After nearly two years without growing its fleet, RwandAir has leased two planes in an effort to ease the wave of delays and cancellations that has hit operations in recent months.

The Rwandan flag carrier received two 174-seater Boeing 737-800s on lease this week, increasing its active fleet to 11, following the return of one previously grounded aircraft to service.

The additions come amid an international shortage of new aircraft and spare parts, and offer much-needed relief to the airline, which has been facing a financial hit from prolonged groundings.

RwandAir is among several African carriers grappling with the parts shortage, with capacity constraints making it to delay or cancel multiple flights, despite increased aviation demand.

The carrier admitted that is has experienced unexpected technical disruptions, which temporarily reduced the number of aircraft available for operations in recent months.“This led to service adjustments that regrettably affected our customers’ travel plans, but have now been fixed, with the affected aircraft returned to service,” the airline said on Thursday.

”While the two planes offer RwandAir relief, it is not clear how long the respite will last. The planes are not the newest on the fleet, raising the possibility they may soon require overhauls – potentially dragging the carrier back into capacity strains.

Both planes, previously operated by Malaysia Airlines, are 12 years old and could remain in service for eight to 10 years before their next scheduled overhauls, assuming they are fresh from maintenance.

They have been leased from AviLease, a Riyadh-based lessor owned by the Saudi government.

In addition to the two leases, RwandAir expects the delivery of a wide-body Airbus A330-200 in the last quarter, increasing its fleet of wide-bodies to four and expanding its long-haul routes.“The additions reinforce RwandAir’s commitment to modernising our fleet and expanding route networks,” the carrier said.“The investment in narrow and wide-body aircraft reflects RwandAir’s strategic focus on intra-Africa travel and our goal of connecting Africa to the world.”Still, RwandAir will not be operating at full capacity even with the additions, as at least four planes in its fleet of 15 remain parked – according live tracking data – due to the shortage of spare parts.

Live data from Planespotters indicate that this week, RwandAir had one 184-seater Boeing 737-800 and a 90-seater Bombardier CRJ-900 parked in Kigali.

Another 90-seater Bombardier CRJ-900 and a 90-seater Bombardier DHC-8-400 remain grounded for maintenance.

The grounded planes are largely narrow-body short and medium-haul, which means their absence strained capacity for regional and intra-Africa flights.

RwandAir’s woes have been compounded by a ban by the DR Congo from its airspace, which increased the cost of serving some routes, especially to West Africa.

These are some of RwandAir’s busiest routes in West Africa, and though it made up for them by increasing frequencies to eastern and southern Africa routes like Zanzibar and Johannesburg, their closure may have exposed it to financial losses this year.

RwandAir is not alone in its woes. Its peers in the region – Kenya Airways (KQ) and Air Tanzania – face troubles with prolonged groundings due to parts shortages, something that is showing in their performance.

Flight delays and cancellations have escalated at Kenya Airways, which it has blamed on the loss of 20 percent of its capacity due to prolonged plane groundings.

In the six months to June, the carrier slipped into a $93 million (Sh12 billion) loss, from a $4 million (Sh517.9 million) profit in a similar period last year, also blamed on the strain on its capacity.

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