Qatar Airways Leases Oman Air A330s As A350 Grounding Continues


Qatar Airways is wet leasing three Oman Air A330-300s, joining two B777-300ERs added from Cathay Pacific. It comes as 21 A350s remain grounded due to surface degradation issues. The A330s are used to Colombo, Dhaka, and Tunis, while the B777s are (for now) primarily deployed on freight runs.

Qatar Airways has wet-leased three of Oman Air’s six A330-300s, with aircraft, crew, maintenance, and insurance provided. The pair have developed a closer relationship, probably as Oman Air wishes to join oneworld.

Radarbox.com shows that the aircraft began flying for Qatar Airways on January 10th. The three aircraft are A40-DH (delivered to Oman Air in November 2014), A40-DI (December 2014), and A40-DJ (February 2015). Funnily enough, they’re the youngest of Oman Air’s six-strong type.

According to ch-aviation.com, all three aircraft are owned by Oman Air. They have 289 seats, with 24 fully flat beds in business and 265 seats in economy. They’re Oman Air’s highest-density A330s. They’re well suited to the routes on which Qatar Airways has deployed them, as follows, with the schedule from/to Doha provided (all times are local).

Colombo: QR662/QR663 (19:25-02:30+1; 04:00-06:30)

Dhaka: QR638/QR639 (09:30-17:20/18:50-21:45) and QR640/641 (01:25-09:15/10:45-13:40)

Tunis: QR1399/QR1400 (09:15-13:35/16:05-23:25)

Through to the end of February, Colombo will be almost entirely by the A330-300, A330-200, and A321. Dhaka will see the A330-300 and -200, while Tunis will be exclusively by the larger A330 variant. Things are due to change in the summer. The A350-1000, A320, B787-8, and B777-300ER are down for Colombo, while Dhaka goes all B777-300ER and Tunis all A350-900.

The A330s arrived shortly after Cathay Pacific’s B777-300ERs, which entered Qatar Airways’ employ in December. As it’s unclear if they’ve been acquired or simply dry-leased (i.e., just the aircraft), it’s not known how long they’ll be used.

The aircraft are A7-BOA (previously B-KPL) and A7-BOB (B-KPM). According to ch-aviation.com, both are owned by BOC Aviation. ‘KPL was delivered to Cathay in October 2009, while ‘KPM arrived two months later.

The ex-Cathay B777s have a four-class configuration, with six first class seats, 53 business, 34 premium economy (which would be sold by Qatar Airways as economy), and 203 in economy. Because of first and premium economy, they have only 296 seats, so 16% to 28% fewer than Qatar’s other B777-300ERs.

They were scheduled to Hong Kong and Malé from February onwards, but this seems no longer the case. They’ve primarily been carrying freight recently. When writing, A7-BOA is about to leave Paris CDG as Qatar 22 Yankie, while A7-BOB is en route to Europe as Qatar 8864.

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