Cathay Pacific to buy 25 Airbus, Boeing jets

Published 6:38 am Wednesday, March 9, 2011

Hong Kong’s Cathay Pacific plans to order 25 new aircraft from Airbus and Boeing, the airline said on Wednesday.

Cathay said it will buy 15 A330s from Airbus and 10 777s from Boeing. It also will lease two A350s from International Lease Finance Corp.

The carrier said that all of the aircraft are due to be delivered by the end of 2015.

“Our plan is to retire our 21 Boeing 747-400 and 11 Airbus A340-300 aircraft before the end of the decade as we take delivery progressively of new generation aircraft that will provide much greater fuel and operating cost efficiencies,” said Tony Tyler, Cathay’s chief executive in a statement.