HB-IWC

In this case, I would imagine that most of the passengers would be delayed for a day. There is no AUA departure, and KLM will bring the much larger B744 to CUR tomorrow.

johan rebel

KL have annouced a reduction in the number of flights to AUA and BON for the rest of the summer season. No reason given, but could it be the ongoing MD11 saga?

Voor de periode juni tot en met oktober 2007 zullen er minder vluchten uitgevoerd worden naar Aruba. De volgende vluchten komen te vervallen op de volgende dagen:

Aruba KL 733 Zaterdag KL 734 Zaterdag 9jun-16sep

Aruba/Bonaire KL 769 Dinsdag KL 769 Dinsdag 25sep-23okt

*Uitzondering is de vlucht van 28 juli die wel uitgevoerd zal worden.

Passagiers worden gedurende deze week omgeboekt op alternatieve vluchten.

The extra (5th) flight to HYD has also been canceled :

In Productnieuws nr. 17 (van 14 maart jl.) kondigde KLM aan 5 keer in plaats van 4 keer op Hyderabad te gaan vliegen tijdens de zomerdienst. Deze wijziging is uitgesteld tot de winterdienst.

Same reason, I suspect!

Johan

HB-IWC

Indeed, a direct result of the overscheduling of the MD11 fleet. At least this move will induce some spare capacity into the system... They will need it to overcome the seemingly unceasing string of technical issues with these aircraft.

johan rebel

There's an article about this on Luchtvaartnieuws.nl, but KL once again blames the problem on a pilot shortage. The introduction of the 777 and A330 has resulted in many pilots being sent on conversion courses, and thus in a shortage of MD11 pilots. The fact that this shortage was not foreseen, is blamed on the "many processes" involved in making a schedule. Not sure what they mean by that.

KLM heeft aangekondigd tijdens de lopende zomerdienstregeling wekelijkse enkele langeafstandsvluchten te schrappen. De maatschappij kampt met een tekort aan cockpitbemanningen en zegt hiermee zichzelf wat lucht te willen geven. Bestemmingen die hierdoor minder KLM-vluchten zullen ontvangen zijn Aruba, Bonaire en Hyderabad. Passagiers worden omgeboekt naar andere vluchten.

KLM-woordvoerder Bart Koster erkent dat het schrappen van de vluchten komt door het vliegerstekort. “We zijn bezig met de introductie van de nieuwe Airbus A330 en Boeing 777 in onze vloot. Daardoor zijn veel vliegers bezig met omscholing en dus niet ‘in bedrijf’.” Het probleem van het vliegerstekort is volgens Koster met name van toepassing op de MD-11, het vliegtuig dat wordt ingezet naar Aruba, Bonaire en Hyderabad.

Onlangs was KLM hierdoor genoodzaakt vluchten naar Curaçao te schrappen en een vervangend vliegtuig van Martinair in te zetten. Naar deze bestemming zet KLM sinds kort de MD-11 in, in plaats van de Boeing 747.

Dat niet eerder is opgemerkt dat er te weinig vliegers zijn om de gepubliceerde dienstregeling volledig uit te kunnen voeren komt volgens de woordvoerder omdat de samenstelling daarvan in vele processen plaatsvindt. “Ergens in dat proces is vastgesteld dat het beter is om deze vluchten te schrappen. Je wilt ook nog voldoende reservecapaciteit beschikbaar hebben. De passagiers worden ruim van tevoren ingelicht, dus die hebben er per saldo geen last van”, aldus Koster.

De vluchten die worden geschrapt betreffen de KL733/KL734 Aruba op zaterdag tussen 9 juni en 16 september en de KL769 naar Aruba en Bonaire op dinsdag tussen 25 september en 23 oktober. De start van de aangekondigde vijfde wekelijkse vlucht van Amsterdam naar het Indiase Hyderabad is uitgesteld tot de start van de winterdienstregeling.

Johan

johan rebel

Just to add to the misery, a 74M enroute to NBO experienced engine vibrations over MUC today, and had to return to AMS.

