March 15–31. Central Asian Commercial Aviation News Brief
During five months of the winter navigation (from November 2023 through March 2024) Samarkand airport served more than 491,000 passengers, representing 55% growth year-on-year. Passenger traffic since the beginning of the year grew to 294,000 people (+39%), according to Air Marakanda, which manages the second largest airport in Uzbekistan.
The continued rapid growth was facilitated by the arrival of seven new carriers to the airport: three Uzbeki and four foreign ones, and an increase in the frequency of flights of existing airlines.
Humo Air, Centrum Air (both Uzbekistan), Red Wings, Ural Airlines (both Russia), SunExpress (Türkiye) and Qazaq Air (Kazakhstan) began flying from Samarkand Airport for the first time.
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After two days full of discussions, opinion sharing, negotiations and announcements, the region’s leading trade event dedicated to maintenance, repair and overhaul of aircraft, MRO Central Asia 2024 conference and exhibition looks back on a successful third edition.
On 26 and 27 March 2024 the international event in Tashkent, Uzbekistan brought together representatives from airlines, MRO service providers, spares and components suppliers, OEMs, logistics operators, lessors, aviation authorities and consultancies.
In the delegates’ list were presented companies from Central and West Asia, Europe, the Middle East and Africa, in addition to the world's leading firms in the commercial aviation aftermarket industry.
Growing commercial fleets in Central Asia and the Caspian region are driving demand for MRO services, but there are still many challenges for MRO development, speakers stressed in their presentations.
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Air Astana Group has reached an agreement with Pratt & Whitney for compensation and other support related to problems with PW1100G engines on Airbus A320/A321neo aircraft operated by the group.
Earlier, the group complained about teething problems with the new engines, leading to frequent aircraft downtimes. The parent Air Astana flies six A320neo and five A321neo aircraft. Its low-cost subsidiary FlyArystan has seven more A320neos in its fleet.
According to the group's calculations, it will need to repair engines by removing them from the wings on almost the entire fleet – 34 engines in total this year.
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Uzbekistan’s start-up Fly Khiva will start cargo flights from mid-April, its vice president Alisher Nurmatov told CentralAsia+ Aero. The private airline plans to provide cargo services between Europe and China through Uzbekistan.
Currently, the company has one Boeing 767-300F freighter, leased from Icelandair in January. Nurmatov mentioned that negotiations are underway to acquire two more aircraft of the type, which are currently undergoing maintenance in Shannon, Ireland.
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The Uzbek low-cost carrier Humo Air, which suspended flights in mid-March, is actively searching for aircraft to resume its operations, said the airline's COO Rene Gsponer at the MRO Central Asia 2024 conference in Tashkent.
Humo Air started budget operations with two wet-leased Airbus A320s in December and managed to carry 120,000 passengers before the grounding. Gsponer explained that these aircraft had to be returned to the Bulgarian ACMI provider Fly2Sky as their lease term expired.
Now, Humo Air aims to find up to four new aircraft for this year and double its fleet next year. Negotiations are currently underway with several lessors.
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Uzbekistan’s aviation group My Freighter is planning to open its first own line maintenance station in May, the company's technical advisor Gennady Kharlap told the MRO Central Asia 2024 conference in Tashkent.
Currently, the privately-owned group, comprising a passenger airline Centrum Air in addition to its dedicated cargo division My Freighter, contracts Uzbekistan Airways Technics to perform line and basic maintenance of its fleet of eight aircraft.
According to Kharlap, the company will start line maintenance with Airbus A320, which Centrum Air operates. The second type will be Boeing 767Fs, which are the core of My Freighter fleet.
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Armenia's inability to remove the country's airlines from the EU blacklist and a sharp increase in competition, were the main reasons for the failure of the promising project of the budget national carrier Fly Arna.
"I should admit that this project has failed <...> Fly Arna has not withstood the competition <...> Unfortunately, we have no reason to be optimistic about the implementation of this project," Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan told the National Assembly.
In early March, the Civil Aviation Committee of the republic suspended Fly Arna's Air operator's certificate for six months, and the company returned all its aircraft to lessors.
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Uzbekistan’s leading MRO provider Uzbekistan Airways Technics (UAT) is to build two new hangars capable to accommodate aircraft up to Boeing 747 size, the company's head Umid Khusanov told the MRO Central Asia 2024 conference in Tashkent.
He explained that they will be used to service Boeing 787s, which are currently taken care of on the apron. Also, the new hangars will expand the provider's ability to work with narrowbody types.
This year UAT plans to add Airbus A330 to its roaster of aircraft types maintained; another new type for UAT will be the Boeing 737MAX.
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Turkish Technic, the Istanbul-based MRO provider, has recently signed a component pool agreement with Azerbaijan’s Silk Way West Airlines. Through this 5-year strategic partnership, Silk Way West will have access to 777F spare parts pooling as well as maintenance, repair and overhaul (MRO) services for the required components.
