Rockwell Collins was selected by Air Arabia to provide a package of communication, navigation and surveillance avionics for 59 forthcoming A320s. Package includes RC's WXR-2100 MultiScan Hazard Detection System. Deliveries are scheduled from 2009 through 2013.

Pratt & Whitney Canada announced integration of its customer service and support center groups into one organization. Move aims to streamline point of contact through Web tools, advance parts availability and improve TATs.

More than 1,000 aircraft will leave the global airline fleet by the end of this year through either retirements or carrier failures, according to Ascend Director Eddy Pieniazek, who spoke yesterday in a webcast presented by the UK-based aviation consultancy and information services firm.

Airbus COO-Customers John Leahy said the manufacturer has agreed to sell 280 additional aircraft to Chinese airlines. He was in Tianjin earlier this week to mark the opening of the newest A320 Family Final Assembly Line (ATWOnline, Sept. 30). According to multiple news service reports, Leahy said as many as 160 of the new aircraft orders could be approved by Beijing and officially announced by year end. They will help Airbus tally about 850 total orders for 2008, he added.

CSA Czech Airlines received a new A319 yesterday, the last of the aircraft ordered by the airline in 2004.

Nigeria's Arik Air ordered three A340-500s, Airbus announced. The Trent 500-powered aircraft will be delivered by the end of November and will be used on new routes to London, New York and Houston, the manufacturer said. "This aircraft order will enable Arik Air to start international connections with new and modern aircraft that will support our objective to become one of Africa's key airlines that operate at international standards with new aircraft, top maintenance and where security and quality come first," Arik Chairman Joseph Arumemi-Johnson said.

Turkish Airlines is expected to announce its long-awaited fleet order this month, President and CEO Temel Kotil told ATWOnline in Istanbul. Kotil declined to elaborate on the order's size or composition and confirmed only that it will be "big" and include both narrowbody and widebody aircraft (ATWOnline, Sept. 5). "We intend to double our narrowbody fleet in the next ten years," he said. "We will have about 200 of them at Istanbul [Ataturk]. We will then be a good player."

Cyprus Airways will lease an A319 from ILFC for six years. It currently operates two A330-200s, two A319s and seven A320s.