Being a smaller airline, Hawaiian outsources a lot of components of its maintenance programs, and that’s not changing with its new Dreamliners. What is changing, though, is their chosen partner for the carbon birds, as Hawaiian taps AFI KLM EM for 787 parts MRO.
For its Airbus fleet, Hawaiian uses SIA Engineering, a division of Singapore Airlines, for heavy aircraft maintenance, especially mandatory heavy checks as the airframes get up there in age. However, to maintain parts inventories and to conduct maintenance on certain aircraft components, Hawaiian relies on Lufthansa Technik for its A330s and A321neos. But for their Boeings, Hawaiian has decided to partner with someone entirely new for them – AFI KLM EM.
Hawaiian Taps AFI KLM EM For 787 Parts MRO
When I say Hawaiian taps AFI KLM EM for 787 parts MRO, you’re probably wondering what the heck that alphabet soup in the middle means. Well, AFI KLM EM is short for Air France Industries KLM Engineering & Maintenance, which is the MRO arm of Group Air France KLM. As the title of this post suggests, AFI KLM EM has been selected as Hawaiian’s 787 MRO for component support and parts pooling, which is a fancy way of saying that they’ll be doing the same thing Lufthansa Technik does for Hawaiian’s Airbuses.
However, Hawaiian also gets to take advantage of AFI KLM EM’s PROGNO® service, which is predictive maintenance for aircraft and is supposed to help boost the airline’s operational efficiency and aircraft reliability.
The ten-year contract has an option for a two-year extension and is Hawaiian’s first relationship with the French-Dutch consortium. It’s worth noting, though, that, like their Lufthansa relationship, this one doesn’t include airframe MRO. Hawaiian hasn’t selected a partner for that yet, though the fleet hasn’t even begun revenue service yet, so it’s not necessary at this time.
Final Thoughts
Air France Industries KLM Engineering & Maintenance is considered one of the best MROs in the world, right up there with Lufthansa Technik and OEM MROs by GE and Rolls-Royce. They’re also one of the few that offers Dreamliner MRO services, which makes the fact that Hawaiian taps AFI KLM EM for 787 parts MRO reasonable, and why I wouldn’t be surprised if they contract with them for airframe MRO, too.
Now, you must be wondering what the heck is going to happen if Alaska Air’s acquisition of Hawaiian does go through. Well, all existing contracts will have to be carried to term; then, it’s anyone’s guess. That said, Alaska Air uses Illinois-based AAR for their Boeing 737 MRO. However, they also offer MRO services for the Airbus A320 family (both CEO and NEO), the A330 family, the Boeing 717, and the Boeing 787. So it’ll be interesting to see just how much Alaska Air tries to simplify its relationships down the road.
Of course, that’s all just speculation for the future, as we’re still at least eight months away from finding out if the acquisition will go through or not. That said, Hawaiian did just receive its second Boeing 787. N780HA finally arrived in Hawaii. It was supposed to be the first, but N781HA ended up beating it.