Ethiopian Airlines will probably decide within the next three months \u200bon an order for 25 smaller commercial jets to \u200cexpand its local network, Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Mesfin Tasew Bekele said late on Saturday during a gathering of airline executives in Brazil.<\/p>\n
Africa\u2019s largest carrier, \u200bwhich operates 147 aircraft, is looking at the Airbus A220, \u200bEmbraer tab E-2 and the Boeing 737 MAX 7, \u2060which is expected to be certified by the United States Federal \u200bAviation Administration this year.<\/p>\n
The planes would be used on both \u200bdomestic routes and around neighboring countries.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere are some issues, but probably within a matter of three months,\u201d Bekele said of the timing of \u200ba decision. Bekele did not specify the issues.<\/p>\n
The A220 \u200bprogramme remains in the red and has faced stiff competition from Brazilian \u200crival \u2060Embraer.<\/p>\n
Like other carriers, Ethiopian Airlines has been wrestling with higher fuel prices due to the war in Iran and it has cut Middle East flights to meet lower passenger demand, \u200bsuch as reducing \u200bfrequency to \u2060Dubai from three flights to two a day, he said.<\/p>\n
System-wide the carrier is spending about \u200b60% more on jet fuel, although it has \u200bmanaged \u2060to resolve concerns over shortages.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe have addressed the supply issue. It is okay now,\u201d he added on the sidelines of the \u2060International \u200bAir Transport Association’s annual summit this \u200bweekend in Rio de Janeiro. \u201cBut the price issue is a serious issue.\u201d<\/p>\n
–Reuters–<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":22653,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"news-type":[26],"class_list":["post-36425","news","type-news","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","news-type-general_news","entry"],"acf":{"short_description":"The planes would be used on both \u200bdomestic routes and around neighboring countries.","published_date":"","news_description":"The planes would be used on both \u200bdomestic routes and around neighboring countries.","form_embed":"","author":"","image_caption":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/36425","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/news"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/36425\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":36426,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/36425\/revisions\/36426"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/22653"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=36425"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"news-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news-type?post=36425"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}