Air France wants to cut its Airbus A380 fleet. The French newspaper Les Echos
writes that CEO Ben Smith has made the decision about this. He has chosen to
stick to only five of these super jumbo's. The French currently have ten A380s
in use.
 
Five of them have been leased. The lease contract for two aircraft expires at
the end of 2019. Those super jumbo's then go back to Airbus. Also the other
leased A380s will be retired in due course. The five own aircraft will be
modernized from the autumn of 2020.
 
Earlier, Air France had already reduced its order at Airbus for the super
jumbo's from twelve to ten. The airline prefers the smaller A350 from Airbus
and the Boeing 777-300ER from Boeing, which are cheaper and more economical to
use.
 
The fact that Air France is holding on to five super jumbo's for the time
being, according to the newspaper, also has to do with the fact that there are
no parties to take over the aircraft. For some of the phased-out A380s from
Singapore Airlines, no new owner could be found recently.

--- D'Bridge 3.99 SR33
 * Origin: AVIATION ECHO HQ (2:292/854)