Brazilian airline Azul is standardizing its long haul fleet, in a rather unconventional way, as the airline is retiring planes that it took delivery of just over a year ago…
Continue reading: Azul Orders More A330neos, Retires A350s
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it never made sense for Azul to have two new generation widebodies, both in fairly small quantities.
The A330NEO can fly everything that Azul currently or potentially serves.
Latam had to consolidate around the 787 which Lan already had.
There seem to be a handful of A350s that get swapped around carriers.
Add these to that list.
How odd to retire 7 year old technology in favor of 30 year old technology. Corruption to the HIGHEST DEGREE! Right after a new leader is elected, hmm? Just saying..... Next Cuba.
Are you stupid or what? Azul is a private airline. Maga/Putin trolls are so dumb!
(If) your testes ever descend, I hope it happens will your sitting on your toilet and they descend right into the BOWL - Ploopity plopity!
Not at all, I'm stating that if little Ricky Dicky's testes descend one they (they haven't yet!), that they descend right into a toilet bowl.
This is a shame. Insults and pettiness being thrown around casually on an aviation/travel blog. Can't we just get along and agree to disagree?! And it's the holiday season for goodness sake. Let's be good with each other, let's be good to each other. We are on here to share that same love and passion for aviation and travel. There is absolutely no need to be angry and spread all kinds of vitriol towards each other.
Just ignore, as you're dealing with someone who's clearly not well.
This "Roberta Everhill," or "Tom Rodgers," or (insert new weekly invented-name here) sometimes even argues with his own self... it's easy to tell, because all of his names write with the exact same grammatical oddities/errors.
So there's that.
Makes sence as the A330-900 can fly about 95% of the A350-900 missions.
The 350 really only shines on very long missions, where you also need some Cargo onboard to make the economics work, but not a lot of Airlines need this really
Roberta is Daryll the troll. Here’s a piece of advice Roberta - stop using “testes” “descend”, or “undescended testes” in your posts. You give yourself away. Now go away.
I suspect the A330 will outlive the A350. Much like the 767 will outlive the 787 (in its current form).
Yeahhh, gonna go out on a limb and suggest that widebody aircraft that "not a lot of airlines need," don't sell more than a thousand units barely 8yrs after entering serivce....
The A330-900 is simply a cheaper aircraft to acquire, delivers most of the operating cost improvements of the A350, and works fine for flights up to 13-14 hours which is all Azul will ever need.
Add in the fleet complexity that Azul stepped into without realizing what they were doing and it is no surprise that they got out of the A350s.
Were the A330 and A350 type ratings separate at Azul? I wonder how much consolidation there’d really be because some authorities have a common type rating for the two.
Agree, this is all it is. It feels misleading to call these 'retirements' because it's more like a 'return to lessor'. Azul isn't stupid, and it didn't make sense to have a tiny subfleet, even if they share type ratings. They weren't using the A350s for anything only the A350 could do.
It does appear strange to be retiring Airbus A 350s as they are the flagship product but keeping your fleet all the same e.g A 330 N.E.O does make a lot of sense.
Airbus allows a common type rating and many small airlines have it for the A330/A350 fleets w/ just differences training. US airlines don't do it as often for different Airbus fleets for pay reasons - but I'm pretty sure the FAA allows it as long as you fly both types w/ enough frequency - which is hard to do on longhaul international fleets.
Boeing is doing the same thing w/ its newer widebodies w/ the same requirement to stay current on both types.
The real benefit in having just one type is parts and scheduling when you have just a couple fleet types.
Also, the A330NEO's range has been enhanced even further which may not have been the case w/ Azul's early A330NEOs.
It wouldn't surprise me to see Azul's A350s end up with the world's only PERFECT airline (that is - Delta - at least according to Tim Dunn).
I will respond to you cognizant of the fact that 1. you mentioned my name and Delta and 2. that some people get tired of hearing about DL in many threads ...
A. Delta is not the perfect airline. They do run a very good business and operation and have learned from not just their mistakes but those of others. And they think a step or two ahead of other airlines.
B. I don't think DL, AI, or LH will be interested in these 2 aircraft - all of which have bought non-standard A350s. AI's first A350-900s are actually aircraft destined for Aeroflot that Airbus can't be delivered due to sanctions. The cabins were either already either installed or it will take too long to get their own cabins delivered.
DL and LH have both bought multiple used A350s and are in the process of retrofitting them but that process takes years given the demand for seats/lavs/galleys for new aircraft.
