around 35. Qatar is at 42, down to 14 at the moment. Those two carriers were generally the biggest two carriers capacity-wise, out of South Africa," says Garrett.
Limited seats driving airfare increases
Garrett says it's now not about where you want to go, but if there is space on other carriers to get you there.
"We are going into peak period, obviously Easter, so capacity was already constrained, and then you take out so many flights on Emirates and Qatar and people are looking for alternative carriers. There are just not enough seats available. If you can find availability, the prices have substantially increased over this next period."
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She says Gulf Easter volume has dropped by 39% year-on-year, with a significant number of passengers avoiding the Gulf routing altogether.
" There certainly have been a fair amount of refund requests on Emirates, Qatar and ITA. What we were very surprised by was the amount of people that are either choosing to keep money on file, so keep a credit with the airlines for later travel and also, a lot of people rebooked, so still travelling, just avoiding the Gulf airspace."
Popular destinations see soaring demand
Garrett says they've seen the biggest airfare increases on routes that go through major international hubs like Addis Ababa, London, Amsterdam, Istanbul, Singapore, Frankfurt and Hong Kong, as well as on direct flights to Atlanta.
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For the Easter weekend, there is still some availability to destinations like London, Amsterdam, Singapore, Paris and Mauritius.
" What we are seeing is a lot of the more familiar close-to-home destinations. We've definitely seen an increase in interest in those, like Mauritius, which is currently is 47% up on prior years, Zanzibar is 185% up. Europe is still roughly around about 20% up in demand. So South Africans are still travelling," says Garrett.
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