Air Serbia takes delivery of second wide-body jet

Air Serbia has taken delivery of its second wide-body Airbus A330-200 aircraft. Named Mihajlo Pupin and sporting a special livery in honour of the physicist, the jet departed Marana in the Arizona desert for New York JFK on Saturday. It will continue its journey to Belgrade this afternoon and is due to arrive in the Serbian capital late at night. The aircraft, registered YU-ARC, is eleven years old and formerly operated on behalf of South African Airways. It has been stored since May 2020. The jet was initially set for delivery in late October and was to be deployed on scheduled flights in early November, however, due to technical reasons its arrival was pushed back.

It is unclear if the aircraft will sport Air Serbia’s long haul hard product or that of its former South African operator. Originally, the carrier’s CEO, Jiri Marek, said it would feature the latter due to the jet’s short entry into service and would be fitted with Air Serbia’s own seats later on. However, this was before the aircraft’s delivery was delayed. Currently, seat maps on Air Serbia’s upcoming New York and Tianjin flights, as well as its future Chicago service, show the same cabin configuration in both business and economy class to that of its A330-200 registered YU-ARB. During the summer, following talks with plane manufacturer Airbus over a fleet-wide cabin retrofit, Mr Marek said, “My vision for Air Serbia’s fleet in terms of the cabin product is not to reduce pitch but to increase the number of seats in a horizontal line. With Airbus’ assistance, we will see whether it is possible to add additional seats in the A330, both in economy and in business class”.

Air Serbia is currently wet-leasing an A330-200 from Spanish carrier Wamos Air for its New York service, as its YU-ARB registered jet is currently undergoing scheduled maintenance in Naples. The wet-lease was initially scheduled to run until yesterday but has since been extended until the end of the month. Air Serbia’s own equipment will be deployed on the New York service again from December 1. The carrier has also scheduled its own A330 on one of its Istanbul flights on November 30. Equipment changes remain possible. Air Serbia has said its A330s will be used on its long haul flights to Belgrade, Tianjin and Chicago, as well as on popular European routes.

EX-YU Aviation News

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