United Airlines orders 10 Boeing 777-300ERs

United Airlines has officially announced that it has placed an order with Boeing for 10 new Boeing 777-300ERs to be delivered from 2016 onwards in exchange for options it currently holds on its Boeing 787-900 order book. It ordered the B77W in order to be a capacity bridge aircraft for its aging fleet of 24 B747-400s which are slated to be retired by 2017-18. The original aircraft ordered by UA to replace the B744 was the Airbus A 350-1000 but that wont be available for many years. In addition, UA also revealed the below mentioned changes to its fleet strategy:

• 10 B777-200s currently being used on trans-atlantic services will be re-deployed exclusively on domestic/Hawaii flights along with it being reconfigured to suit the USA market segment
• All B757 flying on trans-atlantic routes into mainland Europe (excluding Ireland/UK) shall be discontinued
• 21 Boeing 767-300ERs will get winglets installed and as a result shall get their lifespan in the UA fleet extended for a few more years