Dubai: Emirates expects its fleet size to reach more than 250 aircraft by 2020, according to Shaikh Ahmad Bin Saeed Al Maktoum, President of Dubai Civil Aviation and Chairman and Chief Executive of Emirates airline and Group.
"We will be over 250 aircraft… maybe around 280 aircraft by 2020," he told Gulf News in an interview yesterday. The Arab world's biggest carrier currently has 162 planes, including 18 Airbus A380 superjumbos.
Shaikh Ahmad spoke shortly after Emirates announced a $26 billion (Dh95.5 billion) deal for 70 Boeing 777-300 ER (Extended Range) aircraft (including options for 20 of the aircraft type) on the opening day of the Dubai Airshow.
Some of the future deliveries would be used to replace the airline's previous fleet, according to Shaikh Ahmad. "Some of them [the 777s] will go into retiring old planes… I don't know how many," he said.
Hunger for growth
"And as we speak today, maybe we will have to extend some of the leases for aircraft that we were supposed to return. But the business was good and so we kept them. So within a year or so from now, you will perhaps see some of the older aircraft going out and being replaced by newer versions," he added.
Meanwhile, Emirates' hunger for growth will see the carrier expanding manifold in the future, Shaikh Ahmad said. Asked if Emirates was ever going to stop growing, he said: "Some of the carriers in the world have been in business for 50-60 years. Did they stop? Our growth should be forever."
Emirates has recently expressed intentions to increase its order for Airbus A380s to 120 planes from the current 90 it has on order as a long-term plan. Shaikh Ahmad said: "I hope [we will have] more. Today we have a huge firm order for 90 A380s, of which 18 are operational in our fleet today. We should have all of the 90 superjumbos operational between now and the next five years."
He said the new Concourse 3 coming up at Dubai International's Terminal 1 would be geared towards accommodating growth.
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