American Airlines wants to strengthen its fleet with Boeing 737 MAX
Based on a buoyant domestic market and long-haul traffic that will take longer to return, American Airlines is converting purchase rights to 30 Boeing 737 MAX 8 aircraft into firm purchases and pushing back Boeing 787-9 deliveries to the end 2023.
Playing on the contractual flexibility offered by the manufacturers, American Airlines has decided to take 30 additional Boeing 737 MAX 8 compared to its initial schedule. The airline has thus transformed into firm purchases purchase rights on seven copies in 2022 and 23 others in 2023 with deliveries of 15 Boeing 737 MAX 8 in 2023 and 15 others in 2024. This is in addition to the aircraft that were already scheduled. This is to take advantage of the growth in US domestic traffic which has regained its pre-pandemic momentum
It is obvious that the suspension of deliveries of the Boeing 787 by the FAA until the identified quality problems have been resolved is put forward by some to explain the decision of American Airlines which has already received penalties. Except that deliveries of the Boeing 787 should resume by the end of the first half of 2022 and that American Airlines should only take its copies “from January 20233. Quality problems also have a “good back”, sometimes, and c It is rather the slowness of the recovery on the long-haul which explains the decision of the American airline.
American Airlines slowly resumes long-haul flights
On the other hand, the pace promises to be ever slower on the long haul. The additional Boeing 737 MAX 8s come with delayed deliveries on Boeing 787-9s originally expected from January 2023 and now pushed back to the end of next year and extending through 2027. American Airlines will only receive ultimately only four Boeing 787-9s for the whole of 2023. At the end of December 2021, American Airlines still had 25 Boeing 787-9s to take delivery with an initial delivery schedule provided for in the “Purchase Agreement No. 3219” in date of October 15, 2008 which has already been amended several times by American Airlines.