What Are The Strategic Implications Of The Airbus A321XLR For Long-Haul Narrowbody Operations? (2024)

As a Central Florida resident, a non-stop flight from Daytona (or even Jacksonville) to London and beyond on one of those planes feels a lot more appealing than having to spend even one second at MCO

2024-07-16 10:22:48

It seems like transiting at MCO is a nightmare.

2024-07-16 13:37:27

This will increase direct flights from Tier-2 cities in India to Europe, Africa , East Asia and Australia (maybe).

2024-07-16 13:58:19

2024-07-16 17:11:20

double edged sword.......cities like Boston and Madrid are going to lose wide body service in favor of more frequent flights. But It does open some second tier cities like Malaga, Nice, Lyon, Shannon, Glasgow, Seville, Cologne, Birmingham etc to more transatlantic service.

2024-07-16 14:54:26

As the airlines get more and more of the XLR, we might see more combinations of planes on the routes: for example, on American Airlines's 787-8 has 234 passengers. Their A321xlr will have 155 seats, I believe. Imagine PHL-ZRH. Today they might have 234 seats year-around. With the XLR, they might have 2 daily XLR during the summer, with 310 seats, then one daily 787-8 with 234 seats in the spring and fall, and 1 daily XLR with 155 seats in the winter. Or on BOS-MAD: Iberia might have one A330 in the winter, and either 2 XLR's or one A330 and 1 XLR in the summer, with 2 XLR's in the spring and fall. Or perhaps a route such as ORD-BCN, which may normally might be seasonal, might have a widebody in the summer and an XLR in the winter, making it year-around. In other words, the XLR might not always result in a downgrade in service, and having extra frequency on these shorter international flights possible on the XLR (<= 9 hours in most cases), is not the worst thing in the world.

2024-07-17 02:13:38

2024-07-18 10:43:24

I agree, but the result isn't always what we expect. SAS started out flying the CPH-BOS route with A321LRs (22 business, 12 PE, 123 Eco) and had a nice load factor. Now the route is handled by the A350-900 due to the amount of freight they have on the route. On the CPH-JFK route they will have twice daily A321LRs, wheras the OSL-EWR, ARN-EWR and CPH-EWR will be served by A330s. So, one airport has higher frequency due to the A321LRs but another still only has one flight from each of the Scandinavian hubs.

2024-07-23 02:32:18

Good replacement for the 757 as once again Boeing has no offering

2024-07-17 09:54:53

I am sure places like Dusseldorf will get direct intercontinental flights back.

2024-07-16 11:29:10

Does not Duesseldorf have the intercontinental connection to Dubai?

2024-07-16 15:37:24

Yes it does. I guess that counts.

2024-07-17 10:35:59

Low-demand long-haul routes, or point-to-point long-haul flights.

2024-07-16 20:43:40

Excited for it to be the Airbus equivalent of a B757, I hope one day to be CA on one.

2024-07-16 17:33:10

The 3+3 economy cabin in the A321-XLR offers more individual space & a wider aisle than for example the high density narrow aisle that most airlines choose for their B777’s (Singapore & Japan Airlines commendable exceptions). I believe a very exciting future lies ahead for the type with numerous city pairs being viable for the first time.

2024-07-17 17:57:36

It opens and closes opportunities. On one side lower load factors and higher range equates new routes like YYZ/YUL-NORTH AFRICA while compromising low profit transatlantic routes like tap planning to put the a321 XLR on its EWR routes instead of the a330-200. So it is mostly a win

2024-07-16 12:17:24

I thought TAP already did this, with A-330s being reserved for JFK?

2024-07-16 12:24:11

2024-07-16 13:55:37

I would like to correct the communication error tap has 2 flights of which one is a330 flight which will become a321xlr and one a321 LR flight

2024-07-19 10:40:31

From an operational point of view I don’t see how this plane is going to be profitable. Crew costs are skyrocketing and on longer routes three pilots will be required. If you were an airline bean counter would you rather have those three pilots flying over 300 people on a 777 or A350, or half that number on a 321? Positioning crews would also be costly. Say Delta starts a San Antonio to Paris run where would the pilots come from? They are not going to open a crew base in SAT so that means deadheading crews in and overnighting them. That’s a very inefficient way to manage your crew costs. Airfares would have to be extremely high for the 321 to make a profit on long haul routes. If I lived in San Antonio I would be willing to make a stopover at DFW or ATL in order to save some money and ride on a widebody to Paris.

2024-07-17 11:30:04

It will benefit lots of cities especially in southern Africa.

2024-07-16 12:48:52

I think it will benefit most airlines in Africa.

2024-07-16 13:38:18

I come from a time where all long-haul operations were flown in narrowbody airplanes - DC-8s and 707s, so I welcome Airbus´s A321XLR arrival as sort of a blessing to those long, thin routes, and airlines´CFOs will bless Airbus for it.

2024-07-17 09:21:56

2024-07-17 16:33:59

Has a crew rest area been anticipated? The flight lengths are getting longer.

2024-07-17 17:12:26

Nothing new really as this is what the 707 and DC-8 did with more range before widebodies had to be introduced because they then got too small for increasing pax as a consequence of their own success and in the case of the 707 stretching it further than the -320B wasn’t worth it as Joe Sutter said given the low ground clearance (even though it’s higher than the original 737 twin direct derivative

2024-07-16 17:20:02

That was then. This is now.

2024-07-16 18:10:08

I worked for Western Airlines in 1968 and we operated B320B aircraft that my old memory says they were Shorter than a B707. Not stretched.

2024-07-17 13:13:14

LAX to CTS may be a possibility. More flights between Sharjah and South East Asia.

2024-07-16 22:53:10

I hope long-haul operations come to Cologne CGN, the west of Germany desperately needs more flights that are longer than 3-4h. With that CGN can finally serve the Americas and Asia in a lower-cost manner.

2024-07-19 19:47:30

2024-07-16 17:36:25

You bring up a good point with the 757's capability and the A321xlr's speed, however, on the other hand, the XLR is much more efficient than the 757 and flies farther. A 757 therefore doesn't make as many long-thin routes profitable or reliably possible. And if the A321xlr means a city such as St. Louis gets a nonstop to London or Dublin, instead of having to connect thru Chicago or another city, then the A321xlr reduces that trip to 9 hours instead of 11 hours or even longer, even though the XLR flies slower. And importantly, a connecting trip is of course a much riskier itinerary....risk of missed connection is a potential issue on an 11-hour STL-LHR itinerary with only a 90-minute connection at ORD, PHL, NYC, etc. Now, if Boeing could re-start production of the 757 and get the newer, efficient Pratt-Whitney and the Leap 1A engines to increase from 35,000 lbf to something closer to the 40,00 thrust the old 757 engines had, then it would be an interesting move, as the efficiency would be close to that of the XLR and the range would likely match the XLR...the old B757-200x had range of 3,900nm, compared to estimated 4,500nm for the A321 (Airbus originally said the XLR range would be 4,700nm, but modifications to achieve certification are expected to reduce it to around 4,500).

2024-07-17 01:59:57

The A321XLR will have a big impact in aviation that’s for sure. A lot of airlines can use the aircraft on lower demand routes, maybe even to airports where bigger planes like the A330 or the 787 aren’t capable of operating.

2024-07-25 12:16:05

2024-07-26 11:13:12

I live in Sacramento, so I hope that this plane is able to fly to further to expand its route network

2024-07-16 16:35:18