Turkish Airlines (THY) has "brought $14 billion of foreign currency to Türkiye this year," said the chairperson of the flag carrier's board, Ahmet Bolat, noting that in 2023, the 90th anniversary of the company, they will add 400 aircraft to their fleet and carry the billionth passenger.
The airline’s subsidiary Turkish Technic has already successfully completed the base (heavy) maintenance operations of the first of the Airbus A350-900 type aircraft, which THY started to add to its fleet in 2020, at its hangars at IGA Istanbul Airport.
Speaking at the ceremony held to mark the departure of the aircraft from the hangar, Bolat stated that there are currently 11 A350 aircraft in the THY fleet and this number is set to increase to 36 in the medium term, adding that they are in talks with Airbus to buy more.
"These are the most effective aircraft of our partnership together with the 787s in long-haul flights, with the engine and fuselage technology they have."
"The increase in fuel prices affects the aviation industry negatively. Immediately after the pandemic, aviation started to rise. Considering all these, we continue to collect aircraft in the market," he said.
Highlighting that Turkish Technic has the capacity to maintain all the aircraft in the fleet, he said they currently do not have capacity in their hangars to allocate space for the maintenance of other airlines’ aircraft.
"However, we continue to work on increasing hangar capacities and investing in Turkish Technic," he said.
Bolat said that the THY had only 60 aircraft in their fleet in 2003 and 82 aircraft in 2005.
"Today, the number of our wide-body aircraft alone is 129. The number of wide-body aircraft in our fleet has grown 10 times," he said.
Apart from bringing foreign currency to the country in 2022, they also provided employment to 75,000 people, he noted.
"One out of every 200 employees in Istanbul is an employee of Turkish Airlines. Istanbul grows, develops and increases the level of welfare together with Turkish Airlines. This is why we attach great importance to our 90th year. We will enter our 90th year by getting stronger and growing," Bolat said.