Aviation Capital Group Delivers Third A320neo to Air Astana and FlyArystan

Air Astana and its low cost subsidiary FlyAristan have been working on streamlining their fleet for quite some time now. A further step in this direction though was made in the past days with the delivery of a third leased A320neo. The plane arrived in Kazakhstan directly from the assembly line in Hamburg, Germany. However it isn't part of a direct order placed by Air Astana with Airbus. Let's take a closer look at what this is all about.

A Third Leased A320neo to FlyArystan and Air Astana Group

The arrival of this third aircraft to the Air Astana's low cost subsidiary, FlyArystan, is part of an agreement with leasing company Aviation Capital Group. The leasing company has an agreement with the eastern European carrier to provide it with 3 new generation Airbus A320neo.

Two planes had already been delivered last year. Specifically those two planes are:

• EI-KBS delivered on December 1st 2022
• EI-KBP delivered on September 30th 2022

All three jets are Airbus A320neo powered by the Pratt&Whitney PW1100 GTF (geared turbofan) engines.

Streamlining Group Operations

As is the case for many low cost carriers, FlyArystan operates a one aircraft type fleet. In their case the plane chosen for all operations is the A320 family.

However looking at the Air Astana group as a whole there is a process of streamlining the fleet ongoing. The full service carrier which currently operates a 3 manufacturer fleet (Boeing, Airbus and Embraer) is looking to streamline this to 2. Air Astana is in fact letting go of its Embraer planes although they are still quite young.

All of this is being done as the airline group wants to simplify its operations and streamline costs. Also it has become apparent that the Embraer E-190-E2 is a little too small for the carrier and routes can be operated with similar operational margins with the much larger Airbus A320neo planes.