American Airlines Retires Traditional Super 80 Aircraft
Luciana Mangas August 25, 2016
The carrier has retired 20 MD-80s in what has been dubbed as the largest single-day aircraft retirement in history.
American Airlines is retiring 20 of its traditional MD-80s. USA Today reports that the planes are being sent to the aircraft “boneyard” in Roswell, NM as part of what the company is calling “one of the largest single-day aircraft retirements in airline history.”
The carrier is in the process of phasing out aging aircraft models and replacing them with modern new Boeing 737 and Airbus A320-family jets. The 140-seat Super 80, as the carrier calls them, touched down at Roswell throughout the day yesterday, though they came in at a clip of about one every five minutes during an 85-minute window starting at 11:20 am local time.
However, American Airlines spokesman Josh Freed said that those 20 retirements do not indicate an acceleration of MD-80 retirements.
“It’s just that we have a long-term MD-80 retirement plan and with the busy summer flying season winding down, today was a good day to take care of these,” Freed added. He also said that some of those MD-80s will remain active through at least the summer of 2018.
Planes can stay in storage for the foreseeable future in Roswell, where the dry desert air prevents corrosion in the idle crafts. Some of them may find second lives by being taken in by cargo carriers or by smaller airlines.
[Photo: Andrew Vane/Airline Reporter]
I actually really liked the MD80/MD90. Scandinavian Airlines (SK) used these for a good number of decades and even though it was a bit of an odd seating configuration (2-3) they were surprisingly quiet unless you sat at the very back with one of the engines less than 20 cm from your ear...
If the airlines wanted to, they could do really go a long way to ease part of this problem, at least for new mothers. For a pilot/copilot who needs to pump, seems they could use the jump seat and ask their cockpit partner to keep "eyes forward". At least it is a semi-private space. Seems like a better solution than to have a pilot spending 20 minutes in the lav, with an FA holding their place in the cockpit... But that jump seat solution wont work for FAs... Or maybe... Yeah. Why not? Allow nursing FAs to use the jump seat in the cockpit, and expect professional behavior from the pilots?? (No jokes about asking the impossible from some pilots)
With my commercial flight history dating back to DC-3s, it's hard for me to mourn the passing of AA's MD80s, a utilitarian and serviceable a/c, but one in which I always felt the onset of claustrophobia. I was never comfortable envisioning evacuating one.