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RAWALPINDI: Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) has acquired another fuel-efficient Airbus A-320 on lease from Ireland for six years as part of its plan to lease six aircraft to improve its performance.
Secretary Aviation Mohammad Ali Gardezi said this while talking to media personnel on the occasion of inducting the Airbus A-320 into the PIA’s fleet here at the Benazir Bhutto International Airport on Saturday.
“The induction of another fuel-efficient Airbus A-320 into the PIA fleet was part of government’s efforts to improve the national flag carrier. With the induction of another A-320 into the PIA fleet, the number of aircraft operating with the PIA will go up to 26,” he said, adding that five more airbus A-320 will be acquired by the end of January next year.
The aircraft with the seating capacity of 146 passengers will operate on domestic routes with lower operating cost. The flying range of Airbus A-320 is 5-1/2 hours.
PIA director for flights operations resigns over ‘interference’
He said PIA had acquired three Airbus A-320s on lease that are considered the safest planes. It was the second aircraft while the third A-320 aircraft will be acquired in October. In addition, four or five more aircraft will be inducted into the fleet by the end of January 2015.
Published in Dawn, July 27th, 2014
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Comments (37) Closed
Jul 27, 2014 06:48am
Dawn news could you elaborate what type of lease it is.? Wet, Dry or Simple? I am sure that it involves a Wet lease as Wet leases around the world are known for Good Commission ( Bribes) . Do the people of Pakistan that after 6 years of this lease to PIA this aircraft will be given back to the main airline ( lessor ) and the PIA will never get any ownership of such aircraft after the stipulated time. PIA management must elaborate what are the conditions involved in this agreement and on what amount this is signed in the first place.
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Jul 27, 2014 06:51am
Great! Nawaz's government is doing a better job in getting PIA back on it's feet. Many more improvements may come If only they get to survive for next four years.
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Jul 27, 2014 08:21am
I hope you guys work on enabling postal votes.
Now with regards to this issue. To be honest I think the existing fleet should be refurbished and the massive staff down-sized!! I know for a FACT that some people have been hired based solely on sifarish! You MUST take these hard decisions, hopefully with the passage of time and slowly! It will only cause problems if you do it extra-constitutionally and will make your government more unpopular :( Even though it's a good decision to cut jobs. The existing fleet is GREAT and just needs to look better, change its seats, make the TVs better etc. The investment will pay massive dividends, simultaneously work on punctuality, it is an extremely important issue in the eyes of passengers.
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Jul 27, 2014 08:47am
This could be big.
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Jul 27, 2014 09:12am
Please get new and better trained stewards also!
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Jul 27, 2014 09:26am
Fuel economic air crafts will help corrupts to pocket in more money.
Without removing corrupts and hiring talents honestly will make no much difference..
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Jul 27, 2014 09:26am
@Adnan man you still dreaming please wake up.
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Jul 27, 2014 09:39am
This government of Mr Nawaz Sharif, is trying, at least trying, to do so many things right. Starting so many Energy projects, cleaning Pak Railway & Pak Steel Mills mess, Motorways, Metro Bus Services, Gwader to China Economic corridor, & of course this cleaning up the PIA's mess, but many other politicians, instead of helping out to make Pakistan a better place for our children, are busy trying to bring "Inqlaab" & "Long Marches".
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Jul 27, 2014 11:03am
Privatize PIA in a transparent way. The committee for privatization should include members from all parties in addition to experts. No handing over PIA at a peanut price to Mansha group.
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Jul 27, 2014 02:32pm
DAWN News: Atleast have the right version of the aircraft in the picture. You can't just paste any picture you find... This is an A320neo...
On the news itself; when will a day come when getting an airplane in the fleet will be business as usual and not a breaking news with politicians coming to inaugurate... Competition has crippled PIA and the airline is far away from being in the race.. Postpone the celebrations till there is a turnaround!
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Jul 27, 2014 03:03pm
Hang on guys, We are treating PIA as we treated GTS busses. People who are old enough to remember GTS know that there was such a large fleet of busses which has just disappeared while in the meantime Daewoo has established itself as one of the most successful transport companies in the country.
We will do that same thing to PIA fleet. Their own planes are falling apart and the Prime Minister of Pakistan has so much time on his hands that he spends hours and millions of Rupees to go and inaugurate the arrival of a little plane on lease!! Come on, this is stupid. PIA is grounding it's own planes because they cannot bother to maintain those and there is nobody interested in improving things at PIA as everyone has decided that it's on it's way out.
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Jul 27, 2014 03:09pm
At a time when everywhere in the world, air travel is becoming more and more affordable and popular, so many new airlines have started operations, PIA with millions of loyal passengers cannot get it's act together.
I always travel PIA but everytime I tell myself "NOT AGAIN" but the next time I again buy PIA ticket because I think that the airfare should go to PIA instead of any other airline.
PIA management, please wake up and make this airline what it is capable of.
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Jul 27, 2014 03:30pm
@abbas kd
Chawal
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Jul 27, 2014 03:56pm
A320 IS A NORMAL REGIONAL / MEDIUM HALL narrow body air craft which has a capacity of 180 passenger. why this big fuzz as if PIA buys an A380 super jumbo
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Jul 27, 2014 05:15pm
Main problem is over staffing , nepotism, and poor customer service. Just fix these issues and PIA will be profitable again.
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Jul 27, 2014 05:51pm
Induction of new aircrafts on lease in PIA's fleet is a good attempt but the government must not forget that the declined stage of PIA is not due to the shortage of aircraft rather its shortage of efficient management , presence of massive corruption , sifarish culture and non commitment on both ends of governments and PIA's staff.
