Airbus sees its A320neo family of aircraft as an answer to the performance capabilities of the Boeing 757-200, as it evaluates offering a longer-range A321neo that could replace the 757 on transatlantic missions.
“Was the 757 being used for capacity or for its performance?” says Keith Stonestreet, director of investor marketing at the European airframer, on the sidelines of the Ascend Flightglobal Consultancy Finance Forum in San Francisco today.
American Airlines has shifted some of its flights to airports that required the performance of the 757, for example hot and high airfields in Latin America and the Rocky Mountain region, to the Airbus A319, he cites as an example.
The legacy American operation at the Fort Worth, Texas-based carrier took delivery of its first A319 in July 2013. It operates the type on some routes with high performance needs, including to Bogota, Jackson Hole and Vail/Eagle.
American had 108 A319s in its fleet at the end of September, following the addition of 93 aircraft from its merger with US Airways in December 2013.
With the performance needs for certain airports met by other variants in Airbus’ A320neo family, Stonetreet says that the proposed long-range A321neo would target thin routes with stage lengths of 3,500nm to 4,000nm.
“There are routes that don’t justify a widebody but would justify a large single aisle [aircraft],” he says.
Potential route opportunities for the long-range A321neo include existing 757 operations across the Atlantic and between the North America and Latin America, as well as less developed markets between Europe and Africa, and Europe and the Gulf, says Stonestreet.
Some of these markets may be smaller than they would be today if production of the 757 had not ended a decade ago, he adds.
The proposed long-range A321neo would have a maximum take-off weight of 97t and fly about 4,100nm in a standard two-class configuration with 164 seats with the first delivery in 2019.
Peter Warlick, vice-president of fleet planning at American, said in November that they were evaluating the “economics and the range and performance capabilities” of the potential aircraft.
Source: Cirium Dashboard
