More XWBs Inbound: Lufthansa To Lease Four Ex-LATAM Airbus A350s

With just over 20 Airbus A350-900s in its fleet, German flag carrier Lufthansa plans to acquire a little more as increasing global demand for air travel requires increased capacity from the airline. Lufthansa is looking to acquire at least six of the Airbus widebodies previously owned and operated by two carriers; LATAM Airlines and South African Airways.

More XWBs incoming for Lufthansa

Lufthansa isn’t a complete stranger to acquiring pre-owned Airbus A350s, as a small handful from its current fleet – specifically D-AIVA, D-AIVB, D-AIVC, and D-AIVD, were previously operating for Philippine Airlines before being leased and delivered to the German flag carrier last year.

But this time around, Lufthansa is looking to acquire more of the widebody aircraft. Four of them previously operated for LATAM Airlines Brazil before it filed for Chapter 11 and focused on having an all-Boeing widebody fleet. And interestingly, the remaining two were initially produced for the Brazilian carrier but instead went to Hainan Airlines.

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Time spent with Hainan Airlines was less than a year before the two widebodies were leased to South African Airways in November 2019, and they entered service in January 2020. Unfortunately, their time spent with the South African flag carrier was even shorter as they were withdrawn from use in April of that same year after the pandemic wrecked the global aviation industry.

Fortunately, Lufthansa will soon be giving all six aircraft a new lease of life soon, as every single one of them is already in the process of being registered under the German flag carrier. And the details of these six aircraft are as follows:

All six Airbus A350s are currently configured differently, with 30 seats in business class and 309 seats in economy class. It’s also uncertain if Lufthansa will be refurbishing the cabins to include the premium economy cabins immediately upon acquisition, as the Star Alliance member is yet to respond to comments at this time of writing.

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Adding in more seats for the summer

With the six additional Airbus A350s, Lufthansa will soon operate 27 of the fuel-efficient aircraft type for its long-haul flight services. However, it’s unclear when the new additions will join the fleet. And although the fleet acquisition would suggest that the airline is trying to speed up the fleet renewal process, especially after ordering more new-generation aircraft earlier this month, these six are still more about adding capacity for the upcoming summer season.

Given the delay of the Boeing 777X program and how deliveries of new aircraft from the order book are also occasionally delayed due to supply chain disruptions, the airline is going to need as much capacity to ensure minimal flight disruptions, which was also why it has also been reactivating its older Airbus A340-600s and A380-800s for flights to North America for the next few months to meet growing market demand.

Photo: Vincenzo Pace | Simple Flying

Bottom line

While the reactivation of the older quad jets will be for the North American market, Lufthansa will likely deploy the Airbus A350-900s to meet the growing demand within the Asia-Pacific region. And since the Airbus new-generation widebodies are all about premium offerings, the flag carrier will likely refurbish the six new fleet additions.

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Source: Air Data News