New American Airlines airplane will be delayed seven weeks ...

We wrote last week that American Airlines might have to delay the first scheduled flights of its new Boeing 777-300ERs. On Tuesday, American confirmed that delay.

?Our entry into service for our first Boeing 777-300ER is now anticipated early next year,? American spokeswoman Andrea Huguely said.

The delay is actually seven weeks, from its original date of Dec. 13 to a new date of Jan. 31. The 310-seat aircraft, the largest in American?s fleet, will be deployed initially on the Dallas/Fort Worth-Sao Paulo, Brazil, route, as originally planned.

We had heard that the problem was with the first-class seats that American had ordered and that were being manufactured in Great Britain. Huguely confirmed that.

?As you know, oftentimes there are delays with the introduction of a new fleet type as there are a multitude of elements that must align in order to deliver a state-of-the-art product for our customers,? she said.

?In this case, the entry into service date has shifted because of production issues being encountered by our First Class suite supplier. We are working closely with our supplier to ensure that our final product reflects the inflight experience that our customers expect from American Airlines,? she said.

The 777-300ERs are ?a critical part of American?s fleet renewal efforts and we are aggressively working to incorporate these new aircraft into our fleet,? Huguely said.

As we wrote last week, American has ordered 14 of the large airplanes, with two to arrive in 2012, 10 in 2013 and two in 2014.

American said in May that it would introduce the 777-300ER on the D/FW-London on Jan. 31, New York-London in February, a second D/FW-London flight in March and New York-Sao Paulo in April. We don?t know how the seat issues will affect the deployment of those aircraft, but we presume that once the problem is resolved on Airplane 1, it?ll be resolved on Airplanes 2-14.

Source: http://aviationblog.dallasnews.com/2012/10/new-american-airlines-airplane-will-be-delayed-seven-weeks.html/

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