Colm Imbert, Trinidad and Tobago’s acting prime minister, has refused to say whether Caribbean Airlines (BW, Port of Spain) would cancel a lease arrangement for twelve B737-8s. But he said that arrangements had been made to extend the leases of its current fleet of B737-800s, Trinidad & Tobago Express has reported.

The airline announced the commitment to the MAX aircraft last year and had been due to start taking deliveries of the first four units on dry-lease from Air Lease Corporation in the fourth quarter of 2019, as a replacement for the -800s.

But responding to a question posed in the Senate - the upper house of Trinidad and Tobago's bicameral parliament - Imbert said that the carrier had made arrangements to extend the leases of its current fleet of B737-800s. Their lessors are AerCap (five units), Carlyle Aviation Partners (three), Air Lease Corporation (two), ALAFCO (one), and Macquarie AirFinance (one), according to the ch-aviation fleets module.

Caribbean also operates its own five ATR72-600 turboprops and has wet-leased in one additional ATR72-200 from DAT LT (R6, Kaunas International).