Qantas said today it would begin putting its Airbus A380 planes back in the air from Saturday, three weeks after a mid-air blast triggered serious safety concerns over the world's biggest passenger jet.
Chief executive Alan Joyce said he would be on the first Qantas A380 passenger flight which will leave from Sydney for London on Saturday. A second aircraft will depart Los Angeles for Sydney later this week.
"We're completely comfortable with the operation of the aircraft," Joyce told reporters.
"We have grounded this fleet for 19 days... To make sure we are fully comfortable before putting them back in the air," he added.
Qantas grounded its six superjumbos after a November 4 scare when one of an A380's four engines blew up minutes into a flight from Singapore to Sydney, damaging a wing and scattering debris, and forcing an emergency return to the city-state.
Joyce said Qantas was being "very conservative" with the re-introduction of the aircraft, and working with Airbus and British engine-maker Rolls-Royce to bring its other A380s back into service.
He said the Australian flag-carrier would take delivery of two more A380s, also equipped with Rolls-Royce Trent 900 engines, by the end of the year.
The giant double-decker aircraft would be used on the Sydney to London route but not on the trans-Pacific journey to Los Angeles until the company was "100 percent sure" the problems had been resolved, Joyce said.
Singapore Airlines has grounded three of its 11 A380s and Lufthansa is changing an engine on one of its superjumbos as a precaution, while other A380 operators use engines from another manufacturer.
The November 4 incident cast a shadow over the A380, which weighs 560 tonnes at takeoff and was hailed as the future of long-haul aviation at its commercial launch in 2007.
Joyce said he did not think the incident would hurt Qantas's image in the long-term, but indicated that the airline might be seeking compensation from Rolls-Royce in the future.
"We are not going to get into, at this stage, talking about what those compensation or dialogue will entail, but we will be talking to Rolls-Royce when the time is a appropriate about a range of issues, he told reporters.
