Turkish Airlines to offer First Class service

Turkish Airlines (THY) will begin offering first class seats on the three Boeing 777-300ERs, recently leased from Jet Airways, by Dec. 29, THY General Manager Temel Kotil has said.

The first 2 Boeing 777-300ER aircraft scheduled to join the fleet on December 24th and 25th, 2008 are configured with 8 First Class suites, 30 Business in a herringbone layout, and 274 Economy, a total seat capacity of 312. The first class cabin offers complete privacy and suite comfort with its seats in 2.1m length reclining a full 180 degrees.

Jet Airways / Turkish Airlines Boeing 777-300ER seat map. Click on map for larger image.

Jet Airways recently won a Business Traveller award for its First Class on these very same aircraft. This is the second instance, within this month, of a foreign carrier benefiting from the financial woes of an Indian carrier. Just two weeks ago, I wrote about, Arik Air of Nigeria using the Kingfisher A340-500 aircraft, complete with its luxurious interiors.

The Boeing 777-300ER aircraft will initially furnish Istanbul services on Singapore, Hong Kong, London, New York, and Tokyo routes. The aircraft will also allow THY to augment its cargo capacity. Using the aircraft on New York route will increase the cargo capacity up to 18 tons per flight.

Turkish Airlines will expand its current 9 A340-500 and 5 A330-200 long haul fleet with 3 Boeing 777-300ER aircraft. Further additions will be 2 A330-200 aircraft, successively joining the fleet in February and April 2009, thus increasing the number of long haul aircraft to 19.