MEA expands fleet with additional A320

The Beirut Star newspaper reported that this is a leased aircraft and quoted MEA chairman Mohammad Hout as saying "We have leased this aircraft for a period stretching from six to eight years, and this step is part of our general policy to expand this fleet,"

The company, in which the country's central bank is a majority shareholder, plans to acquire new generation aircraft from 2016 and 2018 with special emphasis on fuel-saving aircraft and is beleived to be considering both the Airbus NEO and the Boeing MAX.

The newspaper reported that by the year 2020, MEA is planning to have a fleet of 20 new aircraft.

MEA has seen its operating profits in 2011 plunge from $90 million to $40 million, a drop of more than 55 percent, as the high cost of fuel, declining number of tourists and improvement in the packages of the company’s pilots, crew and staff eroded a big chunk of the firm’s overall revenues.