In November 2024, I had written about the last few A319s of India. These A319s were part of the 2006 deal with Airbus where the airline had placed orders for 20 A321, 19 A319 and 4 A320s. The initial three all economy aircraft were leased until the factory fresh ones were inducted. At one point of time, these were the backbone of Indian Airlines’ network in the North East from Kolkata and also served up some key trunk routes. The A319s categorised lower trip cost as compared to its larger siblings, but with higher CASK.
Air India, in its June edition of its inflight magazine has listed only 04 A319s as part of its fleet. Some research online shows that VT-SCM has not flown since April 02 this year and VT-SCF has not flown since March 31 this year. This is an indication that they won’t be flying commercial service again. The four operational A319s are thus VT-SCV, VT-SCH, VT-SCQ, and VT-SCR, which has been confirmed via FlightRadar24 as well.
Starting June, Air India has reduced its domestic (as well as international) operations with the domestic schedule being reduced by over 20% as it battles market conditions, fuel prices, demand pressures amidst the over INR 25,000 crore loss in last financial year. With a reduced flight schedule, the need to deploy the A319 would have further reduced operationally. What was earlier used as a rotational spare or capacity management tool, will now see minimal operations showing data shared by Cirium, an aviation analytics company. This is because the airline will have spare A320 family aircraft to operate if needed. On one hand, a smaller aircraft would better suit the shrinking demand but it comes at a cost because the aircraft are A320ceo, the older generation consuming more fuel, a challenge at current times when fuel costs are high.
On a scheduled basis, the airline has only 42 operations per week with the A319s. One operating from Delhi and one from Mumbai. The airline probably has one each in Delhi and Mumbai to be used as a spare, if needed.
Delhi, Mumbai, Jaipur, Bhubaneshwar, Varanasi, Goa
The airline is operating a daily flight to Jaipur and Bhubaneshwar from Delhi with the A319, both flights operating from Terminal 2 at Delhi. From Mumbai, the airline is scheduled to deploy the A319 once a week to Varanasi and six times a week to Goa – Dabolim.
Network Thoughts
The A319s were on the books of Air India and it made sense to keep operating the aircraft since it did not have lease obligations. As long as the aircraft could recover the operating cost, the aircraft would make money for the airline. However, the mid-life upgrades, D-Checks, re-configurations are capital extensive and a decision then needs to be taken on spending as much versus seeing its end of life journey. As the airline moves to a new generation of fleet, the A319s are obviously bound to retire soon.
How long will they fly? If the fuel costs remain higher, their retirement could be fast tracked as the airline will have some spare capacity to offer. Any reversal could see the airline extract everything from the air frames. Either ways, if you plan to fly the last few A319s of India and Air India, time is running out.
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