A350 grounded: Qatar Airways company announces legal action against Airbus

New episode in the dispute between Airbus to the company Qatar Airways. For several months, the Doha-based airline has regularly questioned the European aircraft manufacturer on accelerated degradation of the fuselage surface under paint of its A350.

Qatar Airways takes legal action

On Monday, December 20, 2021, Qatar Airways – which is one of Airbus’ big customers – announced that it had sued Airbus before the British courts.

“Qatar Airways currently has 21 A350 immobilized due to this problem and legal proceedings have been initiated to ensure that Airbus will now address our legitimate concerns without further delay, ”the company wrote. in a press release posted on its website.

“We have unfortunately failed in all our attempts to reach a constructive solution with Airbus,” added the company, which claims to have ” no other choice than to seek a rapid settlement of this dispute through the courts ”. The High Court of Justice was therefore seized by the airline. These procedures aim to “guarantee that Airbus will henceforth respond to our legitimate concerns without further delay”, Qatar Airways further details.

“No impact on safety” for Airbus

In this case, Airbus reacted on December 9, regretting “ the attempt of this client (Qatar Airways, editor’s note) to distort this specific subject as an airworthiness problem posing a threat to international protocols on security matters ”.

” Safety is Airbus’ top priority. The results linked to the surface painting have been carefully evaluated by Airbus and confirmed by the European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) as having no impact on the airworthiness of the A350 fleet ″, explained Airbus. Thus, to “defend its position and its reputation”, the aircraft manufacturer had announced that it would request an independent legal assessment to resolve the dispute.

Airbus, “ready to take legal action”

This time around, following Qatar Airways’ announcement to take legal action, the situation has changed. Asked by AFP, Airbus has assured that it is “Ready to resort to legal action in order to resolve this dispute, faced with an erroneous characterization of the non-structural surface degradation problems on certain A350s, the root cause of which has been identified ”.

“Airbus will continue to take all necessary measures to defend its position and its reputation, ”continued a spokesperson.

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