The announcement from Turkish Airlines comes on the back of a major deal with European plane maker Airbus. Bolat said, “We finished with Airbus. We have ordered 385 aircraft; some are fixed, and some are options. So, with Airbus, should we exercise our options or not? That is the question, but it will happen after three to four years,” he said.

Bolat said the airline, which has a fleet of 455 aircraft from Boeing and Airbus, has ambitions to double its total fleet size to 810 aircraft in ten years. The airline chairman said the order could potentially go to Airbus, given Boeing’s ongoing production challenges. He explained, “With our current fleet and our Airbus order, we can reach the target of 810 aircraft if we don’t replace any of our existing fleet.”

However, the airline has adopted a plan to “split the risks because right now, Boeing has some production problems, and it might happen to Airbus sometime later.  Therefore, we want to mitigate the risks by using both products available in the market,” he said.

Over the last 20 years, the airline has expanded its fleet 6.7 times with orders for 424 aircraft, including 126 widebody, 281 narrow-body, and 17 freighters.

“In 2023, we had had a fleet of 65 aircraft. In 10 years, we will grow it to 810 aircraft… We are pretty much confident that we can do it. In the last 20 years, our average growth rate is 12.3 per cent, almost 3 times more than IATA’s average. In this 20 years, every year Turkish Airlines had profit… expect in 2016 and 2020. Our growth is sustainable,” he said.

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