News
Cathay Pacific becomes latest A350 operator and Airbus ponders larger -1000 variant
June 3rd 2016
Hong Kong’s Cathay Pacific Airways has taken delivery of its first A350-900, B-LRA. The twinjet is scheduled to make its commercial debut on June 1 on flights to Manila and Taipei. Read More » Cathay has a total of 48 A350s on order, including 22 -900s and 26 -1000s variants. It expects to receive twelve of the smaller -900s this year, with the remainder due in 2017. Deliveries of the -1000s are scheduled to begin in 2018.
Airbus has delivered 24 A350s to date, including eight to Qatar Airways, five to Finnair, four to Vietnam Airlines, three to LATAM and Singapore Airlines (SIA), respectively and one to Cathay.
SIA will be the launch customer for the ultra-long range A350-900 ULR, scheduled for delivery in 2018, which will allow the carrier to operate a 19-hour direct service from Singapore to New York.
SIA this week said it would deploy the A350 to Johannesburg from June 27, following current daily flights to Amsterdam. It will also launch a new service to Duesseldorf from July 1, using the extra-widebody aircraft.
Airbus has received 804 orders for the A350 from 42 customers. A third of these orders were placed by Asia-Pacific carriers.
This year, it has delivered nine to date, but hopes to increase this tally to 50 by year-end. This looks increasingly challenging, however, given persisting cabin equipment delays, particularly seats, from outside suppliers. Airbus’ president and CEO, Fabrice Brégier, told media in Hamburg this week he was extremely displeased with the (non-) performance of his suppliers.
That said, Airbus expects to improve the current -900 by 2020, including a 2% fuel reduction, 500nm more range and five tons more payload.
Regarding the -1000, Tom Williams, Airbus COO, said all three test aircraft are in final assembly and the OEM is looking to do the first flight in September. Airbus has 181 orders from ten customers for the -1000, mostly carriers from the Asia-Pacific.
Meanwhile, Airbus customers COO, John Leahy, said the manufacturer was still studying a potential third and largest version A350 variant, which “could be called the -2000”, to go head-to-head with Boeing’s larger B777X series. Leahy said a decision was “not imminent”, reversing earlier suggestions that such announcement could be made at the Farnborough Airshow in July.
