Hawaiian Airlines and a subsidiary of Lufthansa Airlines have entered an agreement that could provide critically needed help for the Hawaii bellwether company. It will be in effect for the next seven years with options to “further extend the cooperation by several additional years,” according to Lufthansa.
The agreement is called a comprehensive Total Component Support (TCS) contract and, according to the press release, covers the entire fleet of Hawaiian’s A330-200 and A321neo aircraft, as well as Hawaiian’s fleet of ten A330-300 planes it operates on behalf of Amazon.
BOH take: It’s clear that Hawaiian Airlines is using its best efforts and creativity in trying to get on the other side of these daunting A321neo fleet problems that have been vexing them.
The first agreement signed between Hawaiian Airlines and Lufthansa Technik.
Lufthansa Technik, also known as “LHT,” is a subsidiary of the Lufthansa Group and provides worldwide maintenance, repair, and overhaul (MRO) services for aircraft, engines, and components.
The important connection with A321neo problems.
No further details were provided in the announcement, so we can’t say definitively that Lufthansa is getting involved in the massive engine repairs on the Hawaiian A321neo fleet. Those repairs are in process and have resulted in flight cancellations and other issues. This kind of help from Lufthansa certainly couldn’t hurt! Otherwise, will never detailed, we believe these repairs have been taking place at a subsidiary of Singapore Airlines in the Philippines.
We believe that Lufthansa may well be providing some of the PW1100G engine repairs for Hawaiian. We say that because it is the same group, LHT, that is doing that inspection and repair work for Lufthansa. Lufthansa had previously said it would provide that type of work to other airlines, and we believe Hawaiian has taken them up on that offer.
Lufthansa Airlines itself said it may have up to 20 of its related A320neo aircraft out of service at one time with the PW1100 engine problems. Hawaiian said yesterday they plan to have four out of service. Hawaiian’s estimate seems somewhat low, given that Lufthansa expects to have up to one-third of its related fleet out of service for this issue.
Lufthansa’s partnership certainly would also give Hawaiian more clout in dealing with these aircraft issues.
While Hawaiian is leaning into its existing and more expensive to operate A330 planes for help during the A321neo problems, Lufthansa is similarly holding onto its older A320 planes that don’t have the engine problems.
Lufthansa Technik will serve Hawaiian Airlines’ at four US mainland locations.
Lufthansa said, “For each aircraft, Lufthansa Technik will perform component maintenance, provide access to the company’s component pool and logistics services, and establish home base stocks at several Hawaiian Airlines maintenance bases, including Honolulu’s Daniel K. Inouye International Airport, Los Angeles International Airport, and Seattle-Tacoma International Airport.”
If in fact the repairs to this point have been done at Clark, Philippines, it would be another significant improvement have them done at the west coast depots going forward.
Hawaiian provided limited details: “When we set out to find a maintenance provider for components installed on our Airbus fleet, we looked for an established MRO organization that shared our focus to safely deliver reliable aircraft and components to the operation on time and at a competitive price. We believe we found that partner with Lufthansa Technik, and we look forward to their support of our Airbus fleet in the years to come.” — Jim Landers, Hawaiian Airlines’ SVP of Technical Operations “
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