What Planes Does Iraqi Airways Fly?

Over the last few years, Iraqi Airways has been making headlines regarding its fleet, with occurrences such as the delivery of its first Airbus A220. With this modernization process in mind, we thought we’d take a closer look at the makeup of the Iraqi flag carrier’s fleet as a whole. The carrier operates jetliners from three different manufacturers, which we shall now examine more closely.

Boeing narrowbodies are dominant

According to data from ch-aviation, there are 42 aircraft in Iraqi Airways’ fleet. Of these, more than half come from US manufacturer Boeing, which accounts for 25 of the carrier’s jets. 13 of these are examples of its popular single-aisle 737-800 model, of which eight of these 162-seaters are presently in storage. These twin-engine narrowbodies have an average age of 9.4 years old.

More recently, Iraqi Airways has also acquired a smaller Boeing 737-700 aircraft. This twinjet is the only example of the type in its fleet, although historically speaking, another two have served the carrier. This two-class, 137-seat twinjet is 17.4 years old, and flew for AirTran, Iraqi Airways, and Fly Baghdad before rejoining the Iraqi flag carrier in September 2022. However, it is presently in storage.

On the newer end of the average age spectrum, Iraqi Airways youngest Boeing narrowbodies are its six examples of the 737 MAX 8, which presently have a mean figure of just 1.3 years old. Given their freshness, it is unsurprising to see that the majority of these next-generation narrowbodies are listed as being active at the time of writing. Indeed, only one is listed otherwise, with YI-ASM in maintenance.

Boeing widebodies

Five twin-aisle Boeing aircraft are also present in the Iraqi flag carrier’s fleet. Two of these are from the famous 747 family, with both being examples of the 747-400 variant. They have an average age of 26.4 years old, and both are presently in storage. Back in 2021, the Iraqi national airline used a Boeing 747-400 to help repatriate around 400 of its citizens from the city of Minsk.

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In addition to these two widebody quadjets, Iraqi Airways also has a 12.3-year-old 777-200LR in its fleet that bears the registration YI-AQZ. This active twinjet has 364 seats, comprising 350 in economy and 14 in business. This aircraft is joined by a pair of modern 787-8 Dreamliners, which are just one year old on average, making them the carrier’s youngest planes. It also has outstanding orders for:

• 10 Boeing 737 MAX 10s.
• Seven Boeing 787-8s.
• One Boeing 787-9.

Airbus designs

Away from Iraqi Airways’ Boeing aircraft, the carrier also flies a handful of designs from Airbus, the US manufacturing juggernaut’s European competitor. The most numerous of these is the standard A320-200, of which the airline has three examples. Two of these are active, and they are 11.8 years old on average. Slightly older are its two larger A321-200s, which have an average age of 14.8 years old.

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Photo: Airbus

There is also a single Airbus widebody present in the Iraqi Airways fleet, namely an example of the twin-engine A330-200 model. This twin-aisle jetliner, which bears the registration YI-AQY, is currently 11.9 years old, and it can accommodate a grand total of 288 passengers, with this figure comprising 264 in economy class and 24 in business class. Iraqi Airways received YI-AQY brand-new in November 2012.

As alluded to earlier, Iraqi Airways reached a milestone not too long ago when it received its first A220-300 in January 2022. Registered as YI-ARE, it represented the first of five deliveries of the modern twinjet, with the type accommodating 120 economy and 12 business class passengers. Iraqi Airways has now taken delivery of all of its A220s, and two are active today, with two stored and one in maintenance.

Half a dozen Bombardier regional jets

The remaining six aircraft in the present Iraqi Airways fleet fall under the category of regional jets. Specifically, they are all examples of the Bombardier CRJ900LR, with five presently listed as being active by ch-aviation. The sixth example of the type is currently sitting in storage at the airline’s Baghdad International Airport (BGW) hub. Iraqi Airways’ CRJ900LRs have an average age of 14.2 years old.

Photo: Fasttailwind | Shutterstock

Unlike Iraqi Airways’ larger aircraft, which favor mixed seating layouts to benefit from the higher margins gained from selling business class tickets, most of these regional jets have an all-economy configuration. This setup consists of 89 seats, with a maximum of four passengers seated per row. YI-AQB is the only exception, with this particular aircraft seating 64 economy and 12 business class guests.

Operational snapshot

Iraqi Airways has a busy year in store for its fleet, with present scheduling data made available by Cirium, an aviation analytics company, showing that the carrier has scheduled 31,096 flights in 2024. This works out at an average of 85, and these flights will offer 4,304,725 seats and 3,150,140,773 available seat miles. Flying out of Baghdad, Iraqi Airways top destinations this year include the likes of:

• Madinah, Saudi Arabia.
• Basrah, Iraq.
• Erbil, Iraq.

What do you make of Iraqi Airways’ fleet? How many of its aircraft have you flown on? Let us know your thoughts and experiences in the comments!