I am not sure these 2 aircraft are even in the same configuration; Hong Kong Airlines had 2 A350 configs w/ different business class seats and lav/galleys; even though their A350s all had the same number of seats, one configuration had 100+ premium economy seats while the other had none - all in the same amount of space. If these 2 aircraft were not the same configuration, there is all the more reason for Azul to get rid of them. It just isn't clear why they got them in the first place.
As for part of why DL is 2 steps out of other airlines, they reportedly negotiated a provision in their engine overhaul agreement with Rolls -Royce for their A350-900 engines to get credit for unperformed but prepaid overhauls which Rolls negotiated on other A350s which DL acquired used. That is part of why the ex-Latam A350s were such a good deal; they were parked for several years and weren't that old.
There were 9 of them and some are 280 tonne (high but not the highest capability) versions but they were all in the same cabin configuration.
There could be a couple blocks of used A350s that come onto the market. By first bet for DL to acquire used A350-900s would be with Asiana which has 15 in service and more on order; if Korean succeeds at the merger, the chances are they will get rid of them. That doesn't mean that DL would be willing to pay the highest price and the A350-900 is in demand. Asiana has a number of early build A350-900s like the ex-Latam fleet but they have some of the 280 tonne copies and are getting some of the newest 283 tonne versions.
On the A350/DL note, DL loaded the seat map for its first 275 seat versions which are also its first 283 tonne models with the full Airbus New Production Standard which includes thinner side walls/ a 4 inch wider cabin, changed galleys in the front and back by moving structures around, and lighter materials which reduce the weight by several tons.
Azul also will get the latest and most capable A330-900s; most of their current 339s were delivered before Airbus added 6 more tonnes to the Max Takeoff Weight of the latest 339s. that is enough for another hour plus of range.
Tim.
Your constant comparison of Delta to other airlines in the manner you employ implies that you believe that Delta is PERFECT, not merely excellent - which it absolutely is. I merely stated that "I wouldn't be surprised" if Azul's A350s ended up at the world's only PERFECT airline (i.e.,Delta). And you felt you had to write "War and Peace" in response. Your consistent overreaction to rather innocuous observations is the basis of my opinion.
Having just flown with their very outdated A330-200 a couple of days ago, the fact that those are being retired makes me very happy. I had a chance to fly with the A350 a while ago, and while it was a great flight, as a passenger I didn’t feel that it was that much better than the A330-900, and consolidating their equipment makes a lot of sense.
Is my math off? Isn't the total fleet going to be 12? They have 5 with 7 on order..
So you asked the question or made the statement and then get bent out of shape when I respond?
Given you say the same thing about thinking others want AA to die and DL is perfect, it is clear that it is you that sees the world through scratched lenses
You and others just want to vent but no one to respond with an intelligent thought.
A little more on Azul's A350 history:
Those planes actually were supposed to be delivered to Azul back in 2016. The airline ordered them along with the first A330s aiming a swift long haul expansion into the early 2020s.
But around the time the planes were supposed to be delivered, Brazil's economy decline sharply, forcing all airlines to reassess their plans. Azul decided to dump the 350s in favour of the A330neo, striking a deal with airbus to swap the planes. The catch was that two of the A350s were virtualy ready for delivery, which Airbus denied the cancelation, so a deal was made with Azul's then shareholder HNA group, that would sub-lease those A350s, while Azul would take two A320neos that would then be delivered to one of the group's airlines (and those jets still fly with Azul, registred PR-YRT and YRU)
Then we all know what happened, HNA went into deep trouble, and then came the pandemic, so they returned the jets to the lessors and scrapped long haul plans. Azul ended up having to take back the planes, which went into storage in Europe still in HK configuration.
The pandemic provided an oportunity to renegotiate the lease contracts more favorably, and Azul needed new Widebodies quick to take on the rebounding demand for international travel from Brazil post-pandemic (also to comply with growth plans presented to shareholders). The jets helped to boost capacity to the USA during 2022-2023 South hemisphere summer and then were used to launch the new Paris route, which proved to be a success.
The airline tried to make the 350 work, even arranging for two other frames to be delivered (one of them even ended up in Azul's livery at AUH), but it quickly became evident that standarising the fleet with the 300neo is the most effective solution, given the cost advantage of the 330. As mentioned above, the A330neo can perform virtualy all missions the A350 would fly at Azul at a much lower unit cost with additional gains in fleet commonality.
Azul doesnt need the additional range and capacity the 350 offers, it is an airline that focus in cost and efficiency, so the single widebody strategy makes more sense.