The future of Brussels Airlines with Lufthansa

[Megaman]

I guess SN will use what LH wants them to use.

[RoMax]

And LH wants that they use Airbus for long haul. But I think that LH gone drop some of their B737's with SN for short haul. Because the A319(4) are with less than the B737's(11).

[Air Key West]

At the risk of disappointing the Boeing fans, LH's 737s will certainly not replace b.air's A319s. b.air's aircraft which really need to be replaced are the 737s which really show their age. In addition, Airbus is definitely LH's favorite aircraft in general and certainly for short and medium range flights. So, I hope b.air's 737s will be the first to be on the list for fleet renewal. in terms of pax comfort, the A318-A321s are, at least as far as I am concerned, more comfortable than the 737s even the most recent versions.

As to LH's A300, if they are really less than twenty years old, they could be a temporary solution to b.air's need for aircraft for additional flights to Africa. I would certainly see them fly the ex sabena routes to Cotonou and Lomé via Ouaga or Niamey.
But as far as I can remember, these aircraft have "European" style seats in Business class. No "lie flat at an angle" sleeper seats which would have to be installed for intercontinental operations.

[NCB]

Conti764, your post on liners.net makes alot of sense with regards to routes.
I guess B753 would have been an option, unfortunately there are not many available on the market.
B767 and even B752 capacity would have made alot of sense but I guess commonality was the main driver behind SN's search for cheap A330's...

LH has grounded half a dozen widebodies including B744's, A346's due to overcapacity.
The front of 3-class configs are difficult to fill these days. A346/B744 are a bit big for SN, they need to be teared apart into a 2-class configuration, they'd only make sense on the FIH and NBO route and could prove useful as very good marketing tool for SN's African network if used to JNB/CPT during next year's soccer world cup.

Actually I don't understand why SN doesn't use its A319's exclusively to Africa. Are some of them of the shorter range version or do they all have the 7000km range? They are not difficult to fill, they can provide immediate capacity and they have similar operating seatmile costs compared to A333's. They are far easier to find on the market, alot cheaper to lease or to buy and are versatile with ULD capabilities and ability to fly shorthaul.

Some information about speculative, potential, maybe, what if, could be, candidate A300's :

D-AIAU: A300-600 EIS with LH 13/01/1992
D-AIAX: A300-600R EIS with LH 30/12/1996
D-AIAY: A300-600R EIS with EK 14/06/1991
D-AIAZ: A300-600R EIS with EK 31/08/1993

Between 13 and 18 years of age... very doable.

If SN really needs short-medium capacity , LH can easily provide 737's.
It could be interesting to expand destinations in Northern Africa (Morocco, Tunisia, Algeria, Lybia, Egypt), Turkey, Lebanon, Israel, Russia( St. Petersburg, more frequencies to Moscow). Though they may face competition from airlines already operating the routes, SN has the advantage of a European feeding network. B733's could provide interim capacity to operate those routes while a fleet plan is setup by LH for post-2013.

[brussels airlines]

Well the plan is to dump 3 SN B737's by the end of the year, or the beginning of next year. However it isn't sure they are going to be replaced, because of the current economic climate.

I don't think Lufthansa will chose Boeing for the short-medium haul. At this moment Lufthansa has 52 orders for Airbusses of the A320-family. Not a single B737-order. By the way, the B737-500 is going to be replaced as from this year by Embrear's 190. The Boeing 737-300 will exit fromservice in 2012.

[RoMax]

About long haul, SN will never use Boeing in the first 5 years I think. This change would be to big again and LH use Airbus itself for long haul (exept of the 744). The A300's are a very temporary solution, this planes should be replaced again over a few years.

[euroflyer]

I don't understand why SN doesn't consider using Boeings again? When SN was a small, independent company where each cent mattered, I could see the relevance of concentrating around one airplane supplier. But with LH backing them up and in the future owning them fully, this shouldn't be much of a problem anymore. I can see both the 757-300 (with the recent popularity of an upgraded 757-200W this type is more difficult to find) and the 767-200/300 (ER) be efficient on their African ops. The A333 is actually a little too big to do the majority of the AFI operations for SN throughout the most of the year and thus the proposed a/c would be more economical (even more so since SN's 333's aren't the youngest around). The A332 would be a good option as well, but these are harder to find given their popularity.

Hm, I guess for a big company every cent matters the same way as it does for a small company (especially with these German efficiency praised here so often - being German myself I am a bit more sceptical on that point by the way ). And LH is operating in its group a big number of different planes, but if I am correct not one single 757 or 767 anymore at the moment. I think OS still has some 767 (correct?), but as those are the only ones you can be pretty sure they will come up with anything, but not with buying some used 757s or 767s for SN or anybody else. I cannot see how that should make sense.

[euroflyer]

At the risk of disappointing the Boeing fans, LH's 737s will certainly not replace b.air's A319s. b.air's aircraft which really need to be replaced are the 737s which really show their age. In addition, Airbus is definitely LH's favorite aircraft in general and certainly for short and medium range flights. So, I hope b.air's 737s will be the first to be on the list for fleet renewal. in terms of pax comfort, the A318-A321s are, at least as far as I am concerned, more comfortable than the 737s even the most recent versions.

As to LH's A300, if they are really less than twenty years old, they could be a temporary solution to b.air's need for aircraft for additional flights to Africa. I would certainly see them fly the ex sabena routes to Cotonou and Lomé via Ouaga or Niamey.
But as far as I can remember, these aircraft have "European" style seats in Business class. No "lie flat at an angle" sleeper seats which would have to be installed for intercontinental operations.

