AFR fake news regarding Qantas

[RSVKanga]

On another online platform I noticed a user claimed that Qantas should not oppose Qatar Airways’ application for their whopping 28 extra flights and stake in VA because Qatar Airways is refurbishing QF’s A380 fleet in Doha and further escalation of QF-QR tensions might risk refurbishments being stopped. They cited this AFR article (from last year) as their source:

Profits and power: Qantas and the Qatar question

Qatar’s request for more landing slots has exposed the hidden dynamics at work in Australia’s aviation market, where Qantas is a central player.

www.afr.com

Qatar is also refurbishing some of Qantas’ A380 fleet, which the Australian airline has yet to bring back from the Californian desert where they were stored during the pandemic.

That’s simply fake news. Qantas’ A380 fleet has been/is being refurbished in Germany and the UAE, and I think most AFF members are well aware of this. I also think that the AFR are aware of this. They’re quite informed on aviation and are not the typical Sky or news.com.au “Airbus 747 Dreamliner” people you’d find in those outlets, so I think this heavily leans towards being deliberate rather than ignorance. I hope someone from the AFR is reading this post and corrects the article. It’s a shame that a paper portraying to be a leader in financial journalism stoops to record lows in the likes of fake news such as this to push their agenda for QR and against our national carrier.

I think it should also be a reminder for all of us to take any AFR claim that is against QF or pro-QR (or anything really) with a very heavy scoop of salt.

 

[samh004]

I hope someone from the FR is reading this post and corrects the article.

Would it not be best to email the AFR with this question, rather than posting on AFF hoping someone from the AFR is reading your posts? Colour me confused.

The reporters email address is even listed at the bottom of the article. I would raise it with her directly.

 

[RooFlyer]

That story is about year old, and clearly just confused Qatar with UAE. Pretty dumb.

But some other excerpts are more telling, especially the last bit.

Almost a decade later, another decision to block a foreign operator has revived questions about the power of the country’s biggest airline and ignited a political debate over whose interests are served by quashing competition.

Qatar Airways, backed by a tiny but oil-rich Persian Gulf sheikdom, applied a year ago to add 28 flights a week into Sydney, doubling its capacity. Partly because it had continued to fly in and out of Australia through the pandemic, its application was supported by state premiers, the federal trade minister, the opposition, rival airlines and tourism operators. Qantas opposed the move.

<redacted>

 

[justinbrett]

Ah, but of course the AFR is a quality publication tabloid.

 

[RSVKanga]

Would it not be best to email the AFR with this question, rather than posting on AFF hoping someone from the AFR is reading your posts? Colour me confused.

I think the Australian travelling public should also be aware of potential ulterior motives from the AFR to push their agenda for QR/against QF, rather than this issue being solved privately.

That story is about year old, and clearly just confused Qatar with UAE. Pretty dumb.

I think it’s not a mistake as it’s quite a stretch to say you confused Qatar with Germany or the UAE when those countries name or spelling is not even remotely close to Qatar.

 

[elanshin]

I think the Australian travelling public should also be aware of potential ulterior motives from the AFR to push their agenda for QR/against QF, rather than this issue being solved privately.



I think it’s not a mistake as it’s quite a stretch to say you confused Qatar with Germany or the UAE when those countries name or spelling is not even remotely close to Qatar.

Never assume malice when ignorance is the more likely answer. Journalistic quality in this day and age is significantly lower than it used to be (not that there isn't any).

Also at this point on AFF, I'm not sure if you're aware, but your claims using flimsy arguments makes you points look weaker than reinforcing it.

Have you heard about the boy that cried wolf by any chance?

 

[drron]

I think the Australian travelling public should also be aware of potential ulterior motives from the AFR to push their agenda for QR/against QF, rather than this issue being solved privately.



I think it’s not a mistake as it’s quite a stretch to say you confused Qatar with Germany or the UAE when those countries name or spelling is not even remotely close to Qatar.

Though Qatar is an Emirate so not so stupid to assume it is part of the UAE.

And someone pushing the QR agenda is really far worse than some one pushing the anti QR agenda using questionable logic.

 

[RooFlyer]

I think it’s not a mistake as it’s quite a stretch to say you confused Qatar with Germany or the UAE when those countries name or spelling is not even remotely close to Qatar.

'You' - you mean me? Germany isn't in the article so how I am supposed to confuse that spelling 'confuses' me. When journos (frequently) confuse say a B787 and an A350 do you ascribe that to malevolence too? The premise that the AFR has it in for Qantas editorially is laughable, as I think you know. Qantas simply has so many faults that all the news outlets will be pointing them out.

<redacted>

 

[samh004]

I think the Australian travelling public should also be aware of potential ulterior motives from the AFR to push their agenda for QR/against QF, rather than this issue being solved privately.

If it were me, I'd send a politely-worded email to see if the issues could be resolved with the story, and then when it was resolved either in the positive or negative, I'd post a thread showing that I got the story changed to correctly report the facts - thus showing it was ignorance on the part of the AFR - or that they were not going to change the story - thus showing it was malice on the part of the AFR.

The resultant thread would then carry more weight.

 

[moa999]

And to be clear, Qantas currently has four A380s at AUH (Abu Dhabi International Airport/ Zayed International Airport) at which the primary airline is Etihad, not Qatar.
And the primary maintenance organisation is Etihad Engineering.

Qatar's home airport and it's maintenance facilities are at DOH (Hamad International Airport) in Doha, Qatar.

Qantas has previously had A380 maintenance done by Lufthansa Engineering in both DRS (Dresden) and MNL (Manilla) as in understand.

