jrkmsp

Delta announced to its pilots today that three 747s will be retired at the end of the peak summer flying period, in September. One additional 747 will be retired at the end of the year.

The retirement announcement comes in advance of what Delta described as a company-wide announcement about its Asia-Pacific plans, later this week.

Delta currently operates 16 747s, 4 of them it owns, 9 on operating leases and 3 on capital leases. I suspect these are lease returns.

Interestingly, Delta is slated to get four A333s next year, though deliveries have slipped from January to May or later.

Here's the text of the update sent to pilots:

With respect to the 747, last week Delta’s Network and Finance teams completed a re-evaluation of options to improve our international performance.

This analysis resulted in a decision to retire three 747-400 aircraft by the end of September, and an additional 747 before the end of the year. When we see opportunities to make the right long-term decisions for our customers, employees and the Company’s profitability, we make them as quickly as possible — consistent with the principle that “speed wins” as described in Rules of the Road.

By taking this step, we have the opportunity to re-gauge some capacity, primarily to help improve the Pacific entity’s performance.**Because of the accelerated 747 retirements, we have not awarded any of the posted 747 vacancies on this AE.

We will not, however, displace any 747 pilots in 2014.

We are also actively assessing options to reduce the need for any 747 Captain displacements in 2015 due to the accelerated retirement of these four aircraft.

We have notified the Association of these developments, and look forward to engaging in a discussion on mitigating displacements. More detail about our overall Asia-Pacific strategy will be shared company-wide this week. Please stay tuned.

Suddenly the decision to take the 747 off of NRT-JFK-TLV makes a lot more sense. That alone, I think, would fund the three retirements. A fourth should be easy to scrounge up out of the Asian beach markets.

355F1

I've never been on one.

I think I need to take a trip to Asia before they retire this beauty.

exwannabe

Sad, but such things have to happen.

EDIT:

Yes, you do. And hopefully upstairs :-)

MSPeconomist

This is so sad, especially with those wonderful new BE seats.

I wonder whether the recent security issues for TLV flights have hastened the decision. I would expect passenger traffic in the TLV market to be down.

pbarnette

I would think it has more to do with Asia being an absolute dog of a market lately.

MSPeconomist

That too, but someone upthread pointed out that the TLV route can explain the three 747s that are retiring at the end of the summer.

BTW, what happened to the old PMNW 747-200s? At some point, one that hadn't been refurbished was used as a reserve aircraft at MSP. It was fun with the retro chandeliers and circular staircase, although the small bins were obviously from a different era.

jrkmsp

Being more specific, I think it has more to do with Japan being an absolute dog of a market lately. Evidence: the 744s are on ICN and PVG now, instead of flows to NRT.

Me, I'm just going to sit in the corner and hope they announce an MSP flight to somewhere else in Asia some time in the next 18 months. And bemoan the loss of the whale.

MSPeconomist

If you find one, please let me know.

ICN is a great airport for connections, but you can't get anywhere in Asia from there on DL.

I wonder whether there will be some news about a JV with KE as part of the announcement within the next week.

pbarnette

I'm also curious what the further announcement will be. I'm keeping my fingers crossed for a KE JV and think it would help with what ails both carriers.

ClipperDelta

It's more about Japan than anything else. JFK-NRT/TLV going to the 777 was already factored into the 744 utilization before this latest change; even with JFK-NRT/TLV gone, the remaining 744 routes would still have required more than 12 planes (Total of 16 minus 4 to be retired). My guess is that both HNL-NRT and HNL-KIX (both scheduled to be 744 flights for the fall/winter) will be downgauged with this change...

Xeno

I am so frustrated that three days ago I canceled an October ticket to SIN that had 747s in both directions (ATL-NRT-ATL).

It was an award ticket and I thought 350K was too much but since I don't even have 747s going to HKG May 2014, I wonder where I can find them. My only other trip in the region is SYD and those of course are 777s.

I could go to TLV next year but I am not really interested without the 747s.

MSPeconomist

Either it's conditions in Japan or DL is trying to reduce capacity a bit on the Japanese beach routes in hopes of raising prices or both. I've always suspected that these routes were relatively profitable given that DL had the aircraft available (and maybe paid for?) during an otherwise low season, but can't generally have been high yielding compared to other TPAC routes, although of course they're shorter and cheaper to fly.

N830MH

Wow! I never flew on 744 aircraft. I hoped that I will fly on 747-400M from AMS-LAX. I need to get on the entire 744 aircraft for one more time.

Sez_Who

You may get your wish but it may take another six months or so.

MSPeconomist

Now I'm starting to rethink my vague travel plans for the next nine months or so.