In addition to winning new MRO customers, Aerostar S.A. a leading Romanian aerospace company is also ensuring that it retains existing customers and winning repeat business from them. In what is shaping up to be a busy first quarter of 2013 for the company, further Boeing 737s from Royal Air Maroc and Pegasus Airlines of Turkey are scheduled to arrive at Aerostar’s Bacau facility in north-eastern Romania for heavy maintenance visits. On January 22nd, a Royal Air Maroc Boeing 737-800 passenger airliner arrived at Bacau for a ‘D01’ check. Since Royal Air Maroc selected Aerostar as an option for MRO work on its Boeing 737 fleet in 2010, the Romanian company has carried out work on 15 aircraft in total. Co-operation with leading low-cost privately-owned Turkish airline Pegasus which began in 2007 will grow in 2013. In the first quarter of this year three Boeing 737s (one Boeing 737-400 and two Boeing 737-800s) from Pegasus will arrive in Bacau for ‘C’ checks.
Aerostar also secured its sixth MRO customer from Turkey. Freebird Airlines has contracted to have one of its seven Airbus A320/321s inspected at Aerostar’s Bacau facility. The aircraft (an Airbus A320-232, msn 2524, manufactured in 2005) was ferried into Bacau on January 7th for a ‘C’ Check and additional works. The second new customer for Aerostar is Swiftair, the major Spanish cargo and passenger airline which has contracted to have one of its six Boeing 737-300 freighters inspected at Bacau. The aircraft (a Boeing 737-3Q8SF, msn 23766, manufactured in 1987 and fitted with a Pemco cargo door) was ferried to Aerostar on January 8th and underwent a ‘C’ Check and additional works, including structural inspections on the Pemco cargo door and Service Bulletins and Airworthiness Directives implementation.