The Australian airline Qantas is suspending international flights from the end of March in response to the coronavirus outbreak.

This will be place until at least May 31st, the carrier said in a statement.

It says this is based on advice from the Australian government, which is recommending against all overseas travel.

While its domestic flights are also being reduced by 60% until the end of May.

Two-thirds of employees are to be temporarily "stood down" to preserve as many jobs as possible in the longer term, it added.

During the stand down, employees will be able to draw down on annual and long service leave.

The company says additional support mechanisms will be introduced - including leave at half pay and early access to long service leave.

A Qantas Boeing 787 Dreamliner plane arrives at Sydney International Airport after flying direct from New York in October 2019 | Image: David Gray /Getty Images for Qantas

While a shareholder dividend payment of of AUS$201m (€106.3m) has been deferred until September.

More than 150 aircraft will be temporarily grounded, including all of Qantas’ A380s, 747s and B787-9s and Jetstar’s B787-8s.

But essential domestic, regional and freight connections will be maintained as much as possible.

Senior management executives and the board of the airline are not to take any salary during this crisis.

They have increased their salary reductions from 30% to 100% until at least the end of this financial year.

The chairman and group CEO will also take no pay, and annual management bonuses have also been cancelled.

Qantas group CEO, Irish man Alan Joyce, said: "The efforts to contain the spread of coronavirus have led to a huge drop in travel demand, the likes of which we have never seen before.

"This is having a devastating impact on all airlines.

"We’re in a strong financial position right now, but our wages bill is more than AUS$4bn a year.

"With the huge drop in revenue we’re facing, we have to make difficult decisions to guarantee the future of the national carrier."

"The reality is we’ll have 150 aircraft on the ground and sadly there’s no work for most of our people.

"Rather than lose these highly skilled employees who we’ll need when this crisis passes, we are instead standing down two-thirds of our 30,000 employees until at least the end of May."

"This is a very hard set of circumstances for our people, as it is for lots of parts of the community right now.

"No airline in the world is immune to this, with the world’s leading carriers making deep cuts to flying schedules and jobs.

"Our strong balance sheet means we’ve entered this crisis in better shape than most and we’re taking action to make sure we can ride this out."