AirTanker has taken delivery of its eleventh Voyager multi-role tanker transport aircraft (MRTT), which will be operated by Thomas Cook ...
AirTanker has taken delivery of its eleventh Voyager multi-role tanker transport aircraft (MRTT), which will be operated by Thomas Cook Airline.
The aircraft, which is part of the Royal Air Force MRTT surge fleet, under the Future Strategic Tanker Aircraft (FSTA) program, will now undergo a three-month in-house conversion, to convert the aircraft into a commercial airliner.
Signed in 2008, the FSTA contract between AirTanker and the UK Ministry of Defence tasks AirTanker, whose shareholders include Airbus Group, Rolls Royce, Thales, Cobham and Babcock, with the delivery, military conversion and subsequent operation and support for, 14 Airbus A330-200 aircraft.
This includes a core fleet of nine aircraft, flown in support of and by the RAF and a further five – the surge fleet - which are available to AirTanker to lease to the civil market.
Under the terms of the three-year agreement, Thomas Cook Airlines will lease a single Airbus A330-200 from the AirTanker/FSTA ‘surge fleet”, to support long haul routes.
Flying under the new Thomas Cook Airlines livery, the aircraft will be operated by AirTanker under its civil Air Operator’s Certificate from May 2015 in support of scheduled routes from Glasgow, Manchester and Stansted to Las Vegas, Cancun and Orlando.
As part of this process, all military modifications will be removed to restore the airframe to its civil A330-200 type. Once complete, the aircraft will be registered by AirTanker on the Civil Aircraft Register as G-VYGK.
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| RAF Voyager MRTT |
In addition to removing all military equipment, this will also include the reconfiguration of the cabin. This includes the installation of 320 new seats and seat back IFE system.
Delivery of the five surge aircraft will be completed bt Q4 2016.
The Airbus A330 MRTT is a military derivative of the A330-200 commercial airliner. It is designed as a dual-role air-to-air refuelling and transport aircraft.
The A330 MRTT has a maximum fuel capacity of 111,000 kg (245,000 lb) without the use of additional fuel tanks, which leaves space for the carriage of 45,000 kg (99,000 lb) of additional cargo.
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