c9skytrain
Well-known member
- Joined
- Feb 25, 2003
- Posts
- 149
UPDATED: How can you crowd more passengers onto an airplane without making your passengers more crowded?
That's what Southwest Airlines says it can do with new, thinner seats that it will install on all its Boeing 737-700s, plus the 737-700 and 717-200s that it is adding through the AirTran Airways merger.
As part of the new interior, Southwest will add a row of seats, raising the maximum passenger load on its Boeing 737-700s from 137 seats to 143 seats (a 4.4 percent increase in capacity without adding an airplane).
The new seating will be installed between March 2012 and mid-year 2013, as well as carpet tiles rather than regular carpet.
The thinner seats allow Southwest to add a row without cutting back on the passengers' personal space, including knee and leg room. Southwest officials says the new seats actually add about two cubic feet of "personal space" for each passenger.
It'll cost Southwest about $60 million to retrofit its existing fleet of 372 Being 737-700s.. It would have cost $110 million, but the seats chosen by Southwest will fit on the existing seat frames, saving $50 million.
Because the AirTran aircraft must have their interiors replaced, Southwest won't be reusing those airplanes' seat frames.
But what about the Boeing 737-300s and 737-500s currently in Southwest's fleet? Bob Jordan, executive vice president, said the 737-500s are too close to the end of their time at Southwest to justify refitting.
As for the 737-300s, of which Southwest was flying 165 as of Sept. 30, Southwest will just have to see if it wants to modify those aircraft, Jordan and Brian Hirshman, Southwest's senior vice president of technical operations, said.
As to the Boeing sky interior for future airplanes, the current fleet isn't being retrofitted to that look.
I guess they are keeping the 717s for a while if they are getting updated and some -300s and all -500 aren't.
That's what Southwest Airlines says it can do with new, thinner seats that it will install on all its Boeing 737-700s, plus the 737-700 and 717-200s that it is adding through the AirTran Airways merger.
As part of the new interior, Southwest will add a row of seats, raising the maximum passenger load on its Boeing 737-700s from 137 seats to 143 seats (a 4.4 percent increase in capacity without adding an airplane).
The new seating will be installed between March 2012 and mid-year 2013, as well as carpet tiles rather than regular carpet.
The thinner seats allow Southwest to add a row without cutting back on the passengers' personal space, including knee and leg room. Southwest officials says the new seats actually add about two cubic feet of "personal space" for each passenger.
It'll cost Southwest about $60 million to retrofit its existing fleet of 372 Being 737-700s.. It would have cost $110 million, but the seats chosen by Southwest will fit on the existing seat frames, saving $50 million.
Because the AirTran aircraft must have their interiors replaced, Southwest won't be reusing those airplanes' seat frames.
But what about the Boeing 737-300s and 737-500s currently in Southwest's fleet? Bob Jordan, executive vice president, said the 737-500s are too close to the end of their time at Southwest to justify refitting.
As for the 737-300s, of which Southwest was flying 165 as of Sept. 30, Southwest will just have to see if it wants to modify those aircraft, Jordan and Brian Hirshman, Southwest's senior vice president of technical operations, said.
As to the Boeing sky interior for future airplanes, the current fleet isn't being retrofitted to that look.
I guess they are keeping the 717s for a while if they are getting updated and some -300s and all -500 aren't.
