Alaska Air Group has announced plans to consolidate its fleet around two families - the B737 for Alaska Airlines (AS, Seattle Tacoma International) and the E175 for Horizon Air (QX, Seattle Tacoma International). All Airbus narrowbodies and DHC-8-Q400s will therefore be retired by the end of 2023.
The carrier holding said during its Investor Day presentation that the simplification of its fleet would reduce operational, maintenance, and training costs while at the same drive efficiency through an increase in seat count per departure.
Alaska Airlines currently operates thirty A320-200s and ten A321-200Ns, having retired all A319-100s during the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic. The airline inherited all of these aircraft from Virgin America (although six A321neo, ordered by Virgin, were delivered directly to Alaska Airlines post-merger). It has been vocal for a while about the need to retire them, starting with the A320s. All of its remaining A320s and A321neo are dry-leased.
The A320-200s were already scheduled to retire by the end of 2023 (six in 2022 and the remaining 24 in 2023). However, Alaska Air Group has not previously provided any timeline for the retirement of the A321neo.
The airline has therefore committed itself to the B737 MAX as its future narrowbody type. It currently operates fourteen B737-9s, alongside eleven B737-700s, sixty-one B737-800s, twelve B737-900s, and seventy-nine B737-900ERs. It has a further seventy-seven B737-9s due from Boeing and Air Lease Corporation, although recently it indicated that it would seek to increase its portfolio of B737 MAX to 150 units, including B737-8s and B737-10s.
On the regional front, Horizon Air currently operates thirty-two DHC-8-Q400s, of which it leases seven and owns the remainder. The turboprops are 14.1 years old on average and are deployed alongside thirty E175s. The holding has a further seven E175s on order from Embraer. SkyWest Airlines (OO, St. George Municipal) operates another thirty-two E175s on behalf of Alaska Airlines.
In its last fleet projection issued at the end of 2021, Alaska Air Group predicted that it would continue operating twenty-five DHC-8-Q400s beyond 2023.
Alaska Airlines has also announced that it will convert two of its passenger B737-800s into freighters to strengthen its cargo division. The aircraft are expected to redeliver post P2F conversion in early 2023 and will become Alaska Airlines' first B737-800 freighters. The airline's cargo division currently operates three B737-700(BDSF)s. The carrier told ch-aviation that it was currently tendering for the conversion and had yet to identify the supplier and, consequently, the conversion variant of the aircraft.
