Turkish Airlines
is expanding its narrowbody fleet with six Airbus A321neos
in 2027.
New lease agreement
Earlier today, BOC Aviation, one of the world’s largest aircraft lessors, announced it will lease six Airbus A321neos to Turkish Airlines. These new planes will be delivered in 2027.
“Turkish Airlines is one of our longest-standing customers, and this transaction is testimony to the breadth of that relationship. There is strong demand for these latest technology aircraft from our orderbook, and that will underpin our growth in the next few years.” – Steven Townend, Chief Executive Officer and Managing Director, BOC Aviation
According to data from ch-aviation, Turkish Airlines has 66 A321neos and has another 199 on order. Thirty-five planes are currently grounded due to issues with Pratt & Whitney’s PW1100G-JM engines. Because of the severity of the groundings, the airline reached a compensation agreement with P&W in July.
Photo: Oleh Yatskiv | Shutterstock
Data from Cirium, an aviation analytics firm, shows that the groundings of the A321neos have led Turkish Airlines to reduce its A321neo operations by 9.1% over November 2023. Last year, the airline had 4,100 A321neo flights and that number dropped to 3,727 flights this month. In total, there are 373 fewer flights and 76,385 fewer seats.
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The A321neos were pulled from several routes, including:
- Istanbul – Hatay
- Istanbul – Erbil
- Istanbul – Madinah
- Istanbul – Kayseri
- Istanbul – Samsun
- Istanbul – Adana
- Istanbul – Izmir
- Istanbul – Diyarbakir
- Istanbul – Ercan
- Istanbul – Antalya
- Istanbul – Van
This year, the busiest A321neo route is to Heathrow Airport (LHR) in London. There are 89 roundtrips scheduled, nearly three daily. This is a 10.1% decrease over the year before on the route.
The second-busiest A321neo route is to Tbilisi in Georgia. There are 61 roundtrips scheduled, about two each day. On this route, Turkish deploys two different configurations of its A321neos, one with 190 seats and another with 182.
Photo: Markus Mainka | Shutterstock
Several A321neo routes are over 2,000 miles long. The longest is from Istanbul to Almaty at 2,444 miles. The second-longest route is from Istanbul to Bishkek at 2,331 miles. The top ten longest routes are below:
|
Origin |
Destination |
Distance (in miles) |
|---|---|---|
|
Istanbul |
Almaty |
2,444 |
|
Istanbul |
Bishkek |
2,331 |
|
Istanbul |
Addis Ababa |
2,306 |
|
Istanbul |
Marrakech |
2,136 |
|
Istanbul |
Astana |
2,125 |
|
Istanbul |
Tashkent |
2,096 |
|
Istanbul |
Muscat |
2,095 |
|
Istanbul |
Samarkand |
2,002 |
|
Istanbul |
Lisbon |
2,000 |
|
Istanbul |
Porto |
1,933 |
Recent Turkish Airlines news
Early this month, Turkish announced that starting next year, its service to Denver International Airport (DEN) would be expanded to daily. With the addition of three flights, Turkish’s seat offering on the route will increase by nearly 8,000 per month. Despite only launching this summer, the airline has seen sufficient demand to the Mile High City that it plans to nearly double services next year.
Photo: Denver International Airport
Denver became the 14th American destination for Turkish, but the airline has no plans to stop. In 2025, Turkish plans to announce new destinations in the US and the number of cities served may soon reach 20. With no other carrier connecting the US to Turkey, the sky is the limit for the airline.