Air New Zealand will deploy its premium-heavy Boeing 787-9s on the Auckland-Houston route from December, alongside larger 777-200ERs.
The first of the newly configured 787s arrived at the Star Alliance carrier’s Auckland base on 8 October, following its ferry flight from Charleston, South Carolina.
Compared to the other nine 787-9s in Air NZ’s fleet, the newest jet (registered ZK-NZL) features nine additional business and 12 additional premium economy seats, for a total seat count of 275 – 27 fewer seats than the existing fleet.
The new jet will enter revenue service on 15 October by operating a flight to Sydney, before being deployed on the North American market from December.
Flight Fleets Analyzer shows that the carrier has three more 787-9s on order. One more will be delivered in November, while the remaining two are scheduled for delivery in 2018.
Source: Cirium Dashboard
