2. Parked fleets create an unprecedented situation

At the peak of the first wave of the coronavirus crisis, airlines parked around 60 percent of the total global fleet. Never before has the industry seen so many of its aircraft temporarily put out of service. This unprecedented situation has caused a number of maintenance and repair challenges.

While parked fleets may experience less wear and tear than when they are in service, the aircraft aren’t just parked somewhere and left to sit until they’re needed again. Far from it. Most aircraft are parked in “flight-ready” condition and because airlines’ post-pandemic plans are still uncertain and dependent on factors out of their control, many have opted to keep their parked aircraft on active maintenance rather than moving them to so-called “deep storage”.

Before parking the aircraft, even if it’s just for a few days, there’s a detailed process that includes covering intakes and exhaust points, protecting the internal entertainment systems, greasing and cleaning landing gear, turning off cockpit controls, and disconnecting batteries. Most parked aircraft are then put on a service schedule that requires basic visual inspections every seven days, electrical and brake maintenance every 14 days, and fuller checks, including starting the engine and inspecting anti-ice systems, every 30 days.

While these practices are fairly standard, the scale at which they occurred in 2020 is anything but. With such a long road to recovery, how exactly this will play out remains unknown. According to an October study published in the Journal of Air Transport Management, periodic maintenance intervention will go down the longer an aircraft is parked but with airlines leery of consigning aircraft to deep storage, which typically entails draining oil and fuel from the engines, some of the currently parked aircraft may eventually enter a grey zone in which they get less maintenance than they normally would but aren’t formally put out to pasture. Aviation Week reported that while most maintenance manuals include plans for long-term storage, they don’t offer detailed instructions for how to prepare aircraft for extended periods of being out of service.

The uncertainty that airlines face about what to do with their parked fleet will impact aviation MRO providers. The parked fleets could end up having a devastating impact on independent MROs, as airlines may decide to bring the basic maintenance processes in-house in another cost-cutting move. And the longer aircraft remain grounded, the higher the chances that some airlines will not survive the crisis. If and when airlines go bankrupt, aviation MROs and other dependent companies are likely to follow.

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Six ways COVID-19 has impacted the MRO industry