AI to estimate aircraft need for its low-cost plan

New Delhi: Starting the first low cost flights of a national carrier within the country, following the merger of AI Express and Alliance Air, is proving to be a challenging task for the government as it has to first find the planes to do so. The AI management has started work on first estimating how many more aircraft would be required for the domestic-cum-international low cost carrier (LCC) so that orders can be quickly placed.
The reason for this crunch is clear. Alliance Air — which is not a low cost carrier (LCC) — has a fleet of seven Boeing 737s and four ATRs. The Boeings are over 20 year old and five of them will be converted into freighters. In fact, the airline plans to stop using these planes for flying passengers by this year-end. The 43 planes ordered by IA were meant for its use.
AI ordered 25 aircraft (Boeing 737-800s) for the AI Express because of the commercial success of this LCC on the lucrative Gulf and and far east sector. In fact, so huge is the traffic that AI feels the 25 planes it ordered may not be adequate for the international flights of the new LCC.
The group will consider if the new A-319s ordered by IA could be used for domestic flights of this LCC. Till the merged airline decides on how may extra planes it needs to order, some planes may be used for beginning low cost domestic flights as the new ones keep joining the fleet.
28/05/07 Times of India

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Categories: Air India Express May 2007, Air India May 2007