Johan

HB-IWC

The fact of the matter is that they continue to shut up about the real problem behind this, which are the technical issues with the MD11 fleet. Sure enough, there are problems with cockpit crew shortage, but those have been centered around the A332 fleet, with the last batch of B767 pilots still in conversion to mainly the A332. There have been very little or no MD11 crew issues, so I regard this as an excuse for the gallery. Continued technical issues is obviously less marketable than crew shortages.

chunk73

It definately does sound like technical issues rather than crew issue as HB-IWC points out. KLM it seems would rather come out and say they didn't plan properly rather than their MD-11's are useless. I was last on one about a year ago on the last days of it doing the 2nd DXB - AMS run and it was pretty grim in Economy....they should just bin them and get some more 330's and / or T7's.

I agree about the front biz class cabin though...it is nice.

HB-IWC

Well, there are definitely crew issues - today's AMS KWI is cancelled because of lack of cockpit crew - but those issues are just not with the MD11, but with the A332. Now, why would KLM reduce the number of MD11 operated flights to alleviate A332 cockpit crew shortages?

chunk73

You would think that AF could send over a few A330 pilots as cover seeing as they have the same cockpits - or at least thats what I read somewhere. Or am I being naive in assuming that AF aren't stretching their crew scheduling as well?!

johan rebel

Figures for Q1 2007 have just been released :

On-time departures : 70.7%, rank 11th (out of 28 AEA airlines).
On-time arrivals : 74.5%, rank 3rd.
Flight regularity : 99.4%, rank 10th.

Not exactly an improvement!

The above figures pertain to longhaul flights. When it comes to shorthaul flights KL did a lot worse, taking 24th place in the flight regularity table, beating only BA and LG.

In the missing luggage league, KL dropped to 21st place.

Johan

HB-IWC

KLM's widebody fleet, even with the recent MD11 flight reductions, is magnificently overstretched this summer, and as long as the airline does not come to this same conclusion and takes corrective action, it will not be able to guarantee a stable and reliable longhaul operation.

Yet nothing is happening, although I read a note of the new KLM CEO to all employees saying that a recent spate of technical issues with the MD11 fleet and crew related issues with the A332 fleet threatens to undermine KLM's reputation of a reliable airline.

Any minor technical issue with a widebody aircraft seems to provoke massive delays these days, because KLM has failed to build adequate operational spare capacity into its summer 2007 flying program. Just last night, a technical problem with a B744 caused KL809/KUL CGK to go out over 3 hours late, and that was even after another B747 flight to PEK had been preemptively cancelled for lack of aircraft.

Quite obviously, every single airline suffers from operational instabilities, yet when compared to its major partners and competitors in Europe (AF, BA, LH, LX), KLM suffers from a disproportionately large number of delays and cancellations induced by operational issues.

While it is surely laudable that KLM is striving for an optimal use of its available resources, this efficiency drive has gone over the top and is starting to seriously affect the reliability of the airline, and the current summer flying program is unlikely to do much good to recoup any of the lost ground.

jetfan

KL565/6 AMS-NBO-AMS for 4 May has been cancelled too.

johan rebel

A decrease in regularity by 0.3%, from 99.7% to 99.4% doesn't sound like much, but it actually means that the number of flights canceled increased from 3 per 1000 to 6 per 1000, i.e. an increase of 100%.

Johan

HB-IWC

Just when one would think that the MD11 problems were a thing of the past, there you have them again. Today's KL681/YVR is delayed for 24 hours because of technical problems with the MD11 and no spare aircraft available. Tomorrow's KL681/YVR is cancelled. Probably a technical trick to avoid certain compensation claims. Why not just cancel today's flight but instead go to the extend of delaying today's flight for 24 hours while cancelling tomorrow's flight?

pinkcity

Without any doubt Johan ; but it's also a way to enlarge figures, without being sure of their meaning : are we on a raise of 100%, or at three (or related to actual flights) more isolated events ? It's not heretic to ask if this 100% is statistically, and beyond all, technically significant... I'm not sure we can definitely conclude about a trend from these numbers... except for what KLM should take it : an alarming indicator to which quick correction is expected...