S7 Airlines’ Airbus A320neo-family fleet grows to 20

S7 Airlines took delivery of its very first A320neo in July 2017 and currently operates 16 А320neos and 4 А321neos (Alexander Listopad)

S7 Group, Russia’s largest privately owned airline consortium, has expanded its fleet with the addition of its 20th Airbus A320neo-family aircraft. The new A320neo, with tail number VQ-BTL, was delivered directly from the European aircraft manufacturer’s Toulouse base to Novosibirsk at the beginning of October.

The carrier has revealed to Russian Aviation Insider that the newly-delivered A320neo is, among others, serving such destinations as Krasnodar, Chita, St Petersburg, Sochi and Blagoveshchensk from its Siberian hub. The latest aircraft offers the S7’s typical A320neo layout of eight business-class and 156 economy seats and is powered by Pratt & Whitney PW1127G engines.

Currently S7 Airlines has 16 A320neos and four A321neos in its fleet and is planning to receive one additional A320neo-family aircraft in December. The total S7 Group fleet currently consists of 102 aircraft.

In a move to improve the efficiency and age of its fleet, S7 Airlines has now started phasing out its Airbus A319s. The first of 18 of them in the airline’s fleet – the 19-year-old VP-BTT – left Russia in September and the airline plans to retire one third of its smallest and oldest narrow-bodies by the end of this year.

In the first eight months of 2019, S7 Airlines, which comprises Sibir and Globus, remained Russia’s second biggest airline grouping. Sibir, itself the country’s second largest individual carrier, transported almost nine million people, up 15.6 per cent on the same period of last year, while the smaller Globus grew by 6.9 per cent, serving three million passengers.

by Ivan Volodin