I am not so sure about Airbus being LH's favorite, but they are in the process of slowly phasing out the 737s in the LH mainline fleet as well. The number of A319/320/312 is increased, new ERJ195 are going into service with LH Cityline and other group airlines, they have a big order for Bombardier C-Jets, but the 737s LH still has are just getting older and older.So I guess quite soon they all will be replaced by a mixture of the aircraft mentioned above.

And yes, the A300 have Business-Class style seats in a 2-2-2 configuration, but no lie-flat and no entertainment system. They have been use for medium-haul routes like Moscow, Istanbul or Cairo, but not for long-haul flights with LH. So somehting would need to be done here to the cabin interior indeed.

[kiwiandrew]

in my opinion it is a bit of a shame that the takeover didnt happen earlier , if the LX A330-200s had still been available tsome of them could have been refurbished for SN . 5 or 6 to replace the SN A330-300s would have allowed decoupling of some of the tag services and higher frequencies to the most important destinations which would have helped boost yields ,and the larger number of airframes would also have allowed for quicker recovery of schedules when an aircraft goes U/S , all round it would have given SN more flexibility than it has now .

[RoMax]

Is there not a single LX A332 available anymore?

[kiwiandrew]

Is there not a single LX A332 available anymore?

If I recall correctly they have all been placed , in any case , a single aircraft would be not much of a fleet . For SN to have obtained a relatively low time , fleet of identical aircraft ( if I am not mistaken their current fleet of A330s are not identical ?? ) of a size better suited , in my opinion , to their needs than their current fleet , would have helped their operations considerably ( of course this is only my opinion )

[sdbelgium]

If I am not mistaken their current fleet of A330s are not identical

Correct: OO-SFW (ex-Air Madrid) is powered by PWs, while the other three (ex-Air Inter) are powered by GEs.

[Conti764]

If I am not mistaken their current fleet of A330s are not identical

Correct: OO-SFW (ex-Air Madrid) is powered by PWs, while the other three (ex-Air Inter) are powered by GEs.

And SFW has a slightly different amount of seats compared to SFM, N and O. Not that this matters so much since it's about 10 seats maximum.

[Atlantis]

Today we could read on Luchtvaartnieuws.nl and Airline route news that it was today the last flight of the A300-600 of LH. The 5 aircraft will be sold to other companies.

Would it be not stupid that they sold one or transfer one to SN while SN is now under the wings of LH. Besides LH removed the A300 because it is too expensive to operate them.

SN is not a dump station. They need some good, fresh aircraft and no second hand from an other company.
It's time to look forward and act like a real company.

[ihd-fc]

OOSFW-O-M-N have the same amount of seats, OOSFW just has another configuartion in the back. But they all have 30C-class and 254 Y-class.

OOSFW has a different kitchen; this is way that if there is an aircraft change last minute, catering takes a long time as they need other trolleys.

If SN buys a new LH-aircraft it is sure that it will not be a new one, but another old old aircraft as there is no monet for something else.

[eurojet]

I don't know why you guys are all so fond of the Airbus 300-600 from Lufthansa. I flew them last year in C-class Frankfurt-Almaty (for a little EUR 5,550), and it was a hell of a flight: very uncomfortable seats, extremely hot in the cabin (I asked to one of the crew, seems it is an old type of airconditioning), no IFE, etc ... Those birds are old, and not fit for the type of product Brussels Airlines wants to offer.

[NCB]

SN can't progress from being a small, low-liquidity airline to a Singapore Airlines MK II overnight.

According to unconfirmed sources, 5 A300's are already sold and some just returned from D-checks, suggesting that LH either has plans with them or it was part of the deal with the buyer. LH has 11 airworthy A300's, so any of them could have been sold.

[tolipanebas]

As to why SN is so hooked on the A330 and doesn't want to use 767s...

This has been explained numerous times already: it has nothing to do with range or pax capacity requirements, which are indeed all met by the 767 too, it has to do with the available cargo volume.
The 767 just can not take 2 standard cargo pallets next to each other, whereas the A330 can and this is precisely what has killed the 767, not only at SN, but globally if I may say!
That's right, apart from the US carriers and the charter airlines, who's still flying 767s to AFI these days?
Hardly anybody and definitely not on routes with high demand for cargo!

With SN heavily depending on cargo too for their long haul operations, there is no chance they will ever operate anything else but the A330/A340 over the next few years and why the 767 -which is occasionally wetleaded to replace a grounded A330- is always sent to DKR: the only destination with relatively low cargo (i.e. a sort of charter destination to them) demand.

Long haul planes to AFI need to have sufficient cargo space and currently the A330 is undoubtably the best plane on the market, hence it also being the benchmark product in its class, dethroning the 767.

[Darjeeling]

Knowing all constraints SN has currently in its Flight ops dpt, they will NEVER have the A300-600. Never !
The only alternatives are A330-200.
The cross-type rating A32F/330 is blocking all other types. Once that is erased, maybe we could see a few ex-LH 343 come and join the fleet. You can think about the A340-600 that LH is soon going to ground, but same hurdle. Remember in Belgium you can't fly 32F/33F/34F...

In fact the double type rating 32F/330 or 340 has shown its limits for a long time now and not only at SN.

[Darjeeling]

Is there not a single LX A332 available anymore?

All left or due to leave to SU and VN. It was the most suitable option for SN. They've been waiting much too long IMO. These were good airplanes, with a well known technical history in Belgium and moreover acquiring an airplane from Switzerland hands is always a good technical bargain (not like Air Madrid if you see what I mean...).

Really a BIG missed opportunity.