Air Asia rejected as modification centre for Boeing 737-400s following audit
Alaska Airlines is insisting Taiwan's Inter-Continental Aircraft Services (ICAS) changes the conversion centre it uses for its first batch of Boeing 737-400 cargo conversions.
Alaska in July signed up as ICAS's launch customer with a $15 million, five-aircraft contract. ICAS was planning to have Taiwanese maintenance firm Air Asia serve as the initial conversion centre, but industry sources say Alaska has rejected this proposal after auditing Air Asia and prefers to have the aircraft converted in the USA.
Sources say ICAS last week met Alaska staff to convince the carrier to agree on China Airlines (CAL) as an alternative conversion centre. Air Asia and China Airlines are both ICAS owners and can perform the conversions at a lower cost than potential US firms. ICAS's other two owners, Taiwan's Aerospace Industrial Development Corporation and EVA Air maintenance arm Evergreen Aviation Technologies, are not interested in serving as conversion centres.
Work on the first aircraft is to begin early next year under the deal to convert four of Alaska Airlines' 737-400s into combis and one into a full freighter. Sources say ICAS also proposes using China's Taikoo (Xiamen) Aircraft Engineering as a conversion centre for mainland Chinese customers, including China Postal Airlines and Hainan Airlines. FedEx is also evaluating a bid by ICAS and other 737-300/400 conversion vendors. ICAS is partnered by B/E Aerospace subsidiary Flight Structures - which is helping ICAS secure a US supplemental type certificate - and Boeing, which will provide aftermarket engineering support.
BRENDAN SOBIE / SINGAPORE
Source: Flight International
