ANA Cancels Additional 176 Flights, More To Come

All Nippon Airways has cancelled 176 additional domestic flights as it continues inspections of Rolls-Royce engines powering some of its Boeing 787 Dreamliner fleet.

ANA, which operates 64 787s, said no international flights will be cancelled, but was forced to drop more domestic flights between July 9 and 22.

“Over the last two years, we have been working very closely with Rolls-Royce and the regulatory authorities to minimise the impact to our flight schedule,” ANA said in a statement. “However, due to the additional mandatory inspections which were announced in mid June, we are cancelling a limited number of flights.”

Indicating that more services are likely to be cancelled, ANA said it will announce flight cancellations for July 23 to July 31 on July 12. Cancellations for August will be announced on July 17.

The additional checks come after Rolls-Royce extended inspections to include older Trent 1000 Package B engines. Previous inspections were of Package C engine compressor blades due to durability issues.

The Japanese airline apologised for the inconveniences and said passengers with reservations on the cancelled flights will be contacted and rebooked on to alternative flights if required.

The latest cancellations are on top of the 113 cancellations announced last week.