Story ID: GPairbusdubaiorders11192019
Airbus Keeps Active in Dubai Orders Chase
By: Gregory Polek
Caption: The European manufacturer signs Air Senegal for A220s and Flynas for A321XLRs.
Word Count: 236
Airbus rode its commercial momentum into the third day of the Dubai Airshow on Tuesday, adding to a Day 2 tally worth more than $30 billion with a pair of less gaudy but perhaps just as strategically significant deals by early afternoon.

First, Airbus’s A220 attracted a new African customer with the signing of a letter of intent covering eight of the A220-300 variant from Air Senegal. That deal calls for deliveries to start in 2021 and arrive at a pace of two airplanes a year. Along with regional and intra-continental services, Air Senegal plans to fly the airplanes from Dakar to European destinations such as London and Geneva.

Next, Saudi Arabia’s Flynas inked a firm order for 10 A321XLRs, raising its total order count for A320-family jets to 90. Now flying 32 Airbus narrowbodies typically within a range radius of four hours, Flynas has heightened its ambitions to fly to destinations as distant as nine hours from its bases in Riyadh, Jeddah, Dammam, and Abha. The order represents a conversion of an MOU signed at June’s Paris Airshow.

The deals in Dubai followed an announcement from Toulouse that EasyJet exercised purchase rights to enlarge its fleet of A320neos by 12 new aircraft. The agreement takes the carrier’s total order count for the A320neo family to 159 aircraft and its overall orders for A320-family jets to 480.