Japan Airlines To Retire Boeing 777 Jets With Pratt & Whitney Engines In Light Of United Accident

Japan Airlines Co Ltd JAPSY said Monday it has retired all of its Boeing Co’s BA 777 jets powered by Pratt & Whitney PW4000 engines, a year earlier than scheduled after suspending operations in February.

What Happened: Two back-to-back engine failure incidents, first in December involving a Japan Airlines jet and then another one involving a United Airlines UAL flight in February, resulted in the global grounding of the 777s powered by the PW4000 series. 

The airline is using the opportunity to accelerate the retirement of all such jets from its fleet and plans to replace them with Airbus SE’s EADSY A350 jets.

Japan Airlines has retired 13 of these jets, seven of which were scheduled to leave its fleet in March this year. The airline now plans to use its current fleet of eight A350s, with orders for 10 more, to handle most of its domestic demand. 

Why It Matters: The Tokyo-based airline said it would use the newer A350s on domestic routes to Osaka’s Itami Airport and use international planes for other domestic routes to help maintain flight frequencies.

See Also: Boeing Seeks Grounding Of 777s Equipped With Pratt-Whitney Engine Model

Raytheon Technologies RTX-owned Pratt & Whitney PW4000 engines are used by a handful of other smaller airlines that include ANA Holding Inc ALNPY, Korean Air Lines Co, Jin Air Co, and Asiana Airlines Inc. 

Price Action: Shares of Boeing closed 2.5% higher at $259.36 on Monday and Raytheon Technologies closed 0.82% higher at $77.91.

Photo by BriYYZ on Flickr