User:Triila73/What should PAL fleet really be like?

The Philippine Airlines fleet is composed of wide-body and narrow-body aircraft from five families (excluding PAL Express fleet): Airbus A321ceo, Airbus A321neo, Airbus A330, their flagship Airbus A350, and Boeing 777. As of, there were 114 aircraft registered in the PAL fleet.

Airbus A321
The Airbus A321 is the main workhorse aircraft for the short haul flights that serve South East, East Asia, Pacific (Guam), and Domestic destinations. They are deployed in Manila-Brisbane route and vice versa.

On August 28, 2012, Philippine Airlines ordered 34 Airbus A321-200 equipped with 2x IAE V2533-A5 engines, and 10 Airbus A321neos equipped with 2x Pratt & Whitney PW1133G-JM engines. The orders were randomly changed, PAL took 11 of the 34 Airbus A321ceo orders and changed them to order 11 A321neos and added one Airbus A321ceo order to its fleet. The first Airbus A321ceo (Current Engine Option) was delivered in August 2013. On March 29, 2015, The airline said that it will be delivering the A321neo starting 2017 but agreed to postpone them and move to May 2018 due to problems with the Pratt & Whitney PW1100G-JM engines.

These Airbus A321neos will serve Philippine Airlines' medium-long haul routes such as Sapporo in Japan and Mumbai and Delhi in India. Philippine Airlines announced that it would only take two Airbus A321neos in Airbus Cabin Flex (ACF) this year while the airline undergoes more plans on re-fleeting.

Airbus A330
The Airbus A330-300 are primarily deployed in Middle East, Australia, and South East and East Asia routes like the cities of Dubai, Riyadh, Singapore, Hong Kong, Sydney, Melbourne, Tokyo, and many more cities. They are also deployed in US territories like Honolulu and Guam. and domestic flights like Puerto Princesa, General Santos City, Cebu and Davao (flights starting with 1 (i.e. PR 1811/1812).

Philippine Airlines introduced the Airbus A330-300 on July 30, 1997, with the delivery of their first aircraft (F-OHZM). Philippine Airlines bought eight Airbus A330-300 in order to fill the gaps that the Airbus A300B4 will leave during its gradual retirement. In 2012, Philippine Airlines ordered 10 Airbus A330-300HGW, but later expands orders to 15.

The newer A330 HGWs (8 of the 15 A330s were refurbished with a tri-class layout) uses a pair of Rolls-Royce Trent 700 engines, unlike previous A330s which uses a pair of General Electric CF6-80E1. The last A330s equipped with GE engines were retired on August 31, 2014.

Airbus A350
The Airbus A350-900 is primarily deployed in North American destinations such as New York and Toronto and in airline's only European destination, London. They are also used in regional Asian flights such as Bangkok, Hong Kong, Sydney, Singapore and Tokyo. PALs A350-900 has an MTOW of 278 tons, enabling non-stop Manila-New York City flights without payload limitations in either direction, a 7,404 nmi (13,712 km) flight which began in October 2018.

On April 9, 2016, Philippine Airlines (PAL) finalized the purchase agreement with Airbus covering the firm order of six A350-900s, plus six options. The contract firms up a Memorandum of Understanding announced during the 2016 Singapore Airshow. The A350-900, which will have a three-class configuration, are scheduled to be deployed on new routes to North America and Europe. The A350-900 also replaced the aging Airbus A340-300.

As of February 2018, Jaime Bautista, president of the airline's holding company, PAL Holdings Inc, stated they were also interested in the larger Airbus A350-1000 variant.

On July 14, 2018, PAL received its first A350-900.

In February 2019, Philippine Airlines took delivery of their fifth A350 with the iconic Love Bus decal, representing the 40th anniversary of their partnership with aircraft manufacturer Airbus. It flew to Bangkok in March 2019.

Expansion with Airbus
On July 15, 2018. Philippine Airlines ordered a total of 66 aircraft composing of 20 additional Airbus A321neo ACF-LR version, 16 Airbus A330-900neo and 30 Airbus A350-900 aircraft as the airline announced to retire the Airbus A320s and open additional routes to the European region. The newly order aircraft will fly to Paris and Toulouse in France, Berlin in Germany, Zurich in Switzerland, Moscow in Russia, Tel Aviv in Israel, Dhaka in Bangladesh and Yangon in Myanmar. While additional routes to Japan and China are still getting planned.

Routes from Davao to Tokyo, Davao to Hong Kong, and more routes from Cebu to East Asia and Europe are still getting planned.

Boeing 777
The Boeing 777-300ER is primarily used for North American destinations such as Los Angeles, San Francisco, Vancouver and Toronto. It was also used for service to London, but that service is now operated by the A350. Sometimes, they are deployed in Asian and Australian routes like Bangkok, Tokyo, Hong Kong, Sydney, and Melbourne.

In 2009, Philippine Airlines leased 2 Boeing 777-300ER to replace the former flagship Boeing 747-400 from GECAS. The first aircraft was delivered in 2009. On March 12, 2007, Philippine Airlines finalized the purchase agreement with Boeing covering the firm order of 2 Boeing 777-300ER, plus 2 options. The first PAL-owned aircraft was delivered on 20 June 2012, with it being the third Boeing 777-300ER for the airline.

The purchase of Boeing 777s effectively signals the end of additional 747-400 orders and production of the said aircraft in passenger configuration and a win for Boeing versus the Airbus A340-600 that was also being considered. In December 2016, 2 more B777s were delivered, leased from Intrepid Aviation. In March 2017, 2 more B777s were leased from Intrepid Aviation with both aircraft being delivered in December 2017.

Philippine Airlines is eyeing to acquire the Boeing 777X to replace their aging Boeing 777.

Fleet maintenance
The entire Philippine Airlines fleet of Airbus and Boeing jets were formerly maintained in-house at the PAL Technical Center, which consisted of two hangars. The hangars contained an engine overhaul shop, two engine test cells, and test shops. The responsibility of maintaining the fleet, as well as all the facilities, was subsequently transferred in 2000 to Lufthansa Technik Philippines (LTP), a joint venture of Hamburg-based Lufthansa Technik AG, a leading maintenance provider in aircraft maintenance, repair and overhaul, and Macro Asia Corporation, one of the Philippines' leading providers of aviation support services and catering for foreign airlines, owned by Lucio Tan, the majority owner of PAL. LTP currently maintains an 8-bay hangar and workshops occupying 110,000 square meters in Manila's Ninoy Aquino International Airport.

Currently, some of the A320 fleets are being handled by PAL Express Maintenance and Engineering, including all A321 aircraft that are already delivered and those to be delivered. PAL Express is the budget arm of PAL and has overtaken PAL last 2012 in domestic seats second only to Cebu Pacific (5J). On May 18, 2018, Philippine Airlines signed a deal with Lufthansa Technik Philippines to maintain its new Airbus jets for 12 years. The deal, which took effect on May 31, is estimated to be worth P13.6 billion ($260 million) during its lifespan.