Last week flew CNF-PTY, and was shocked (pleasantly) to see the plane equipped with 16 BF seats (the legacy-CO-BF-type). The seats were placed closer to one another that the older CO seats, but quite farther apart compared to their usual FC seats. VERY nice. They also had the AVOD, with monitors between seats. Excellent touch-screen response, and the clearest picture I’ve seen on any aircraft monitor. Think they also had a form of AVOD in economy, but did not check this out.

I talked with a FA and co-pilot about the plane. It was in service less than 2 months. Copa has two of these new aircraft configured this way, and they are used on all routes. That makes it difficult to determine when and where these new planes will be used. The co-pilot said they are not aware of the aircraft they will be flying until about 3 days in advance, and even that is subject to change.

FA said Copa was considering retro-fitting the older aircraft with this new seating, but that would reduce the number of “business” seats from 16 to
12; no decision yet made. (As much as I love the new seats, would prefer the larger number of front-cabin premium seats.)

Agents in the PTY Copa Club did not know how to find out when and where the new aircraft would be flying. So odds seem quite low on snagging a sseat on one of these. Hope someone here can shed some light on this.