MSGID: 2:292/854 14255263
TZUTC: 0200                  
Air India has sold a Boeing 737-200 that the company no longer even knew it
owned. The aircraft had been sitting idle for years in a remote parking lot at
Kolkata (Calcutta) airport.
 
Only when airport authorities requested the aircraft be removed did Air India
employees discover it was actually theirs, the Economic Times of India reports.
 
The 43-year-old freighter was grounded in 2012 and later retired. Over time,
it disappeared from official records and institutional memory.
 
In a memo to employees, Air India CEO and MD Campbell Wilson announced Friday
that the sale and transfer of the aircraft, registered as VT-EHH, had been
completed last week. He called it an unusual sale, as the airline had recently
discovered the aircraft was actually still part of its fleet. The aircraft, he
explained, was once intended for India Post operations and had somehow
disappeared from various records in the years before privatization. Air India
was privatized three years ago.
 
Air India has 191 aircraft. This fleet is expected to expand to at least 570
in the coming years.

--- DB4 - 20230201
 * Origin: AVIATION ECHO HQ (2:292/854)
SEEN-BY: 80/1 105/81 106/201 128/187 129/14 305 153/7715 154/110 218/700
SEEN-BY: 221/1 226/30 227/114 229/110 112 317 400 426 428 470 664
SEEN-BY: 229/700 705 280/464 291/111 292/854 2226 8125 301/1 320/219
SEEN-BY: 322/757 335/364 342/200 396/45 460/58 633/280 712/848 902/26
SEEN-BY: 5001/100 5075/35
PATH: 292/854 229/426