Northwest Planes, Crews Coming To Delta Routes

Delta Airlines is diving right into the task of reorganizing its fleet deployment following its acquisition of Northwest Airlines. In a break from the now-common strategy of focusing on as few aircraft models as possible to save on training and maintenance costs, Delta will instead embrace fleet diversity to optimize aircraft for routes served.

The Wall Street Journal reported on an internal memo outlining 14 changes the airline will make to improve efficiency. One example is its service between New York and Venice, which has been run using a Boeing 767-300. Delta says that starting next summer, it will switch to using a larger Airbus A330 which came in as part of Northwest's fleet. 

Glen Hauenstein, Delta's executive VP of network planning, said recently that fleet simplification, exemplified by Southwest Airlines' exclusive use of Boeing 737s isn't necessarily the way to go.

"We will trade off fleet complexity with an ability to better match the market," he said.

For the time being, the combined airline will have to keep crews from Northwest operating planes from the Northwest fleet, pending receipt of a joint operating certificate from the FAA. Delta expects that to happen by the end of 2009.

Regarding rumors Delta will make significant changes to aircraft orders already placed with Boeing by both airlines before the merger, a company spokeswoman would only say that a combined fleet will have different future needs than those of two separate airlines.

FMI: www.delta.com