Arik Air to take 3 Kingfisher A340-500s, New York Possible

[Iberia A340-600]

Arik Air of Lagos, Nigeria will be taking delivery of 3 A340-500 aircraft originally destined for Kingfisher. The 3 aircraft already painted and interior fitted for Kingfisher and will be flown to ORY to be repainted and have some interior refurbishment done. Planned destinations for these aircraft are London, Houston, and New York. The destinations will probably be started as listed. Arik Air placed a Boeing order for -200LR aircraft to start a Lagos - Houston route and these aircraft are interim solutions.

Arik Air may be the only direct connection to Nigeria from New York since the Delta application was denied and Virgin Nigeria scraped plans due to high fuel costs.

Kingfisher will still take delivery of 2 A340-500 aircraft to operate their planned route to San Francisco.

http://www.flightglobal.com/articles/20 ... -500s.html

On a side note I believe the 4 Thai A340-500s are still available for purchase.

[Matt Molnar]

Maybe this is why the DL flight was denied.

Nice livery by the way...

[T-Bird76]

Delta and CO didn't want to pay the the "Fees" aka "kickbacks" to the Gov't Nigeria and there their applications were denied. If it wasn't for oil in that country no one would give a rats buttock about Nigeria.

[Iberia A340-600]

First aircraft is out of the hangar.



http://www.skyliner-aviation.de/viewpho ... picid=5154

The aircraft will be operated by HiFly, former Air Luxor and Pourtugese airline, along with 2 other former Kingfisher A340-500s. As it stands now Kingfisher will not take delivery of any A340-500 aircraft and will instead fly BLR-LHR-SFO with A330-200 aircraft.

[Iberia A340-600]

First aircraft is out of the hangar.



http://www.skyliner-aviation.de/viewpho ... picid=5154

The aircraft will be operated by HiFly, former Air Luxor and Pourtugese airline, along with 2 other former Kingfisher A340-500s. As it stands now Kingfisher will not take delivery of any A340-500 aircraft and will instead fly BLR-LHR-SFO with A330-200 aircraft.

[Delta777LR]

The A340-500 looks very nice in the Arik colors, hope to see the same on the 777-200LR and 747-8i...

If Arik Air does start NY service.. Would it be JFK or EWR?