Australia likely to remain closed until sometime in 2022.
India’s COVID raging out of control.
Thailand’s cases climbing.
Travel bubble with Singapore looking less and less likely with new restrictions being imposed as cases increase.
Quarantine period increased to 3 weeks in many countries.
Indian COVID variant more transmissible and infecting vaccinated people.
Delays in vaccination programs in many countries.
Travel unlikely to return to pre pandemic levels until 2024.
The recovery will be uneven, whilst domestic air travel in some countries has already recovered and may soon exceed pre pandemic levels, international is still dead in the water. When it gets going again, it will be direct flights between fully vaccinated countries such as UK - USA. Long haul connecting traffic will be the last to come back, particularly in the premium cabins.
CX have done a fantastic job in avoiding layoffs for as long as they have, EK were doing it within a few weeks of the shutdown and SQ a few months later. However you are kidding yourself if you think the airline will remain as it is for the next three years until normality returns. CX will need to downsize into something that can survive the next few years and adapt to what the future will bring.
A shortage of training capacity in the medium term is the last thing on the bean counters minds.