Why popular airplanes are getting scrapped years early

GOODYEAR, Ariz. — An Airbus A320neo, one of the world’s most popular planes, rolled off the Mobile, Alabama, factory line in July 2022, painted bright yellow for its next destination: Spirit Airlines.

It was built to fly for decades. But this May, less than four years later, it was stripped for parts worth millions and crushed, the steel teeth of an excavator tearing through its fuselage at a facility on the outskirts of Phoenix.

More aircraft are getting dismantled years, if not decades, earlier than expected, industry executives told CNBC. It is the result of a shortage of parts, none more precious and expensive than aircraft engines, that has exasperated airlines and driven up costs for years.

Even after the engines are removed, firms are looking for parts as varied as landing gear and antennae to sell.

“It’s the first time in my career that involved purchasing an aircraft that’s less than five years since date of manufacture,” said Bill Thompson, vice president who leads aircraft and engine acquisition for the Americas at aviation asset management and trading firm EirTrade Aviation, which bought the less than 4-year-old Airbus A320neo earlier this year.

He said the company paid “single-digit” millions each for that airplane and a similarly aged one, and it expects to make a profit from selling the more than 1,000 parts it took off them before they were crushed.

“I don’t know if you’re going to sell the coffee makers but you never know. Sometimes you do,” he said.

Twenty-one newest-generation aircraft were torn down from June 2025 through this past August, according to aviation data and advisory firm IBA Group. The scrapped planes were 6.4 years old on average, and included mostly Airbus but also some Boeing planes. That compares with an average retirement age for narrow-body airplanes of 21.7 years, IBA said.

“Anytime that you end up with any period of market softness in aircraft availability, engine availability, it’s going to cause investors to look at other options,” said Simon Goodson, CEO of AerFin, a company that buys, sells, repairs and leases aircraft and parts. “We always say to our aircraft and engine traders, ‘Please don’t fall in love with the metal.'”

Hundreds of aircraft are retired each year as manufacturers ramp up production for airlines, so older planes are swapped out for newer, more fuel-efficient models.

But aside from retiring aging planes, some owners don’t want to wait around for replacement parts or repairs on younger jets.

“A year might not sound that long, but does three or four years?” said Dave Querio, CEO of Ascent Aviation Services, a company that repairs, modifies, stores and disassembles aircraft, based in Marana, Arizona, outside of Tucson. “That’s the issue for the…