Widebodies: Park, Store, Scrap, Return to Service?
September 2021
There are always some aircraft in the world’s commercial fleet that are parked, in storage, or otherwise just not in service. They may be on their way to a new operator, getting ready for conversion from passenger to freight, heading for a retirement home, destined for the knackers yard, or just being used for spares. Even in good times this can be around 5% of the available fleet, as it was at the end of 2019.
In each of the past few cyclical downturns, the aircraft boneyards in such as the Mojave desert, Teruel or Alice Springs, have been a temporary solution for commercial airlines to cope with the sudden loss of demand; and the proportion of aircraft in storage has historically risen to over 15% of the total commercial fleet. Industry observers have dusted off their analysis from the previous downturn to point out that a good majority of the parked aircraft will not return to service: the downturn acts as a catalyst to retire aircraft that had already been worked past retirement age.
Is the current crisis different? Eighteen months after the start of the pandemic, 26% of the world’s commercial fleet remains parked. There has been some recovery in short haul operations, but long haul flights remain severely constrained, and may well not recover to pre-pandemic levels before 2024/25. Nearly a third of the world’s commercial passenger widebody fleet is in storage.
In this analysis we look at the widebody fleet as a surrogate for long haul — but it’s worth noting that not all widebodies are used on long haul routes and not all long haul routes are served by widebodies.
Widebody aircraft are seen to play an important part of the industry providing 45% of the total capacity in ASK terms. But in terms of the number of seats flown they accounted pre-pandemic for only 17% of the total.
Equally long-haul is a small part of the total airline business — only 10% of seats flown were on routes longer than 4,000km. In the decade leading up to 2019, the total number of long haul seats flown grew at a compound average rate of 6% pa while widebody seats flown increased at a slightly slower average of 4% pa.
In 2019 the commercial widebody fleet numbered 6,220 units, 5,811 in service and 409 in storage. Since then, some 271 widebodies have been retired or scrapped (half of which had been in storage in 2019), 1,412 put into storage around 90 returned to service from storage, and 344 new aircraft have been delivered. In 2021 the fleet comprises 6,310 units of which 4,677 are in service and 1,633 stored.
1,455 widebodies, a quarter of the 6,310 commercial widebody fleet, are configured for cargo operations. The comprehensive grounding of long haul passenger services during the pandemic removed half the capacity from the cargo business (flown in the belly-holds of passenger aircraft), markedly pushing up demand for freighters. Some 130 freighters have been added to the active fleet since 2019, 87 new or newly converted (including one 787 and two A350s) and 40 that had been previously parked. The 84 freighters in storage mostly consist of equipment over 30 years old.
The passenger fleet of widebodies has seen some significant movement in the past two years. Some 260 new aircraft entered the fleet — in descending order of relevance A350s, 787s, A330s and the last of the A380s. About the same number of aircraft were retired or scrapped — 747s (averaging 24 years old), 777s (19 years), A330s (20 years), A340s (19 years), 767s (27 years), and even a handful of youthful A380s (13 years old). 43 aircraft re-entered service from storage (mainly 787s and A330s), while nearly 1,350 were newly placed into storage — including 17 airframes that had been delivered new over the period.
The aircraft types put into the deserts reflect the immediate need to remove equipment with high seat capacity and high trip costs. A380s (with an average 500 seats) and 747s (400 seats) account for 19% and 5% of the total seats in storage (see pie charts), twice their respective weighting in the total fleet. But so do the A340s (277 seats), accounting for another 6% of stored seats, burdened also by being unfashionably four-engined.
Many of these will probably not return to service.
Half the fleet of A380s is operated by Emirates, and it suggested last year that it would permanently decommission 40% of its fleet, expecting to be at least 20% smaller when the industry recovers. Air France had already in 2019 taken the decision to get rid of its eight aircraft of the type. Lufthansa is using the excuse of the crisis to accelerate the simplification of its fleet from 13 types to nine: intimating that it will remove all its A380s, 747-400s and A340s — concentrating on the more efficient 747-8i and 777-900. SIA a year ago suggested that seven of its 19 A380s would not return to service.
Qantas, meanwhile has said that its fleet of 12 A380s will probably fly again in its colours “once a recovery in international markets is sufficiently advanced”: the type is particularly suited to its operations to the US West Coast because of curfews and time differences. Likewise British Airways, with severe slot constraints at its home base at Heathrow has a good need for its 12 A380s — and has recently started bringing some back into service — while it has retired its entire 747-400 fleet.
Some of the other operators of the A380 probably regret that they ever acquired the type. Unfortunately, there was no second-hand market even before the pandemic, freighter conversion is fraught with difficulties — HiFly, the only carrier to have acquired a second-hand A380, originally announced in 2020 plans to convert it, then abruptly withdrew the jet from service completely.
Another older type unlikely to re-enter passenger service is the 767 — those that are parked average 24 years in age. As with the 747-400, they happily enjoy their later years as freighters and some airlines, such as LATAM, have already progressed plans to for cargo conversions.
Assuming that passenger long haul does not return to 2019 levels until 2024, the long haul market in that year will be 25% smaller than planned for pre-pandemic. Approximately 740 units are scheduled for delivery from now to the end of 2024. Either the delivery rate is slowed, which is probable, or up to 1,100 units currently in storage will have to be permanently deleted for the market to return to equilibrium.
