Are Australian flights safe? More cancellations expected as Middle East war, fuel rocks travel industry

Aussies could soon expect to see more flight cancellations and price increases for air travel as war in the Middle East sparks logistical chaos and aviation fuel shortage fears grow.

As fuel prices remain volatile, on Tuesday, Environment Minister Murray Watt told Sky News that he “can’t predict what the future is going to hold”, however, he suggested there would be consequences of the disruption of global fuel networks.

“We’ve already seen our domestic airlines make some changes around their flight routes,” he said.

“That’s obviously, at least in part, a response to the global fuel shortage that we’re seeing, and I don’t think that we can rule out future events occurring.

“It’s why we’ve been saying that we want to see this conflict resolved as quickly as possible.

“It’s why we want to see the Strait of Hormuz opened as soon as possible.

“We’ve always said that the longer this dispute goes on, the more difficult it will be for Australians and everyone around the world in terms of meeting our fuel needs.”

His comments come a week after Qantas and Virgin Australia made the decision to slash their domestic flight capacities and bump up prices.

Domestic travel

In response to the steady rise of fuel prices, domestic airlines have made operational changes to their businesses.

For May and June, Qantas cut domestic capacity by about 5 per cent, and Virgin by about 1 per cent.

Qantas said fuel costs and ballooned by up to $800 million since the start of the war.

In addition to cutting capacity, several routes, including the Busselton-Sydney service under budget airline Jetstar were axed.

A representative of Virgin said fuel security cast a dark shadow over the aviation industry.

“The price of jet fuel has been extremely volatile and has more than doubled since the end of February 2026 which impacts fuel costs for the June 2026 quarter” they said.

Global crisis

Last week, the head of the International Energy Agency (IEA) said that Europe had “maybe six weeks or so (of) jet fuel left”.

IEA executive director Fatih Birol said the impact would be “higher petrol prices, higher gas prices, high electricity prices”, as well as flight cancellations because of a lack of jet fuel.

He suggested the countries that would “suffer most” were developing nations in Asia, Africa, and Latin America, but that Europe and the Americas would not be immune from repercussions.

Flight Centre founder and chief executive Graham Turner said that Aussies wanting to travel to London were going to get the best price by travelling with Emirates, Qatar, or Etihad airlines.

“If people feel it’s totally safe, it will be a major way for people to travel, there’s no doubt in our mind,” he told The Nightly.

“Shopping around, particularly looking at going through the Middle East now and in the next few weeks, next month, you will save money.

“You’ve got to be a bit prepared that there could be disruption, flights might get cancelled.”