Air New Zealand had earlier announced employee lay-offs and lower pay for those who would stay on job. However, the management has now shocked employees with the news of 2,000 more layoffs.

Air New Zealand has announced nearly 300 job cuts in engineering and maintenance segment. The airline had earlier said that it will take a long time for recovery and it will all depend on how much time tourists will take to return to different destinations covered by Air NZ.

Air New Zealand will start flights to majority of domestic airports when New Zealand announces alert level 2 regarding coronavirus pandemic. During the initial period, Air NZ will operate only 20 percent of its capacity on domestic routes.

The inaugural flight of Air New Zealand to Vietnam touched Ho Chi Minh City from Auckland.

The Flight NZ269 departed from the Auckland International Airport at 12:45pm and arrived at Ho Chi Minh City's Tan Son Nhat International Airport on Saturday, at about 8pm.

Air New Zealand has a new destination and that's Ho Chi Minh City in Vietnam. The flight which took eleven hours reached its destination on Sunday morning.

Air New Zealand and Virgin Australia are teaming up to explore options for locally produced biofuel that can fly their planes in a more environment friendly manner.

They have issued a "request for information" to the market to explore the prospects of locally-producing aviation biofuel.

Environment friendly fuel is a focus in many countries and according to Air New Zealand's chief flight operations and safety officer, Captain David Morgan; this move is a part of the carbon management program initiated by the airline.