Qatar Airways confirmed on Thursday that it has grounded 13 Airbus A350 aircraft that are showing severe degradation of the surface of the fuselage.
The withdrawal of the aircraft from service was determined by the country’s civil aviation authorities. According to the carrier, the issue occurs below the paint on the jets at an accelerated rate and had already been observed before.
To replace the planes, Qatar has confirmed it is putting the A330s back into service – the airline has 12 units that were parked.
“With this latest development, we sincerely expect that Airbus treats this matter with the proper attention that it requires. Qatar Airways will not accept anything other than aircraft that continue to offer its customers the highest possible standard of safety and the best travel experience that they deserve,” said Qatar Airways CEO, Akbar Al Baker.
The executive says he expects the European manufacturer “to have established the root cause and permanently corrected the underlying condition to the satisfaction of Qatar Airways and our regulator before we take delivery of any further A350 aircraft.”
Qatar has a fleet of 53 A350s, according to Planespotters. Two A350-1000 and 11 A350-900 appear as ‘parked’ on the website.
Airbus had not issued a statement about it until this Thursday.
