Alaska Airlines closer to an all-Boeing fleet as of today

[TangoWhiskey]

They parked their last MD-80 today... Any idea if they plan to park the Dash-80's and Q400's? This article makes it sound like they are going all-Boeing.

Interesting cost-per-hour and cost-per-seat-hour information in this article. Can you imagine a fuel bill of $3500/hr?

http://aviationblog.dallasnews.com/archives/2008/08/alaska-airlines-parks-its-last.html

 

[TMetzinger]

Not the Q400s - those are apparently nice economical airplanes for the routes and loads they have.

 

[Pilawt]

I heard that Horizon (regional arm of Alaska) is in the process of thinning its herd down to a single type, the Q400.

 

[wsuffa]

Uh, an MD-80 IS Boeing. The 717's are a derivative with the native Boeing nameplate.

The MD-80s are also fuel hogs. Airlines can't park 'em fast enough. AA (MD80, MD82) and DL (MD88, MD90) are running the largest fleets of 'em now..... with Airtran having a whole bunch of 717's

 

[jmaynard]

Don't forget NW's DC-9s, either. They refurbished a whole bunch of them a while back, and that looked like a real smart decision until fuel prices went through the roof.

 

[ScottM]

Uh, an MD-80 IS Boeing. The 717's are a derivative with the native Boeing nameplate.

That is what I thought too.

It is like when I bought my Jeep and Daimler-Benz then bought Chrysler. Over night I became a Mercedes owner

 

[t0r0nad0]

Uh, an MD-80 IS Boeing. The 717's are a derivative with the native Boeing nameplate.

Not really... MD-80 is a Douglas product, and was originally supposed to be the DC-9-80. When McDonnell and Douglas merged, it was re-designated as MD-80 (and -88, -90, etc.). Boeing just inherited it when they bought out M-D. The Boeing 717 (the current iteration, not the 707 derivative that is the real 717), while being somewhat similar in appearance and seat layout, is a very different design than the MD-80, with different engines, avionics, systems, etc. It requires a completely separate type-rating.

Before CO retired theirs, I made the mistake of referring to one as a "Boeing MD-80" in front of one of their pilots... I was quickly corrected.