Japan Airlines (JAL) finally took delivery of its first A350-1000 on December 13th. The aircraft, part of an order for 13 jets, was received at the delivery center in Toulouse, France.
Over the next 40 days, JAL will put the new widebody into training in order to debut the first route, on January 24, between Tokyo (Haneda) and New York (JFK).
The delivery to JAL is hugely delayed as the carrier planned to put the widebody into service in November and then postponed the start of commercial flights until December.
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The A350-1000 was chosen as the new main aircraft in the Japan Airlines fleet, where it will replace the Boeing 777-300ER on long-haul flights.
To mark its debut, JAL configured its cabin with four classes, including First Class with six suites, Business Class, with 54 seats including suites and private doors, 24 seats in Premium Economy Class and 155 in Economy Class.
There will be a total of 239 seats, or five fewer than the 777-300ER.
JAL has 31 firm orders for the A350, which debuted with the carrier in 2019. In addition to 13 A350-1000s, there are 18 orders for the A350-900, of which 16 are in service.
According to Airbus, the A350 family had already received 1,072 firm orders from 57 customers around the world. Of these, 821 are from the A350-900 (77%), 212 from the A350-1000 and 39 from the A350F freighter.
