Philippine Airlines (PR, Manila Ninoy Aquino International) will wet-lease two A330-200s from Wamos Air (EB, Madrid Barajas) to operate on the Manila-Sydney Kingsford Smith and Manila-Melbourne Tullamarine city pairs for five months, effective June 1, 2024. The carrier said the deal would help ensure effective fleet management and operational resilience during the upcoming peak travel period.
“We have additional maintenance requirements during this period due to global supply chain issues that continue to impact the industry," CEO Stanley Ng said in a May 17 Philippine Stock Exchange filing. "We see the need to temporarily add these aircraft to ensure that we have sufficient capacity to meet the demand that we are anticipating across our network.”
Wamos Air operates four A330-200s, along with six A330-300s. CEO Enrique Saiz told ch-aviation the two aircraft heading to the Philippines are EC-NCK (msn 840) and EC-NUI (msn 963). The Sydney services will operate between June 1 and October 31 inclusive. The Melbourne flights will run between June 1 and September 30 inclusive.
Philippines Airlines flies to Sydney daily and five times per week to Melbourne. It says the Wamos aircraft will offer a two-cabin class configuration and passengers will receive comparable amenities inflight and the same ground experience as when flying on a Philippines Airlines A330.
Ng has previously talked about growing pains at the carrier as it finds itself unable to procure aircraft quickly enough to meet strong passenger demand. According to the ch-aviation fleets module, Philippine Airlines operates 52 aircraft, including three A320-200s, eighteen A321-200s, six A321-200N, two A321-200NX, eleven A330-300s, two A350-900s, and ten B777-300ERs. It also has thirteen A321-200Ns, nine A350-1000s, and one B777-300ERs due for delivery. The airline flies to 73 airports in 21 countries.
