COPA 737-800 seating question
 

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.

Wikipedia shows 2 configurations of Copa's 738 - one with 12/141 and one with 16/144. I guess they take out one row of business and half a row of economy plus some galley/lav adjustments?

Seems that COPA is ordering quite a few of new 738s over the next couple years. I cannot confirm that will all be equipped with the BF seats, but I certainly hope so.

If they extended this, that would be excellent.

I'm not sure it's necessary for the whole CM fleet, but certainly if they could offer it on select long-haul routes. LAX-PTY, PTY-GIG, etc., are over 3,000 miles, and I (and I'm sure others) avoid flying CM F because it's not a "real" J product.

Exactly! I have avoided COPA for this reason. Hoping they do this soon.

Hoping that COPA will adopt this universally, then CO Mike, then maybe even domestic. I could see paying for the domestic front cabin if they improved the hard product to this level and made accompanying improvements to the soft product.

Perhaps this will start a revolution? Nah, I'm delusional.

Yeah imagine the whole domestic fleet with lie flat?! How awesome would that be. But yeah it's delusional!

Does this make the front cabin not EUA-able

True in general, but I still prefer taking Copa (in the old FC seats, which I do hope they change) to places such as CNF and, soon, BSB. Don't really like transfers in South Amer.

As of now, no change in upgrade policy.

This is the old BF seat, not the current 752/772 flat bed, yes?

This is a major upgrade. They are not the old BF seats, but rather brand new recliners with what looks like at least 45" pitch. In Y, they have the new BE Pinnacle seats with integrated IFE like the refurbed 764s currently in service. Appears to be really, really good.

A few pictures I robbed from another message board:

http://img341.imageshack.us/img341/4...nomyclass1.jpg
http://img195.imageshack.us/img195/2...nomyclass3.jpg
http://img41.imageshack.us/img41/4575/economyclass2.jpg
http://img192.imageshack.us/img192/4...nessclass3.jpg
http://img542.imageshack.us/img542/1...nessclass2.jpg
http://img43.imageshack.us/img43/964...nessclass1.jpg

This is great news! Let's hope that these are used on the MIA-PTY and PTY-LIM routes...like in late May. ;)

So now when the only award option US-GRU/GIG is on Copa, the trip will be slightly less torturous... ;)

that actually looks like a pretty nice for a 738. i wish the north american UA 73x's and A32x's had configurations like that.

I can confirm one of these plane flew PTY-MIA at the end of March... ^