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Went spotting with a few members of the Aviation Photographers India yesterday.
As it rolled off runway 09, I could not believe my eyes, but sure enough, it was soon confirmed, VT-ESC one of the early batch of Airbus A320’s delivered back in the early 1990’s was rolling in wearing a new fresh coat of paint in the livery of Air India.
The erstwhile Indian Airlines was an early adopter of the Airbus A320. It’s first A320 VT-EPB was the 45th A320 produced by Airbus, which was delivered to the carrier on June 26 1989. VT-ESC has a manufacturer serial number (MSN) of 416 and was the 21st A320 delivered to the carrier on June 2, 1993.
These early A320s were all fitted with the slim and long IAE V2500 engines, which also power the current A320’s of IndiGo and Kingfisher Airlines. Compare this to the shorter and fatter CFM56 engines which now power the new Air India A320 family aircraft along with the A320’s of GoAir. Another very noticeable feature is the main landing gear which had two smaller wheel sets when compared to the single large wheel set found on the newer A320’s.
Compare the old and the new A320s of Air India. Below is a picture of VT-EDD which was delivered to Air India in February this year.
Images © Devesh Agarwal. All rights reserved. View more pictures here.
