Boeing 787 Orders Have Been Changed

Boeing 787 orders have been quietly shifted as Thai Airways looks to reshape the backlog of its widebody aircraft for the future.

The changes see the Boeing 787-10, the high-capacity model, come into view as part of the business’s plan, as confirmed in the planemaker’s latest May orderbook: Thai Airways made the shift.

A desire for more capacity isn’t uncommon among airlines, and the shift in its backlog and the variants now selected indicate that, more than ever, it is.

Thai Airways Shifts To The Boeing 787-10

As part of the change, Thai Airways has converted nine previously ordered 787-9s to 787-10s. The change is a significant commitment to growing capacity across widebody flying for the future.

That change comes following the blockbuster Dreamliner deal, which saw the airline cover 45 of the aircraft. Additionally, there were many options to accommodate fleet growth if demand continued to trend upward.

The Boeing 787-10 is now taking shape, with at least nine of the frames being traded up for the larger plane. While the airline will lose some range, the benefit will be additional capacity, which it’s actively pursuing.

For Thai Airways, that trade-off makes sense and comes amid a need for more seats. Recovery at the business hasn’t been built strictly around offering ultra-long-haul flights, but rather on expanding its regional and medium-haul flights as demand jumps considerably.

That regional flying is also benefited with the likes of Australia and Europe, the more high-density markets on the network, that extra seats can also benefit without still needing the range of an aircraft like the 787-9 already present.

A Fleet That Is Still Catching Up

Thai Airways’ push for more capacity, now partially achieved through a change to its 787 orderbook and a commitment to the 787-10, is calculated and comes amid necessity following changes over the last decade.

The Thailand-based carrier has been living with gaps in its widebody fleet since the pandemic. When the airline entered a period of heavy restructuring, it needed to cut costs to survive. The easiest changes were those to the fleet.

With a strong widebody fleet and an equally large number of quad-engined superjumbos, these were types that, while important for capacity across long-haul networks, were the most logical to cut to slim down the fleet and make it more efficient.

Aircraft families like the Airbus A380, then the Boeing 747-400s with the A340s were all axed in favour of a smaller widebody composition centred on the A350, 777 and 787 models. While more efficient and twin-engined, these types came with significantly less capacity.

While that lower capacity was ok for the airline during its restructuring at the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic, as it emerged from those dark days, the business saw a gap in its operations and a backlog insufficient to meet the increasing demand, with no way to address it.

The new Dreamliner order was placed years ago, and now the up-gauge to the 787-10 is one part of that answer, but isn’t the final solution as the flag-carrier works to shape what’s next and its new flagship.

A Bigger Flagship Is Coming

The Boeing 787-10 will not, on its own, be the solution to capacity needs, nor become the flagship. Thai Airways is actively pursuing the next generation of high-capacity models, with the Airbus A350-1000 and Boeing 777-9 under consideration for an order likely comprising 10 aircraft.

Recent reporting shows the airline looking to find a new-generation flagship in the 400-seat category that would represent a step above its A350-900 and 777 commitments today and ensure that some of its high-profile routes would have the scope to see seat increases over time.

That order is still some time away, as Thai Airways is insistent on making a calculated, smart decision given its recent restructuring. Additionally, the business wants to see the 777X certified first, which will give it confidence in the product and in the real-world data supporting its final decision.