For the first time in the Indian aviation industry, the carriers took delivery of more than 100 aircraft in the year 2018. The budget carrier, IndiGo accounted for more than half of these deliveries. The carriers that reached these figures are the nine domestic carriers in India, who in total inducted over 120 planes last year. In 2017, these carriers had inducted only 88 aircraft. As per the industry experts, this is the result of the increase in aviation traffic, which has been growing at about 20% year on year, for four years now. As such, capacity addition has been one of the prominent factors in this increase.
IndiGo Receives Delivery for More Than Half Order Volume
As per the data available, most of the planes which were delivered to the Indian carriers were the Airbus A320 Neos which are deployed by IndiGo, GoAir, Air India and Vistara. Together, these airlines have inducted around 60 Airbus A320 Neos this year.
Presently, these carriers boast of having a total of 660 planes in their fleets combined. IndiGo out of all, has the biggest fleet of 206 planes which includes the A320 Neos as well. On the other hand, Air India and Jet Airways have 125 and 124 aircraft respectively in their fleets. In the previous year, IndiGo inducted a total of 55 aircraft. A prominent addition in IndiGo’s fleet last year was its first long-range A321 Neo aircraft which would help the carrier in flying international flights.
Air India and its subsidiaries, in the same year, took deliveries of 18 planes followed by GoAir which inducted 16 planes. Lastly, SpiceJet inducted 14 planes in its fleet last year. It is also worth noting that while IndiGo’s and GoAir’s A320 Neos have been powered by Pratt and Whitney engines, Air India’s and Vistara’s A320 Neos have been powered by CFM engines.
Capacity Addition to Stay Consistent in Coming Years
Back in 2017, Sydney-based aviation think-tank Centre for Asia Pacific Aviation (CAPA) had forecasted that Indian carriers would receive around 100 narrow body, wide body, and regional aircrafts each year for the next five year. It is notable that IndiGo, Jet Airways, SpiceJet, GoAir, Vistara have placed an order for approximately 1,115 planes with the aircraft makers. This forecast, however, was done before Vistara placed an order for 60 additional planes in July last year.
