LAA: Airbus A321H / 321 ETOPS replacing LAX Boeing 757 to Hawaii (master thd)
 

Talking to a couple of AA management-types and the days of the 757 ETOPS on Hawaii on AA metal are fast approaching.

In the fall AA will start replacing 2 LAX-HNL 757's with a soon-to-be-delivered sub-fleet of ETOPS A321 aircraft. By the end of the year the 757's to Hawaii will be gone from LA and replaced by the 321.

Couple of interesting notes...the 321 will have to go out with a weight restriction from LIH and OGG. How much I don't know.

And as for PHX, as soon as AA can cover the US 757's with their own 757 ETOPS, the ex-America West 757's will be parked. They are the oldest in the fleet.

I'm not an elite on AA but I would be disappointed in the removal of an aircraft with up to 24 first class seats - with one that only has 16. As far as I know the 321 ETOPS sub-fleet will match the domestic-issue 321 seat-for-seat.

FWIW, the A321B showing on the AA schedule in September has 24F on the seat map, rows 1-6.

It's the 757 seatmap. You can tell by the economy seatmap and exit row configuration.

Will these be -neos?

Interesting that AA never developed a Boeing 737 ETOPS qualified fleet a la Alaska Airlines (the Inuit man depicted on the tail is wearing a lei) and has chosen to get some A321s "new out of the box" with ETOPS.

Off topic, I remember those Aloha ETOPS 737-200 (Adv) classics!

Starting September, fight 31 LAX-HNL and fight 297 LAX-HNL will be 321 for sure, not sure what happens with the rest and when.

By early October, we'll have a thread decrying the loss of the Hawaiian 757-223s. :D

The 757s were pretty ancient, and the "first class" seating is quite cramped, no footrests and so forth. My general strategy is to avoid them if at all possible, and use the 767s instead which in "first" have low-end business class seats that at least have foot rests and lie fairly flat.

At least the A321 will be new.

Now, about the weight restriction. Is this related to the local runways? OGG is somewhat closer to LAX than HNL; LIH is farther.

It is related to the range of the A321 and the winds AFAIK. The runways can handle whatever but the planes don't have the range to get to Hawaii from the west coast fully loaded. Virgin America thinks that winglets on its new A320s will help make up some of the range issues but it is not clear if they will be similarly weight restricted for the westbound flights.

Yes, they're effective 18AUG15.

The currently loaded seatmap is for the "regular" 32B, i.e. 16F/J 165Y.

New, and having IFE, are the only things going for the interior of the A32B, but their lower mass will mean more impact by turbulence. Crampedness, no footrest and so forth will remain -- I doubt that your general, and sound, strategy will be affected at all by this equipment switch.

For interest, a HNL-LAX flight I have in December has been changed to a 32B in the last couple of days.

A friend of mine on another flight the same day had the same change.

I've moved to 1A, hopefully this is a nice place to sit.

No. Airbus' first A320neo is slated for delivery to QR in October 2015, well in advance of the original second quarter of 2016; the first A319neo is delivered later (also to QR) and the A321neo is the last one to come out, with the first airframe going to ILFC. Am not sure what the AA delivery schedule is, but the -neos will 100% not be available for this route on 18AUG15!

Wow! As if the Hawaii market couldn't get any worse... Can an A321 even make it there in the winter?

Is this worse than the 757s? They are not the most comfortable aircraft for an overnight in that's for sure.

A321 max range is about 3000 nmi says wikipedia. With wind that might be cutting it fine!

For comparison BA has a pair of A318s operating LON-NYC.

Edit: The longest route a 321 serves is presently 2,800 miles. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Non-sto..._aircraft_type
Probably with weight restrictions Hawaii is not too difficult.