Qantas passengers have again taken to the skies after Fair Work Australia (FWA) ordered all industrial action to be terminated.

Qantas' decision to ground all flights from Saturday left nearly 70,000 people stranded.

The airline's defiant chief Alan Joyce said Qantas would return to "business as usual" as soon as possible.

FWA made its ruling terminating all industrial action between Qantas and the Transport Workers Union (TWU), the Australian International Pilots Association and the Australian Licensed Aircraft Engineers Association (ALAEA) following a meeting in Melbourne on Monday.

It gave the parties 21 days to resolve their differences.

Joyce apologised to all the airline's customers and said he hoped the backlog could be cleared within 24 hours, adding he believed the Qantas brand would recover.

"I have every confidence that we will recover back to a 65 percent domestic market share and recover internationally," he said.

Joyce added that it had been the right decision to ground the airline in a bid to stop the ongoing industrial action that was costing the airline A$15 million a week.

Although grounding all 108 planes had cost A$20 million a day, it saved the airline in the long run, he said.

"I'll make whatever tough decisions are needed to be made in order to ensure the survival of this great company," he said.

The TWU says it hopes to settle the dispute but may challenge the ban on strike action.

"If the company negotiates in good faith, which is what we're expecting the company to do, the next 21 days we will not be taking industrial action," TWU national secretary Tony Mr Sheldon said.

"We are also considering with our legal advisers whether we should appeal this decision."

Image: Getty