The Airbus A380 is not a part of Lufthansa’s fleet plans for the long term, despite the airline’s ambitions to bring back up to six of the double-deckers by 2024.
The airline’s “New Normal” fleet in the future will consist of the Airbus A350-1000 and -900, A330-300, Boeing 747-8, 777-300, 777X-9, and 787-9, as well as the 777F to perform cargo-only flights.
In the near future, there will be at least six fewer varieties of cockpits available due to the phase-out of some of the older, less economical aircraft. Airbus A380, A340-600, A340-300, and A330-200 models as well as Boeing 747-400, 777-200, and 767-300 models will no longer be operated.
During the Lufthansa Group’s 2022 earnings call, Carsten Spohr, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer (CEO), stated that modern cabin interior and advanced aircraft are the foundation of an improved offering for an airline. According to Spohr, “that is why we are methodically continuing the modernization of our aircraft fleet,” and in 2023, the airline group plans to add 35 planes to its various carriers.
The organization placed orders for 22 more long-haul aircraft, including 10 Airbus A350-1000, five A350-900, and seven Boeing 787-9s, to replace its aging widebody aircraft fleet. The German airline firm has 87 widebody planes on order in total, with 44 more possibilities (20 for the 787, 24 for the 777X). Deliveries of the aircraft is anticipated to start in 2023, with the first 777X delivery starting in 2025.
More than half of the 200 additional aircraft the carrier group will add to its fleet by 2030 will be long-range aircraft, Spohr noted.
“The Group expects significant cost savings from these efforts, especially in the areas of staff training, maintenance and operations,” the corporation wrote in its 2022 full-year report.
For its long-haul operations, Lufthansa also unveiled 14 new Allegris cabin interior products. Over the next few years, six Airbus A380s will total return to Lufthansa’s fleet. Six Super Jumbos, out of the 14 A380s the German airline held before the COVID-19 outbreak, will be returned to Airbus by November 2023, according to the financial report for the company. Ten of the type of aircraft were no longer in service as of the end of 2022.
Yet as of December 2022, Lufthansa has started putting back A380s into service. Four of the type will be flown by the Frankfurt Airport (FRA) airline out of Munich Airport by the peak travel season in 2023. (MUC). In 2024, two more Airbus A380s will resume service.
A profit of €791 million ($839.4 million) was reported on €33 billion ($35 billion) in revenue by the German airline company, which includes but is not limited to Austrian Airlines, Brussels Airlines, Lufthansa, and Swiss International Air Lines. Over the course of the year, it transported 102 million people in total.
