Due to a production slowdown at Boeing and a recent strike at aircraft makers’ manufacturing facilities in the US, deliveries of aircraft to the Air India Group are being delayed, with some deliveries of already manufactured jets that were earlier scheduled for December now stretched. Has been. June 2025. For line-fit aircraft – especially those built for Air India – the airline is not yet sure about the possible delay and its impact.
“There were 50 (Boeing 737 Max) white-tails and they were all supposed to arrive by December. As things stand now, they will extend till June next year. This in itself has little impact. As far as line-fit (plane) is concerned, there are two contributing factors here. Firstly, there was a slowdown in their (Boeing) production and then there was a strike. So, it is not clear to us, and I think for Boeing also, it is not yet clear how long the impact is going to last,” said Campbell Wilson, chief executive officer and managing director of Air India.
As part of its mega order of 470 aircraft placed with Airbus and Boeing last year, Air India Group had ordered 220 Boeing aircraft – 190 narrow-body 737 Max aircraft, 20 wide-body 787 aircraft and 10 wide-body aircraft. Body 777X aircraft. Of the 190 737 Max aircraft, 50 were to be white-tail aircraft – aircraft built for other airlines but transferred to Air India Group due to cancellation of the original order – and the other 140 were to be line-fit aircraft. So far, 35 of the 50 have been delivered to White-Tails group’s low-cost airline Air India Express, with the remaining aircraft delayed.
The delivery of new aircraft is a key aspect of the Air India Group’s fleet and network expansion plans. Slower than expected aircraft deliveries could slow the airline group’s growth plans.
Air India Group, which currently has a collective fleet of 300 aircraft, plans to increase this to 400 aircraft by 2027.
100 new aircraft inducted in the last 18 months
Over the past 18 months or so, the airline group has added 100 new aircraft.
Over the past year, it added a new aircraft on average every six days, and this trend is likely to continue for a few months.
“Certainly, I think a six-month (delay) is reasonable for some aircraft, but there is still a whole backlog that they (Boeing) have to work on. So, the impact could last, I don’t know how long, but it could be a reasonable (amount of time),” Wilson said.
As for wide-body 787 planes, which are not manufactured at Boeing facilities affected by the strike, Wilson said industry-wide supply chain-related challenges remain.
“That (delay in delivery) is just a part. “We and every airline are affected by this and we just have to adjust our plans,” Wilson said.
Air India expects a “short lag” in aircraft deliveries until late 2025, after which line-fit aircraft airbus And Boeing is expected to “begin arrivals at an accelerated pace.”
Air India’s order for 250 Airbus aircraft includes 210 narrow-body jets of the A320 family and 40 wide-body A350 aircraft.