Brussels Airlines Airbus A330-300.
Brussels Airlines has wet-leased in Air Europa Boeing 787-9 capacity until mid-March to cover unforeseen Airbus A330-300 maintenance issues.
As Brussels Airlines has been preparing aircraft capacity for the upcoming summer season, the Lufthansa subsidiary has been hit by unforeseen delays during scheduled aircraft maintenance.
“The problem this [maintenance season] has been unforeseen technical problems on the A330 fleet during planned maintenance work,” a Brussels Airlines spokesperson told Aviation Week on Feb. 26.
Normally, Brussels Airlines has some spare aircraft capacity available, but not enough for this situation. “We had two options,” the spokesperson said. “Either cancel quite a number of flights or wet-lease aircraft capacity—Air Europa offered capacity to help out with a Boeing 787 until mid-March.”
Since Feb. 22, an Air Europa 787-9 has been operating Brussels Airlines' four-times weekly service SN501/502 from Brussels Zaventem to New York JFK. Besides the Air Europa cockpit crew and several cabin crew members, Brussels Airlines has three of its own cabin crew onboard these flights.
Brussels Airlines operates a widebody fleet of 10 A330-300s.
As the African Competence Center of the Lufthansa Group, the majority of its A330 fleet is operating to sub-Saharan African destinations from its Brussels hub. An eleventh A330 will join the fleet by the summer, the spokesperson says. This will be followed by two more A330s in the coming years.
Additionally, Brussels Airlines will wet-lease four airBaltic A220-300s for the upcoming summer season. “The big difference between the Air Europa wet-lease and the contract with AirBaltic is that [airBaltic] has been planned for a long time when high demand is needed,” the spokesperson said.
Separate to the 787-9 wet-lease contract for Brussels Airlines, Lufthansa Group has been considering an investment in Air Europa and has confirmed talks with its owner Globalia as it looks to build out its South American network.
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