Icelandair’s first interim A321neo emerges from the paint shop
September 11, 2024
Icelandair has shared photos of its first Airbus A321neo (an A321-200NX, TF-IAA) after painting in the airline’s colours at Hamburg. The aircraft was rolled out of Airbus’ paint shop in Hamburg on 9 September.
The aircraft will now have its engines, seats and entertainment system installed before flight testing. Icelandair expect to take delivery of the aircraft in November. Icelandair expects to have a total of four Airbus A321 LR aircraft by the start of the summer of 2025.
Icelandair is enjoying steady growth, reporting a 10% increase in passenger numbers in August 2024 compared to last year. A total of 601,000 passengers flew with the airline in August (with 3.2 million passengers carried this year to date, an 8% increase on 2023), and Icelandair’s load factor improved from 83.9% in 2023 to 86.9% this year, while on-time performance rose to 82.8%.
There has been a slight reduction in passenger numbers travelling to Iceland but this has been offsest by increased demand for transit flights, helped by the popularity of Icelandair’s Stopover programme. In August, some 18,000 passengers took advantage of the airline’s ‘free 1-7 day stopover’ facility, boosting Iceland’s tourist industry.
Icelandair has thirteen A321-200NYs on order directly from Airbus and these are planned for delivery from 2029 onwards, to replace the carrier’s ageing Boeing 757s. The newly painted aircraft is one of seven ‘interim’ aircraft that will be leased from SMBC (five) and CDB Aviation Leasing (two).
The A321neo order marks a shift away from what has been an all-Boeing fleet. Icelandair currently operates 17 Boeing 737-8s, four Boeing 737-9s, 12 Boeing 757-200s, two Boeing 757-300s, three Boeing 767-300ERs, and two Boeing 767-300ERBCFs.
