AAL 777 on VHHH tarmac

[744Cap]

There was an AAL 777-200 parked on the tarmac on Tuesday (11 Dec). Saw it taxiing out around 1500. Anyone know why it was there or where it was headed?

[swh]

American signed a contract with HAECO a few months back, they are moving all of their 777 maintenance here.

As a result American will be closing down their 767/777 maintenance base at Fort Worth's Alliance Airport, with the loss of around 1100 jobs. The 767 work that was done there is being relocated to their Tulsa facility.

I would not be surprised to see the 767 work going to HAECO at some stage as well.

[744Cap]

I had seen that article but sort of assumed they would still do the work stateside. Long way to bring an airframe for service. Might explain their finances a bit.

[I'mbatman]

Or, AA's mechanics are paid so much more than the HAECO boys that its worth flying an empty 777 over and back for savings. Not justifying it, just saying.

[BillytheKid]

Delta did the same thing a few years back. I'm sure they are flying it from Shanghai and back versus from Dallas.

[geh065]

There are often 4 or more Delta 767s here for maintenance, along with United 767s, neither of which fly scheduled services here. The United ones are ferried from the US but the Delta ones are often ferried down from Japan. With the quality of Haeco's services on the decline maybe they can offer very good rates!

[swh]

United also run their aircraft via Hawaii and Guam.

[DropKnee]

Haeco has the contract to install winglets on all of DL and UA 767s

[Traffic]

American has a lot of flights into NRT so not a big stretch to get them down to HAECO. Code share with CX could even see them hauling PAX on both sectors.