SpiceJet scales down fleet again, drops network restoration plan

Firm says it will not take aircraft on short term lease as announced fifteen days ago

In spite of a deepening crisis, SpiceJet has said it will operate 22-24 Boeing 737 planes till middle of next year and will not take aircraft on short term lease as announced fifteen days ago.

"The decision to shrink is part of our restructuring," the airline's chief operating officer Sanjiv Kapoor told Reuters on Friday. The airline flew 42 Boeing planes at the end of last year, and it has cut its daily flights to 275 from 340, he said.

The airline began shrinking its fleet last month and cut down 40 flights. However barely a fortnight ago Kapoor had said the airline would grow its Boeing 737 fleet to 35 by December end. The airline was operating 26 out of its 28 Boeing planes, he had said.

SpiceJet operates a mix fleet of Boeing 737s and 15 Bombardier Q400s and the latter are used on regional routes.

"The fleet size should go up to 31 by the end of the month and to 35 aircraft by December-end." Once fresh funds come in, the Boeing 737 fleet will see 10-15 additions, most likely by the end of 2015,'' Kapoor had said.

Asked about the change in plans Kapoor said plans were evolving. "Earlier we had considered short-term leases to get fleet back to original size but our latest thinking is to operate a smaller Boeing fleet until atleast mid-next year,'' SpiceJet spokesperson said.

The airline maintains that it is scaling down fleet to control costs and consolidate its operations. The airline is reported to have told the government that it expects investor in six weeks and has repeatedly denied lessors are taking back its planes.

Kapoor also said that the Airports Authority of India had reinstated its credit facility after the airline resolved all outstanding issues with the regulatory body.

However the recent developments surrounding the airline has got the government and Directorate General of Civil Aviation into action. The DGCA is monitoring SpiceJet operations daily.

"We are running through a lot of turbulent weather ... not only the public sector, the private sector is also crashing. (With) Kingfisher crashing and, right now SpiceJet seems to be giving us heart attacks as far as airlines are concerned, " civil aviation minister Ashok Gajapathi Raju remarked responding to a media query on the airline.

Kapoor had met ministry official in November seeking a six weeks moratorium on payments to be made to the Airports Authority of India (AAI) last month. Ministry sources informed that AAI has not been too forthcoming on granting a moratorium on payments to SpiceJet fearing a Kingfisher like situation but is now examining possibility to grant a week's moratorium to SpiceJet. The DGCA too is monitoring airline's operations on a daily basis, sources said.

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