African carrier Air Cote d’Ivoire has taken delivery of its first widebody aircraft, with the arrival of its initial Airbus A330-900, one of a pair on order.
The airline signed for the two Rolls-Royce Trent 7000-powered twinjets in September 2022.
Air Cote d’Ivoire’s aircraft is configured in a four-class layout, with four first-class, 44 business-class and 21 premium-economy seats, plus a 173-seat economy section.
The airline intends to operate the aircraft on European, North American and Middle Eastern destinations from Abidjan.
It will initially deploy the A330-900 on the Paris route.
Air Cote d’Ivoire’s fleet comprises about a dozen other aircraft – a mix of Airbus A320s and A319s plus De Havilland Dash 8-400s.
Although it offers long-haul flights to New York JFK, these are operated by Ethiopian Airlines Boeing 787s.
Airbus says the delivery flight of the aircraft (TU-TRG), which took place on 4 September, included carriage of humanitarian cargo.
It states that the service was the third goodwill flight for the airline, and was co-ordinated with the Airbus Foundation and supported by Aviation Sans Frontieres.