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Jul 27, 2014 05:56pm
@srd
When you have fallen so low,even a cycle purchase become newsworthy.
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Jul 27, 2014 06:43pm
PIA once a proud carrier of Pakistan is laughing joke as whenever our political leadership get involved, than its goes to dogs. Please sell this Airline to some U.A.E carrier as Emitrates Airlines has become the king of Sky as they got the cream of the world aviation to run that airline and it is scaring best Airlines in West to provide them access. Dubai gave its Airline a free hand without any Sheikhs getting involved.
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Jul 27, 2014 06:50pm
PIA is DEAD.........and everyone knows it, but government and PIA management NEVER want to admit this because they they ALLL MAKE BIG. MONEY FROM PIA and the country suffers.
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Jul 27, 2014 07:59pm
Its the people that make an airline not planes although they might help Aslong as corruption and religious hypocrisy remain the zeitgeist of Pakistan all improvement is illusory
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Jul 27, 2014 08:29pm
A-320 acquired from Ireland are on: Dry, Wet or Lease-Purchase basis? Normally long term lease has an "Option to Purchase".
How old are these aircraft? Before acquisition has CAA inspected the aircraft and reviewed its maintenance record?
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Jul 27, 2014 08:31pm
They should also tell us the ages of these aircrafts and how well they have been maintained so far by the airlines who are leasing them out to PIA.
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Jul 27, 2014 08:32pm
@Awan Agreed 100 percent AND they should also tell us the ages of these aircarfts.
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Jul 27, 2014 08:35pm
@Shuaib Bhat As I read a few days ago, the aircrafts that these leased ones are replacing are past their working age (they are 25+ years old). I would prefer if these are replaced with younger ones instead of refurbished.
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Jul 27, 2014 09:09pm
yes bro without good steward it is not possible to mentain the good performance of any fleet
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Jul 27, 2014 09:39pm
Good job. Conditions should be made public to which the deal has been signed. Those responsible for the present condition of PIA should not go free. Culprits should be brought to justice, causing the colossal loss to the national exchequer. Future is connected to the past. Mistakes should be rectified and those responsible be punished.
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Jul 27, 2014 10:12pm
@Awan You are absolutely right when you allude to the lack of depth in reports emanating in Pakistan's print media in general. It seems that the stories are mostly "copy-pasted" from elsewhere without giving the details of how situations and actions might affect Pakistan. In some cases even the figures quoted are absurdly wrong.
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Jul 28, 2014 12:21am
This seems a good move. The next step should be to buy the planes to expand the PIA fleet instead of leasing them.
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Jul 28, 2014 02:07am
A320 has been a proven workhorse for some decades now, surprised that PIA has got one now in 2014, in india we got the Aircraft 20 years back and was the mainstay aircraft for now merged Indian Airlines, really surprised PIA did not induct this fuel efficient aircraft long back
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Jul 28, 2014 02:45am
These planes have not seen PIA yet. What will these planes efficiency be any good when their would be management and staff (from PIA) are highly inefficient. These kind of planes are only efficient if they do not carry passengers and their families who don't pay to travel. Also, if they are not carrying the free baggage of thousands of travelers. What will their efficiency do if they won't reach their destinations on time so the crew could be paid over time. Not to mention additional burden of providing hotels and meals to all their late passengers costing PIA billions. The best services PIA could do to Pakistan is to just shut down this white elephant.
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Jul 28, 2014 04:02am
please improve PIA and hire good people to run this airline 200Million people live in the country and our airline won't make profit its impossible common guy please do better then this.
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Jul 28, 2014 05:36am
Don't get amazed... We just have after adding this one, 26 aircraft. A comparison of this from other airlines will reveal that we are nothing. Emirates which is quite popular ammongst us, has over 200 aircrafts just in service. If you count down their total number of air crafts, it sums up to over 500. Not to mention American airline has approximately double that in their fleet!
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Jul 28, 2014 11:55pm
@Farrukh Munir Merge with Malaysian Airlines and let them run PIA.
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Jul 29, 2014 02:25am
I don't see any major problems in resolving most of the issues that pia have with annoyed passengers whom mostly have started boycotting pia now. Gone are the days when people could be hoarded aboard like goats, then being fleeced and kicked out on arrivals with a grin.
Passengers these days are expecting, a hassle free journey with quality and a fare that justifies value for money. Unfortunately, pia is not in this realm and stubbornly refuses to change its draconian ways. Just implementing in a few changes would work wonders, new aircraft or not.
First stop the pathetic drama of this so called security at the entrance to the parking lot where a couple of guards hang around with a metal coat hanger. Its a nuisance and a hindrance. The entrance to the main building from the parking ground is shared by exiting vehicles, arriving passengers and departing passengers, all struggling for escape...Is there not anybody in Pakistan to organize this grand cockup? Further to stop exploiting passengers at the lounge with serving stale food and asking New York prices! .Next is to change the entire ground and air crew. Nobody gets any preference apart from paying passengers. Simple common sense would change so much
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Jul 29, 2014 05:35am
@Moon probably the two million people are just as corrupt
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Jul 29, 2014 10:54am
I'm going on long march in this airbus!!
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Jul 29, 2014 11:34am
Actually A320 is not the most fuel efficient aircraft in its category. With a capacity of 150 passengers it delivers 2.61 liters per passenger-100kilometre. Compared with thisBoeing 737-900ER gives 2.32 liters per passenger-100kilometer and Airbus A321-200 gives 2.5 liters per passenger-100kilometer. Lower figure means more efficient.
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