by Lufthansa Flyer | Oct 27, 2016 | 737, Featured, Fleet Update, Frankfurt, Lufthansa |
This Saturday, October 29, Lufthansa will be broadcasting via Facebook the retirement ceremonies surrounding the last 737 in the fleet.
Her last day of work is scheduled to be on October 29th with a few roundtrip flights from Frankfurt. As of now, she is scheduled to fly to Geneva, Stuttgart and Nuremberg. The final landing of the 737 is scheduled to take place at 7:40p when she returns from Nuremberg (LH153) and the simulcast will capture the moment. Tickets are still available for these final flights.
To tune into the broadcast, please use this link (you will be redirected to Facebook). You can also track events on Twitter or Facebook using the hashtag of #ThankYou737.
One of the retired workhorses of the LH Fleet…..
There’s a lot attention being paid to this final 737 due to the fact that Lufthansa was the launch customer for the aircraft nearly 50 years ago and is responsible for the aircraft’s existence.
Lufthansa approached Boeing in the 1960s looking to replace a propeller driven regional fleet with jets so that they can better serve their European destinations. Boeing and Lufthansa announced February 19, 1965 that LH would be the launch customer, and almost exactly 3 years later on February 10, 1968, the first 737 joined the fleet. In all, 155 737 aircraft had been part of the LH fleet at one time or another over the last 48 years.
Had it not been for LH, there’s no guarantee that the 737 would have ever been developed and become one of history’s best selling and most popular aircraft.
Related:
Lufthansa gives birth to the 737
Lufthansa’s 737 retirement schedule
by Lufthansa Flyer | Oct 23, 2016 | Air Berlin, Corporate, Featured, Lufthansa |
Reuters has reported that talks may have taken place between Lufthansa and Alitalia about the prospects of Lufthansa taking a substantial stake in Italy’s national carrier. The main topic of the conversation may have been regarding Etihad looking to give Air Berlin to Lufthansa in return for a stake in Alitalia.
Etihad currently owns a 49% stake in Air Berlin and a 29% stake in Alitalia and both investments are slowly becoming disasters for Etihad. So much so that Etihad signed off on the Air Berlin deal to let Lufthansa lease 40 aircraft and take over a substantial part of Air Berlin’s routes while Air Berlin tries to fix its woes.
According to the article, Alitalia management denied that any talks have happened but what are they supposed to say? Yes? We did and Lufthansa is going buy a large piece of us and we’re going to throw in Air Berlin as a door prize? How many times have discussions been denied only to become fact a short time later.
It’s an interesting 3-way deal that may be brewing between Rome, Frankfurt and Abu Dhabi. Etihad sees 2 major losses on the horizon with Air Berlin and Alitalia, and sees a way out of almost both problems by giving away Air Berlin to Lufthansa in turn for Lufthansa taking a stake in Alitalia.
My gut suggests that a complete take over of Air Berlin by Lufthansa would simply solidify their Eurowings unit as one of Europe’s largest Low Cost Carriers (LCC) without Lufthansa having to grow the brand organically from within. Considering Air Berlin’s dire financial straits, LH could steal the airline for a song.
But of course, these conversations never happened 😉
by Lufthansa Flyer | Oct 19, 2016 | Austrian, Corporate, Featured, Industry News, Lufthansa, Swiss |
Expanding on their initial ban of the Samsung Galaxy Note 7 aboard flights between the US and Europe, Lufthansa has now banned this ‘Smart Tinderbox’ from all flights on their timetable worldwide. The Lufthansa bans cover the phone being brought into the cabin and as well as being place in checked luggage.
The expansion of the ban comes after the FAA has made it a Federal crime to bring the phone aboard any flight operating to, from, or within the USA. Offenders are subject to civil penalties of up to approximately $180,000. Don’t even try to ship it via Air Mail, that’s been made a crime as well!
The ban applies to all Lufthansa Group Airlines and is effective immediately.
Related: Air Sickness Bags Coming For Your Electronics
by Lufthansa Flyer | Sep 29, 2016 | Air Berlin, Corporate, Eurowings, Featured |
What we knew would happen for weeks has become official. Lufthansa has entered a Letter of Intent with Air Berlin to assume a wet-lease for 40 Air Berlin aircraft, complete with Air Berlin crews to operate the flights. The aircraft will enter service on March 26, 2017, coinciding with the beginning of Lufthansa’s Summer timetable. 35 of the aircraft will be repainted to the Eurowings livery, while the remain 5 will fly under Austrian’s colors. Specifically, the lease involves 29 Airbus 320 and 11 Airbus A319 aircraft.
The decision was made after Lufthansa approached Air Berlin with an offer to help reduce some of the stress that Air Berlin is under due to mounting losses. Of course LH was not completely altruistic with the offer since there would be a substantial benefit to Eurowings, both in the growth of the fleet and the reduction of competition in the German LCC market.
Lufthansa will operate the aircraft on existing Air Berlin routes except those that serve Dusseldorf or Berlin. Air Berlin will continue to operate out these major hubs. However I do expect that a few tweaks will be made to the timetable to take into account existing routes already being flown by Eurowings.
Under wet lease agreements, the operating airline pays ‘rent’ for the aircraft and assumes all other responsibilities for the aircraft including maintenance etc. Any profits or losses remain with the airline leasing the aircraft, obviously in this case it is Lufthansa.
The ‘Letter of Intent’ announcement came from the Supervisory Board of the Lufthansa Group. The board held a regularly scheduled meeting on Wednesday (28 September) to discuss various proposals and strategy initiatives. Another major announcement that came from the Board was the approval for the Lufthansa Group to purchase the remaining 55 percent stake that it did not already own in Brussels Airlines.
by Lufthansa Flyer | Sep 28, 2016 | Brussels, Corporate, Featured, Lufthansa |
Lufthansa Group’s Supervisory Board has voted to approve the acquisition of the remain share of Brussels Airlines that it previously did not own, making ‘SN’ a fully owned by the Airline Group. Up until today, Lufthansa Group had owned only 45% of SN. This decision was fully expected.
The deal is expected to be closed by the beginning of 2017.
What happens from here with Brussels remains interesting. One leading idea floating around Lufthansa Group is a plan to meld Brussels into the Eurowings LCC division to bolster EW’s position among LCC carriers in Europe. With Brussel’s 51 aircraft, most of which are short to medium haul specialists, it would seem to be the likely scenario now that LH controls all of Brussels. I
in addition to the 43 short and medium haul aircraft in Brussels’ hangar, they also operate 8 A330 aircraft which would be critically important to EW as plans exist to expand EW’s long haul network next year.
BUT…..
What may change this original plan was the recent news announcing Lufthansa will wet least 40 aircraft from Air Berlin and take over a substantial portion of Air Berlin’s routes in Europe that do not involve AB’s hubs in Dusseldorf and Berlin.
IF both plans come to fruition, we may see Eurowings go from a small LCC with only 34 aircraft and turn into a European LCC powerhouse with upwards of 125 aircraft in the fleet virtually overnight. This would allow EW to take a realistic run at competitors such as Ryanair and Easyjet and have it happen in fairly short order. Which has been the plan along if you ask anyone at Lufthansa.
