Five days after its lessor Dubai Aerospace Enterprise (DAE) requested it, the DGCA deregistered three SpiceJet aircraft on Thursday, according to sources.
The Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA), in response to a request made by the Irish lessor company Alterna aircraft on August 1, is also anticipated to deregister another SpiceJet aircraft on Friday.
To deregister the aforementioned four aircraft, DAE and Alterna submitted Irrevocable Deregistration and Export Request Authorization (IDERA) requests.
When a lessor’s negotiations with the airline over the payment of dues are unsuccessful, the lessor will typically submit an IDERA request.
SpiceJet released a statement on the DAE’s move earlier this week, but it did not do so on Thursday.
“SpiceJet plans to replace all its older Boeing aircraft with the new Max model in a phased manner. Between now and next calendar year, SpiceJet will induct around 20 new Max planes into its fleet. As part of this modernisation plan, we are returning older aircraft in a phased manner including these three aircraft,” it had said.
These returns were anticipated and won’t affect our business operations, it had been observed.
“SpiceJet has already returned 12 old Boeing aircraft to lessors in the last calendar year. We have 13 Max aircraft in our fleet and the new inductions would begin from October 2022,” the airline had said.
According to a statement made by Alterna earlier this week, the aircraft is a part of an early termination agreement that was signed with the lessor back in November 2021.
“The lessor has not provided documentation in the manner desired to SpiceJet to facilitate de-registration of the aircraft and has instead chosen to de-register on its own. This aircraft has already been removed from our fleet for over eight months and does not in any manner affect our operations or schedule,” the airline had said.
The last four years have seen losses for SpiceJet. In the years 2018–19, 2019–20, and 2020–21, it had net losses of Rs 316 crore, Rs 934 crore, and Rs 998 crore, respectively.
The airline reported a financial loss of Rs 1,248 crore for the April through December 2021 period. The airline has not yet released its 2022 January–March financial figures.
On July 27, the DGCA issued a directive ordering SpiceJet to operate no more than 50% of its flights that were authorised for the summer schedule for an eight-week period.
SpiceJet received a show-cause notice from the aviation authorities on July 6 in response to at least eight incidences of mechanical issues with its aircraft since June 19.
