HONG KONG - Cathay Pacific Airways, grappling with flight cancellations over the holiday period that have frustrated passengers, acknowledged that pilots reaching or at their 12-month limit on flying hours had contributed to the problem.

While there were “elevated sickness rates on certain days”, the airline’s director of flight operations Chris Kempis said in a memo that many pilots had hit or come close to the cap of 900 block hours on a rolling 12-month basis, which meant “there is much less flexibility around the deployment of pilots on reserve and days off”.

Cathay cancelled 9 per cent of the 126 planned departures from Hong Kong on Dec 30, airport data showed. The airline axed another six flights on Dec 31. Its representatives did not respond to requests for comment outside business hours.

“This has been an extremely challenging time for us,” Mr Kempis wrote in the memo to pilots on Dec 30 seen by Bloomberg News. He called the confluence of factors a “learning point for us and it’s on me to ensure that we don’t see a repeat of the same circumstances going forward”.

Hong Kong has seen a resurgence of travel after more than three years of strict Covid-19 restrictions. That has put a strain on the city’s flagship carrier to ramp up operations, after curtailing flights and cutting jobs amid the pandemic.

The carrier is contending with a shortfall of cockpit crew. Pilots on staff now stand at 2,532, according to Hong Kong Aircrew Officers Association data, a 35 per cent drop from the end of 2019.

Cathay operated nearly 8 per cent more flights per day on average over the Christmas and New Year period compared with its typical schedule. Some pilots have had to accept multiple flight swops and work on their guaranteed days off designed to give them appropriate time off to rest, Mr Kempis wrote.

“We are still very much in our rebuild phase,” he added. “We are on the road to achieving our full capacity and are already seeing the real benefits that come with that.” BLOOMBERG