'Utter rubbish' says SAA of alleged plans to jettison new fleet

SOUTH AFRICAN Airways has rejected claims that it is about to jettison its new Boeing 737 fleet used on domestic routes as 'utter rubbish'. Aviation industry experts are however satisfied that 'where there is smoke there must be fire' and that the airline will include the wide-bodied Airbus aircraft in future plans, if only to meet cargo carrying demands in addition to passenger services. The jettison claims came from a group of South African journalists who visited the Airbus factory in France recently, and were told by that company's vice-president of sales for Africa and India, Kiran Rao, that SAA had asked both Airbus and Boeing to propose ways of providing aircraft to replace the 737-800, stating that while SAA would not be able to replace these 'overnight', a proposal had been submitted to the airline from Airbus which would see these aircraft phased out. Victor Nosi, SAA executive vice-president for marketing and corporate communications, while agreeing that both aircraft manufacturers had been asked to submit proposals, denied that any move had been made to remove the 737-800 from the rebuilding plan.