British Airways (BA, London Heathrow) has confirmed it has wet-leased nine A320-200s from Qatar Airways (QR, Doha Hamad International) to cover a cabin crew strike that began on July 1 and which is expected to end on July 16.

In a statement, the IAG International Airlines Group unit said it would aim to operate almost all of its scheduled services for the duration of the strike.

"We will operate 99.5 per cent of our schedule," the carrier said last week. "Our Oneworld partner Qatar Airways will be operating a small number of short-haul flights on our behalf."

Despite the Qatari carrier's assistance, British Airways did confirm a "very small number of London Heathrow long-haul services" have had to be merged for the strike's duration.