Icelandair will introduce the Boeing 767 back into its passenger service from the start of April 2016, around ten years since the carrier last utilised the type on its scheduled route from its hub at Keflavik International Airport.
The airline will use the aircraft on a single flight to London Heathrow on April 1, 2016 and then on daily rotations to the UK capital and New York JFK International from April 15, 2016. It had previously utilised the 767 on its scheduled network in summer 2005 and 2006 when the type was used to operate routes from Keflavik International Airport to Boston and San Francisco and occasional rotations within Europe to Copenhagen, Frankfurt, London, Oslo and Paris.
Icelandair revealed earlier this year that it would acquire two 260-seat 767-300ERs for operation in summer 2016 to replace two smaller 757s which will be retired from its fleet this autumn when their leases expire. It currently operates a fleet of 23 183-seat 757-200s and a single 220-seat 757-300, the stretched variant of the type.
“Operating one type of aircraft has been very economical for Icelandair but when the route network and the fleet reaches a certain size it becomes more feasible to have a broader range of aircraft in the fleet. High load factors all year round and limited number of landing slots on certain airports also support this decision,” said Bjorgolfur Johannsson, president and chief executive officer, Icelandair Group:
"We foresee further growth opportunities in the coming years with these changes to the fleet policy for passenger aircraft. The Boeing 767 aircraft can service markets that the current fleet cannot, which will enable us to go into new markets and connect them to the current route network,” he added.
For Icelandair the 767 offers some commonality to its current 757 in terms of maintenance and crew training and the airline has experience in operating that type. Alongside its previous scheduled operations Icelandair Group’s charter subsidiary, Loftleidir Icelandic, has operated the type in leasing projects that have been maintained and supported by Icelandair.
Here's the proposed Icelandair 767 summer 2016 schedule as extracted from OAG Schedules Analyser on the morning of June 26, 2015. The current schedule with the deployment of the aircraft on these two routes is displaying through to July 21, 2016.
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