NEW DELHI: Taking to the skies 21 years ago to essentially connect Kerala with the Gulf, the US-Iran war had a significant impact on Air India Express operations. Now part of the Tata Group, the airline used this ground time its aircraft were suddenly getting to expedite their retrofit. As a result, the no frills airline will have a uniform all-economy fleet and seats with chargers much earlier than originally envisaged.“We used to have 360 weekly flights to the Gulf. After Feb 28, this number dropped significantly and we decided to utilise the downtime to accelerate the cabin retrofit programme across our Boeing 737-8 fleet,” said airline sources.The airline got about two months before airlines started to progressively restore Gulf services from late April. AI Express is currently operating 285 weekly flights to the region.AI Express had inducted 50 white-tail B737-8s (made for some other airline/s as per their cabin layout specifications but which could not take delivery) on an as is, where is basis from Boeing in the last two years before its own line-fit (as per AI Express specifications) deliveries began in Dec 2025. This led to the no frills airline having planes with first two rows with 2×2 seating as the original customer airline intended to have a business class on these planes.Since aircraft deliveries have been delayed post Covid due to supply chain constraints, AI Express took these planes as air traffic has boomed post 2022. The plan was to change the cabin layout to an all-economy seating gradually without taking planes out of service, needing flights to be cancelled. The US-Iran war gave it that moment earlier than expected.“We are retrofitting all out white-tail Boeing 737 MAX fleet to reset the guest experience. The retrofit is complete on five aircraft, with three currently undergoing that work. We are processing 3-4 aircraft a month. With acceleration now in effect, the target is 6-7 aircraft a month, with 14 aircraft completed by July 2026. Full fleet completion is targeted by March 2027,” said sources.The white-tail B737 MAX aircraft were inducted in seat configurations ranging from 162 to 178 seats. Upon completion of the retrofit programme, all aircraft will be standardised with a 189-seat configuration, “unlocking about 700 additional seats across the fleet, equivalent to adding 3.7 aircraft without any fleet expansion.”“The retrofit will also significantly enhance the onboard experience through the installation of new seats featuring USB-A and USB-C charging ports at every seat, while maintaining our all-economy cabin configuration,” they add.This work is happening across three AIESL facilities in Thiruvananthapuram, Kolkata and Hyderabad. The turnaround time is 10- 22 days depending on the aircraft configuration and other factors.AI Express fleet comprises of 53 Boeing 737-8 MAX, 26 Boeing 737 -800 NG, 12 A320ceo, 12 A320neo and 4 A321neo. “The A320 and B737 NG fleets are covered under a separate cabin perfect programme to align both fleets with current brand standards and improving guest experience,” sources say.
