How old are most American Airlines planes?
The airline operates one of the largest commercial aircraft fleets globally, with approximately 1,486 planes in its fleet as of 2022. With such a huge fleet serving hundreds of destinations globally, a key question for many fliers is:
Where and when was American Airlines founded, and how old are its planes?
The age distribution referring to the average age of planes within an airline company at the level of a whole fleet is rather limited in terms of providing insights. Companies that operate airline services are known to reinvest by buying new planes and retiring the old ones. Many American Airlines aircraft are relatively young and were assembled at Boeing or Airbus recently, while some of them have been in service for several decades.
Knowing how well an airline’s fleet is equipped and how recent its aircraft are can give a lot of information about the quality of the experience for passengers, efficiency and costs of operations, and environmental effects. The more contemporary airplanes provide passengers with such comforts as personal entertainment screens, Internet connections, and electrical outlets. They also claim to possess enhanced fuel economy coupled with reduced emissions.
Oh yes, but what can be said about the distribution of aircraft ages within the vast American Airlines’ fleet?
A commercial aircraft usually reaches its end of use after 20–30 operational years before being retired and replaced. As of 2022, there should be an average age of all the American Airlines aircraft at circa 20 years old. This is based on the number of mainline aircraft plus regional jet aircraft that are from the regional partners of American airlines but marketed under the American Eagle brand.
When focusing only on the mainline American Airlines, excluding regional affiliates, the average aircraft age is years. This is not too young, but it is relatively young as compared to competing domestic airlines such as Delta and United. It implies that Americans have increasingly purchased new planes in the recent past in an effort to modernize.
It is only a natural occurrence that any fleet of an airline possesses both new and old jets in its armada. American currently orders Boeing and Airbus jets by hundreds more to gradually update its fleet in the following ten years.
The majority of American planes are either freshly purchased directly from manufacturers or at most years of age. American’s Airbus A, Boeing, and Boeing ER aircraft families are dominating the youth movement with young people. These are some next-generation aircraft because of their airliner configuration, amenities, and engines.
However, around half of the planes in American’s fleet are or more years old. The series of planes currently in service but belonging to the oldest ones is described as the MDSuper aircraft family.
Although subsonic tri-engine jets are not as fuel-efficient as their modern counterparts, they are sufficiently suitable for short-haul flights. While they are expected to remain in service beyond the current year, they will probably be withdrawn as newer delivery takes over by the end of this decade. Actually, the Boeing series that is middle-aged also constitutes the key constituency of the United States' operational fleet.
Regional aircraft of American Eagle start from newly manufactured to over a year old The mainline fleet of American Eagle is as follows:
These are airplanes that transport passengers over relatively shorter distances since passenger traffic cannot support the larger aircraft.
The average age of aircraft metric also sheds no light on the true state of the cabins. Newer aircrafts that are part of American’s fleet have been upgraded to have new seats, WiFi, and other accessories to match those of new deliveries.
Nevertheless, nothing compares with the well-lit and airy cabin areas of the newest wide-body aircrafts. It has cost Americans billions of dollars to modernize their fleet with those advanced aircrafts. The airline likes to claim that it operates the youngest fleet in the context of US network carriers.
Although COVID-affected aircraft deliveries have increased over the past couple years, American anticipates more fleet renewal going forward over the 2020s. It was at the end of the decade that more established MD and series planes were intended to be phased out by American.
New entries remain in the planes order backlog, such as Boeing’s dream liner and Airbus axe WB. These capable, technologically advanced aircraft will enable American to enhance the onboard offering while managing operating costs properly.
Altogether, based on the data presented in the table, one could conclude that years seems rather old for American Airlines and, thus, the company needs new planes to replace old ones; however, it is also necessary to consider that the average age of the fleet is influenced by the fact that the company has some old planes that will be retired in the near future. More than a third of its fleet are new or less than a year or two old. In addition to its aircraft orders of nearly $100 billion, American is advancing with the intention of becoming one of the world’s most cutting-edge airlines this decade.
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