IndiGo expects grounding of over 30 Airbus A320Neo aircraft in the upcoming fourth quarter due to defects in Pratt & Whitney engines.

These will be in addition to around 40 planes which are on ground due to engine related issues.

“We have recently received additional information on the powder metal issue from Pratt & Whitney and based on our preliminary assessment of this, we anticipate aircraft on ground (AOG) in the range of mid-thirties in the fourth quarter (January-March 2024) due to accelerated engine removals. These groundings will be  incremental to the current AOGs,” the airline said in a statement on Tuesday.

Earlier this year, Pratt & Whitney highlighted the impact of the powder metal issue that has affected its new generation GTF aircrat engine. “Globally, we understand that a large number of incremental engines ranging between 600-700 are being removed for accelerated inspections and shop visits between 2023 and 2026 and two thirds of these engine removals are planned for 2023 and early 2024,” IndiGo said.

The airline has indicated it will continue to maintain capacity guidance of ‘north of mid teens’ for the current fiscal as it continues to take mitigating measures.

“Our long-term aspiration is to double our size in a decade. None of recent announcements have made any change in the ambition. We have an aircraft being delivered almost every week. We have taken a lot of mitigating measures, the two wide-body planes, which we are operating, the wet leases and other lease extensions that we’ve done. And all that has really helped us to live up to our capacity guidance. IndiGo is very well positioned to deal with issues, global supply chain challenges,” the airline’s CEO Pieter Elbers told businessline on Monday.

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