Flight Friday: Regional Sector Boosts Asia-Pacific's COVID Recovery
Increased flight hours in the regional sector have been supported by the ARJ21.
Looking at the Aviation Week Events calendar, MRO Asia-Pacific is Sept. 24-26, so for Flight Friday, we will be examining indexed flight cycles for combined operators in Asia-Pacific, China and India by aircraft class, comparing them to the equivalent month in 2019.
At first glance, the data shows a sawtooth pattern, with the Asia-Pacific region taking time to recover from COVID-19. China’s strict local and regional lockdowns in 2021 and 2022 caused fluctuations in flight utilization. However, once China ended its zero-COVID policy in late 2022, there was a significant increase in flights in the combined regions.
The data also reveals a notable increase in flights for regional jets, which contrasts with other parts of the world. The in-service fleet of regional jets has grown by 70 aircraft, a nearly 15% increase, largely due to the continued deliveries of the Comac ARJ21, which has added almost 120 aircraft to its in-service numbers.
Following the recovery curve are the regional turboprops, an important aircraft class in the Asia-Pacific region, servicing smaller islands and remote locations. Despite a 3% decrease in the in-service fleet compared to the end of 2019, these aircraft are being utilized to keep communities connected.
Since the beginning of 2023, the narrowbody sector has consistently been at or above 2019 levels for most months. A 6% growth in the in-service fleet, mainly due to growth in India, has resulted in an 18% increase in flight cycles. The narrowbody aircraft are now shouldering the industry’s weight, leading to similar trends in these regions.
Similar to the rest of the world, widebody aircraft have taken the longest to return to 2019 levels in the combined regions but are now virtually there. The removal of the China zero-COVID policy has helped propel the recovery. Despite being 50 aircraft smaller in the in-service fleet today compared to the end of 2019, the widebody fleet has almost fully recovered.
This data was put together using Aviation Week’s Tracked Aircraft Utilization tool.
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