Cost of flights set to soar as supply crisis grounds planes.

Airfares are set to hit record highs next year and there will be a surge in flight cancellations as a result of critical shortages of plane engines and spare aviation parts, insiders fear.

- SIMON CALDER, ANDY GREGORY

British Airways and Virgin Atlantic are among carriers who have already been forced to ground planes and postpone entire routes as a result of a shortage of Rolls-Royce Trent 1000 engines.

The situation is resulting in airfares soaring as competition between airlines narrows, and insiders warn that flight cancellations linked to supply chain issues will hit their peak next year.

In one instance uncovered by The Independent, the cost of a hand-baggage only British Airways ticket on the Heathrow-Cape Town route on 11 April now sits at £2,922 return – nearly three times the price on BA for the same dates to and from Johannesburg.

Last month BA cancelled the resumption of daily flights between Heathrow and Kuala Lumpur this winter, removing 200,000 seats from the available capacity between the UK and southeast Asia, in a move it blamed on “delays to the delivery of engines and parts from Rolls-Royce”.

Virgin Atlantic also blamed Rolls-Royce shortages after it deferred a planned resumption of London flights to Accra in Ghana and Tel Aviv in Israel until next winter, with its Cape Town schedule also set to pause a month earlier than planned.

Paul Charles, former director of communications at Virgin Atlantic and now CEO at The PC Agency, said: “The engine issues have caused massive problems for airlines and consumers.