STORY:
Ansett Airlines Grounding Planes

Australian domestic airline cancels all New Year's Eve Flights

Ansett Airlines which services the Australian domestic market will suspend all its flights on New Year's Eve because of what it says is insufficient customer demand. All domestic and international services will stop over a 13-hour period from 11pm AEST on December 31 until noon on January 1. Ansett says customers clearly prefer to celebrate the millennium on the ground.

However, spokesman Nick Slater concedes that for some people, concern about the impact of the computer Y2K bug on navigation systems might have been a consideration.

"There's nothing we can do to allay speculation, other than to talk about the work that we've done. Some of [the speculation has] been misguided and some of it's been based on relatively thin information," Slater told the Sydney Morning Herald

Most of the major international carriers including Qantas will have planes in the air over New Year's Eve but on a reduced schedule, also due to lower demand. Virgin Atlantic and the Polish Airline LOT are the two major international carrier that have chosen to ground their planes over New Year's Eve.

DATE: 9/30/99

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