While of absolutely no consequence to passengers, this has to be one of the more unusual stories that an airline executive has shared with employees (thanks to Anand for flagging this)…
Kolkata Airport tells Air India to dispose of a Boeing 737
Air India CEO Campbell Wilson shared an interesting story with employees in an internal post, about how the airline just sold a plane it forgot about. Specifically, this involves a 43-year-old Boeing 737-200 with the registration code VT-EHH, that the airline forgot about at Kolkata Airport (CCU).
Here’s how Wilson describes what happened:
Though disposal of an old aircraft is not unusual, this one is – for it’s an aircraft that we didn’t even know we owned until recently!
Many years before privatisation, this aircraft had been decommissioned in order to operate for India Post and was omitted from many documents.
Over time, it was lost from memory and only came to light when our friends at Kolkata Airport informed us of its presence in a (very) remote parking bay and asked us to remove it! After verifying that it was indeed ours, we’ve now done so – and in so doing removed another old cobweb from our closet!
What’s the story of this 43-year-old Boeing 737-200?
This particular Boeing 737-200 was delivered in 1982, and it has quite the history. Initially it flew as a passenger jet for for Indian Airlines, before being leased to Alliance Air in 1998. The plane flew there for nearly a decade, before being transfered back to Indian Airlines in 2007, at which point it was converted into a freighter aircraft.
In 2007, Indian Airlines was merged into Air India, which is the point at which the plane officially joined Air India’s fleet. At the time, the plane flew for Air India Cargo, operating flights on behalf of Indian Post. It operated there for around five years, until 2012, at which point it was parked at Kolkata Airport.
Somehow as time went on, the airline just forgot it owned this plane, and it was “ignored” for 13 years. Like, shouldn’t there be some cost to having a plane parked there, even if it’s in grass off a taxiway? I just don’t get how that’s something that’s addressed 13 years later… why did the airport suddenly decide that it cares now?
I’m also curious how exactly Air India “sold” this plane. I assume it’s being sold for next to nothing, for scrap materials, or to turn into a cafe, or something, right?
Bottom line
Air India has just sold a Boeing 737, which has been parked at Kolkata Airport since 2012. The plane only briefly operated for Air India Cargo on behalf of Indian Post. Somehow as time went on and the airline was privatized, it lost track of owning the plane. The airport finally decided it wanted the airplane disposed of, which is how this all came up.
This is kind of a wild story, but I guess airlines have a lot to keep track of. For that matter, American once lost slots at JFK because it forgot it had them, so I guess none of this is so wild…
What do you make of this story of the forgotten Air India 737?
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