It has been announced internally to operational teams that 4 ex TCX A321’s have been outright purchased. The recent roadshows have indeed meant that recruitment of ex TCX Airbus flight deck and engineers had happened. This is has not been communicated in an official communication however this happening.
The 4 A321’s will be based at MAN. Originally it was looked into to keeping the 3 757’s due for retirement however some of the frames need heavy mx so will still be disposed of. Last I heard GLSAH will remain in in the fleet after some work over winter, AG and AI are still going.
The A321’s and remaining 757 will allow a generous capacity increase at MAN, and will also allow a couple of 737’s to be redistributed to BHX and STN.
Titan will acquire another A321 to be based at STN. Next summer there will be A321’s and STN, BHX and MAN.
It’s apparent that the last few years of measuring the A321’s economics at BHX & STN has paid off. By the end of 2020, GLA, EDI, NCL, BFS, EMA and LBA will all be 737-800 exclusive bases. STN & BHX will be 737-800/A321 bases and MAN 737-800, A321, A330 and 757 whilst they are slowly parted out over the coming years.
The 757 lovers need to accept they are all old and the A321 can do everything the 757 does for Jet2, with much better economics and dispatch reliability. Any long haul charters and NY flights will operate on the A330. The important word there is long haul charters, not scheduled services. Jet2 is very cautious and those hoping for Florida and Caribbean shouldn’t waste any time thinking about it.
Jet2 is no going to put on sale anywhere near the capacity lost by TCX. It will add a handful of extra aircraft at each of its core markets STN, BHX and MAN and carry on growing other bases by tweaking schedules and making use of the Spanish bases Aircraft to allow extra rotations by UK bases to fit in.