Virgin Australia Boeing B737-800 VH-IJR (ex 9V-MGC) First Visit to CQ at Mackay Airport

On Sunday 23 March, Virgin Australia Boeing B737-800 VH-IJR was noted making its first visit into Central Queensland after it was acquired by the airline from Singapore Airlines (SilkAir). VH-IJR made its first visit to CQ operating from and back to Brisbane on the VOZ605/8 service to Mackay Airport.

As mentioned below, B737-800 was previously operated by SilkAir (now merged with Singapore Airlines) as 9V-MGC and was delivered to Virgin Australia in Brisbane in February this year after flying in from Singapore (Seletar) as VOZ9904. It entered service only a couple of days later.

This addition to the Virgin Australia fleet is a bit a surprise to me and it turns out that the airline is acquiring a second B737-800 from Singapore Airlines in the form of 9V-MGD which has been registered VH-IXK.  A bit more fleet chasing to go!

File photos taken by Tony Haynes, David Rowcroft and Stefan Kruber  ©