PIA - Pakistan International Airlines (PK, Karachi Int'l) has established an MRO facility at Islamabad Quaid-e-Azam Int'l, where the overhauling of its A320 Family of jets will be carried out, the flag carrier revealed in a statement.
PIA's engineering team carried out its first complete A-check in a newly constructed hangar at the airline's Islamabad Engineering base, on one of its eleven A320-200s, AP-BLB (msn 2155).
The facility existed previously at the airline's Karachi Int'l hub and has been moved to Islamabad. The initiative was part of PIA's business plan, CEO Arshad Malik said, adding that basing the engineering team in Islamabad would benefit the carrier in terms of cost savings, and with the potential to generate additional revenues through providing MRO services to other airlines.
Amir Ali, the carrier's director of MRO and training, said that plans were also underway to upgrade the engineering facilities at Lahore Int'l.
In February, the Pakistani government was said to be considering a proposal to move PIA's headquarters from Karachi to Islamabad, together with another plan to appoint the airline to operate the airport, which opened on May 3, 2018, replacing the Pakistan Civil Aviation Authority in this role.