Fiji’s international carrier, Air Pacific had made a historic announcement today as the airline has ordered three new Airbus A330-200 aircraft to replace its current fleet of B747 and B767 aircraft.
While making the announcement and signing the deal with Airbus in Suva today, Air Pacific Managing Director and CEO, Dave Pflieger said this is a significant milestone for the airline and the people of Fiji.
This sees Air Pacific moving away from the leased Boeing planes and entering into an agreement for the first time ever to purchase Airbus planes.
The first of the three state of the art planes will be arriving in March 2013 while the other two will arrive in Nadi later that year.
Pflieger said the catalogue price of a A330-200 plane is 200 million US dollars however he said due to confidential commercial agreements, he would not be able to reveal further details on the purchase price of the three planes.
The planes will have 20% additional cargo capacity and will also burn 45 percent less fuel than the current 747-400 jumbo jets.
This will result in significant fuel saving for Air Pacific and will also be more environmentally friendly.
Tourism Minister, Aiyaz Sayed-Khaiyum said this is a huge leap forward for Air Pacific and Fiji as a whole.
Dave Pflieger confirmed that Air Pacific has borrowed about $200 million for initial funding in relation to the purchase of the three aircrafts.
Sayed-Khaiyum said the FNPF loan to Air Pacific is assisting the country move forward and he highlighted how the Singaporean Superannuation Fund assisted its country in development in the early days.
Pflieger said 85%of the funding for the purchase of the three aircraft will be borrowed from offshore banks.
Air Pacific is already in talks with the European Credit Agency.
Story by: Vijay Narayan
Air Pacific orders 3 new Airbus aircrafts
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