Bangladeshi Minister for Tourism and Civil Aviation, Shahjahan Kamal, has confirmed Biman Bangladesh Airlines (BG, Dhaka) will take delivery of its first of four B787-8s on order from Boeing (BOE, Washington National) duirng the second half of the year.

Speaking in parliament this week, Kamal was quoted by The New Age newspaper as confirming the first of the type would arrive in August followed by the second in November. Thereafter, he said, the third and fourth will arrive in October and November 2019.

Although no specific operational plans have yet been laid out for the aircraft, Biman has indicated it is planning to start flights to destinations such as Guangzhou, Colombo International, Malé, and Sydney Kingsford Smith while resuming those to Tokyo Narita, Manchester International, Rome Fiumicino, New York JFK, Delhi International, and Hong Kong International.

Financing RFP documents indicate the aircraft will be powered by General Electric GEnx-1B64 motors and feature 271 seats with 24 in business and 247 in economy.

At present, Biman's widebody fleet consists of four B777-300(ER)s, two B777-200(ER)s (leased from EgyptAir), and one A330-200 (wet-leased from Wamos Air). The ch-aviation schedules module shows they are collectively used to serve Chittagong locally and Abu Dhabi International, Dammam, Doha Hamad International, Jeddah International, Kuala Lumpur International, Kuwait, London Heathrow, Muscat, Riyadh, and Yangon internationally.