Additionally, the largest cargo airline in the Caspian and Central Asian region will benefit from short and fast transport routes within Turkish Technic’s global supply chain network, including AOG (Aircraft on Ground) support for time-critical components.
Baku-based air freight specialist currently operates two Boeing 777Fs and has four more of the type on order along with two 777-8Fs. The core of the operator's fleet now consists of seven Boeing 747-400s and five 747-8Fs.
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Italian MRO provider EU Wings has signed an agreement with Uzbekistan Airports Holding to create a joint center for basе aircraft maintenance at Navoi airport.
The signing ceremony took place at the MRO Central Asia 2024 conference in Tashkent on March 26.
The partners plan to build a hangar at Navoi airport for maintenance of Airbus A320 and Boeing 737 narrowbodies. The joint venture is expected to be operational within the next 18 months.
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My Freighter, Uzbekistan’s privately-run air cargo specialist, has expanded its fleet with a third Boeing 767-300BCF. The 29-year-old aircraft arrived from Ostrava, Czech Republic, to Tashkent on March 23. It received the local registration number UK67010 and made its first commercial flight from Uzbeki capital to Vienna the next day.
In addition to the three Boeing 767-300F converted freighters, the airline also operates a Boeing 747-200F aircraft. My Freighter stands as Uzbekistan's largest cargo airline by the size of dedicated aircraft fleet.
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?The fourth passenger air gateway will launch operations in the most densely populated region of Uzbekistan, the Fergana Valley, in April. Airports of Uzbekistan holding announced the completion of the reconstruction of the Kokand airport, which had not served passenger flights for over 20 years.
This airfield welcomed its first technical flight on March 20 when Airbus A320neo belonging to the state-run Uzbekistan Airways landed there after a 33-minute flight from Tashkent.
During the reconstruction, the Kokand airport's runway was extended to 2000 meters, and a ramp with two parking stands for A320 and ATR72-600 type aircraft was installed. Additionally, a new passenger terminal covering an area of 900 square meters was built at the airport, designed to serve 100 passengers.
Regular flights to Kokand will start on April 1, 2024, Airports of Uzbekistan said.
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Silk Way West Airlines, the leading cargo airline in the Caspian and Central Asian region, has expanded its commitment to a modern and eco-friendly fleet by amending its contract with Boeing to purchase an additional Boeing 777 Freighter, scheduled for delivery in 2025.
This addition builds on the initial April 2021 contract, when Silk Way West Airlines committed to purchasing five Boeing 777 freighters, two of which have already been received, with delivery of the remaining jets to take place by 2027.
Silk Way West (7L) is based at Baku's Heydar Aliyev International Airport (GYD) and operates scheduled flights to 40 destinations worldwide. Airline’s annual cargo turnover exceeds 500,000 tons.
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The new international terminal’s building of the Kazakhstan’s largest airport is now 93% ready, according to Alp Er Tunga Ersoy, President of Almaty International Airport and General Manager of TAV Kazakhstan.
The head of the airport management company said that all necessary machinery and airport equipment has been purchased for the terminal, some of which is already being installed.
Start of operations of the new terminal is planned "in the summer of 2024".
Addition of the new facility, as well as modernization of the existing terminal, will double Almaty airport’s annual throughput to 14 million passengers.
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Kazakhstan's largest airline group, Air Astana, plans to increase its fleet to 56 aircraft by the end of 2024, group’s Executive Director Peter Foster told investors during a March 15 conference call, in which CentralAsia+ Aero participated.
The group has already built the Central Asian and Caspian region’s largest fleet, with 50 jets. 32 of them belong to the parent airline, while another 18 aircraft fly with the LCC subsidiary FlyArystan.
The group plans to take delivery of seven more Airbus A320neos: three for Air Astana and four for FlyArystan, in 2024. At the same time, it expects to get five older A320ceo modifications. These are intended to serve as a backup in case of continued technical issues with PW1100G engines on neo aircraft.
Furthermore, Air Astana is in negotiations with lessors to accelerate the retirement of five Embraer E190-E2 regional jets from its fleet, Foster said.
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Silk Avia, Uzbekistan’s first regional carrier, took delivery of another ATR 72-600 turboprop. The new aircraft arrived in Tashkent on March 16, directly from the manufacturer, becoming fifth aircraft of the type in the fleet of the carrier, which is part of the Uzbekistan Airways group.
The new addition will permit Silk Avia to intensify flying between Uzbeki cities, allowing to fill the void created by local LCC startup Humo Air, which abruptly suspended flight operations earlier this month.
The airline currently connects nine cities within the Central Asian republic: Tashkent, Bukhara, Karshi, Navoi, Namangan, Samarkand, Termez, Fergana and Urgench.
Aviation consultant, observer and commentator
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