Cubana, the Havana-based flag carrier of Cuba – now in its 94th year – has just received another one of its aircraft back from maintenance. Until recently, most of its fleet is parked except for a single ATR72 aircraft that flies domestically within the country.
Roughly three months ago, in September of 2023, a Tupolev TU204, which carriers the registration CU-T1702, returned to Cuba after being flown in from Ulyanovsk, Russia where it was undergoing heavy maintenance for over four years. The Tupolev in question flew domestically for a few months within Cuba, before being flown to Doha via Gander and Moscow on Nov. 30, 2023.
Thanks to the carrier’s surprisingly active Facebook page, it is now known that the airline has received an Ilyushin IL-96-300 that carries the registration of CU-T1250 after it was flown back to Cuba from Russia after “regularly scheduled maintenance.” The aircraft was met with a water cannon salute upon arrival in Cuba on Dec. 3, 2023.
A Rare Aircraft
It is assumed that similar to the TU204, the IL96-300 will be placed on regularly scheduled routes within Cubana’s network in the near future. The airline has flown this aircraft on its main two international routes to Buenos Aries and Madrid, which have been flown on leased Airbus A340-300s from Spanish company PlusUltra since their IL96s have been in maintenance.
For AvGeeks who can visit Cuba and fly on the airline, this presents a rare and unique opportunity as the airline will have two aircraft that aren’t found anywhere in the world on passenger operations; the IL96, as Cubana is the sole commercial operator, and the Tu204, of which Cubana is one of two current operators with the second being Air Koryo in North Korea.