 

[RSVKanga]

Never assume malice when ignorance is the more likely answer. Journalistic quality in this day and age is significantly lower than it used to be (not that there isn't any).

Look, if this was from news.com.au or an outlet like this or something along those lines, I’d agree with you and assume it’s ignorance. But these people at the AFR know their planes, airlines and other things that aviation enthusiasts know. You can see this writer’s article history and it’s clear she’s informed in an aviation perspective.

And considering the actions, activities and motives of the AFR ‘journalists’ who are absolutely obsessed with attacking QF/painting the best possible picture of QR, I think it would be safe to say it might have been deliberate and that they thought that their readers would skim through and just assume it’s true.

I’m not completely ruling out this being a genuine error, but we need to look through the history behind this author (and colleagues). AFR ‘journalists’ are not ‘dumb’ and I think this is a case of the AFR carefully picking relatively unknown points to convey misinformation in - the average AFR reader is highly unlikely to know where QF is refurbishing the A380s, and hence this misinformation has gone unnoticed for a year.

 

[justinbrett]

But these people at the AFR know their planes, airlines and other things that aviation enthusiasts know.

I actually think they don’t. Joe Aston’s columns were often riddled with errors, well best case they were errors but possibly wilful misinformation in order to make his point.

Other writers have made many factual errors in similar stories.

I actually think there’s a very small number of knowledgeable aviation journalists in Australia; and I even heard Geoffrey Thomas telling some furphies to breakfast telelvision a few weeks ago.

Internationally, Richard Quest is the guy I trust the most.

 

[SeatBackForward]

Lets face it the AFR should be known as the Australian Financiers Report - in other words, a publication that favours the interests of it's vested parties.

 

[dajop]

All this fuss about Qatar vs Qantas. A bit OTT I think and getting a bit tiresome.

So the science-y part of me says, what does the data say?

So if you exclude pseudo-domestic (short haul) services (ie. NZ, Indonesia*, SW Pacific) in March:
1) Qatar command about 5.3% of the med-long haul market.
2) Qantas group has 21%, Singapore Airlines group 18% clearly the two most dominant players.
3) Then it's EK (6.7%), CX (5.5%), and QR.

Of QF groups med-long haul traffic only about 8% of it is in direct competition with QR (UK), although that will increase with CDG and FCO. You could perhaps argue some indirect competition for India, South Africa and US East Coast traffic, so may be add another 5% or so there.

Still I don't see that QR is such a threat to the beloved "National Carrier" but meanwhile SQ and Scoot have quietly commanded 18% of the market.

* didn't dig into separating out DPS from CGK, as you could argue the latter belongs in medium-long haul category for flights from SYD & MEL, but I don't think it materially changes the results, if anything slightly increase QF market share.

 

[RSVKanga]

Joe Aston’s columns were often riddled with errors, well best case they were errors but possibly wilful misinformation in order to make his point.

No doubt about that. I certainly don't think Aston's content were errors considering he worked for Qantas in the past, so all deliberate IMHO. The AFR have a clear agenda against our national carrier and are tasked with the job of evangelising people into hating QF and supporting QR, and I think they carefully select which avenues to push their thinly-veiled misinformation in so they can successfully push that agenda without being dismissed and ridiculed as a fake news outlet. That needs to change, and there needs to be a place online where people can call it out.

I think this thread can be the perfect place for people to call out and debunk past and future outright fake news and misinformation from the AFR about QF (and there likely to be a lot of it - not just regarding QF vs QR but on other fronts as well). The Australian travelling public should not be manipulated and taken for a ride by this 'paper'

 

[DC3]

See what Poochie will make of this

 

[Happy Dude]

It’s a shame that a paper portraying to be a leader in financial journalism stoops to record lows in the likes of fake news such as this to push their agenda for QR and against our national carrier.

I think it should also be a reminder for all of us to take any AFR claim that is against QF or pro-QR (or anything really) with a very heavy scoop of salt.

I'd take @samh004 suggestions a step further and give it wider air if you believe the latter is important and the travelling public needs protection, then do contact Media Watch (Tip Offs - Media Watch). They've covered the rise and fall of Joe Aston/AFR reports on QF in the past, so presumably would be particularly interested in the former.

 

[Gold Member]

I actually think there’s a very small number of knowledgeable aviation journalists in Australia; and I even heard Geoffrey Thomas telling some furphies to breakfast telelvision a few weeks ago.

I actually think there was one Aviation Enthusiast keyboard warrior on here who was called out late last year for commercial/political manipulation of AFF. But as the tide went out and we all got to see who was wearing any clothes, the messaging changed and a new "National Carrier" account was quickly created on AFF as a secondary mouthpiece in an attempt to distance themselves and try to regain some sort of credibility. Could this be the same member? Or even from the same Cell Block at AnalyticalFlying? I guess we'll never know.

I think the Australian travelling public should also be aware of potential ulterior motives from the AFR to push their agenda for QR/against QF, rather than this issue being solved privately.

That's mighty rich coming from you, National Carrier. Almost every one of your posts since inception have ulterior motives - EVERY. SINGLE. TIME.

I think it should also be a reminder for all of us to take any AFR claim that is against QF or pro-QR (or anything really) with a very heavy scoop of salt.

It's such a shame that we can't have an open, honest and fair discussion without all the clear and biased agendas. National Carriers need to be taken with a very heavy scoop of salt (if not already).

 

[Quickstatus]

think the Australian travelling public should also be aware of potential ulterior motives from the AFR to push their agenda for QR/against QF

Go and put it in the public forum somewhere. How your X account going