Deliveries from Boeing’s 737 MAX stored inventory slowed in the last two months, providing early evidence that supports Boeing’s latest projections of deliveries from the parked backlog lasting into 2023, an Aviation Week Fleet Discovery analysis shows.
Boeing handed over a total of 44 737 MAXs in September and October, but only 19 came from the backlog of aircraft built from mid-March 2019 to December 2020, when the model was grounded, and deliveries halted. Boeing delivered 13 from the stored inventory in September, but just six in October, Fleet Discovery data shows.
The backlog of stored 737 MAXs reached about 460 before deliveries re-started in early December 2020. Once regulators began approving the 737 MAX to return, clearing the way for deliveries, the company set an informal target of clearing out the entire backlog by the end of 2022. The target required a delivery pace of about 19 per month from the inventory.
Boeing was close to this pace as recently as August, but a combination of factors is causing changes to customer delivery plans. Regulators’ cascading approvals mean affected airlines were unsure when the aircraft could be flown, creating fleet planning uncertainty. Airlines in a few countries, notably China, still cannot operate 737 MAXs, meaning any airframes in the Boeing backlog won’t be delivered until they can.
Another issue is already-built aircraft changing hands, or at least end-users. Several lessors have shuffled their 737 MAX delivery time lines as operators step back and others step in. The changes have affected some already-built aircraft, adding work to the pre-delivery process.
“The bigger source of variability with respect to completions and deliveries is on the inventoried airplanes that we are bringing into service as opposed to ones coming fresh off the production line,” Boeing CEO Dave Calhoun said on the company’s third-quarter earnings call in October. “We don’t get to unilaterally decide who gets them and how fast they get them. They have to incorporate [undelivered 737 MAXs] into their fleet plans, and there has been some repositioning of airplanes that require work.”
Boeing will not say how many already-built aircraft need reconfiguring, but Calhoun acknowledged that the issue is one reason the unwinding of stored aircraft will stretch beyond 2022.
“I wouldn’t consider it significant relative to the number of airplanes that we’re going to move,” Calhoun said. “Most of them are going to move under previously determined plans ... But that is why there is some drift into 2023 with respect to deliveries.”
Boeing has delivered 185 737 MAXs through the first 10 months of 2021. The program’s production rate is now at about 19 per month but spent most of the year below that figure. It has handed over 212 737 MAXs since deliveries restarted nearly a year ago.
Meanwhile, utilization continues to increase as demand recovers, particularly in narrowbody-friendly markets. Aviation Week’s Tracked Aircraft Utilization (TAU) data show that 422 737 MAXs flew at least one cycle in October, with the average airframe racking up 248 flight hours and 95 cycles. The figures compare favorably with February 2019—the last full month of 737 MAX fleet operations before the grounding. Back then, 317 aircraft flew at least one cycle, averaging 287 flight hours and 98 flight cycles. The current fleet’s comparable average cycles but lower average hours likely reflect international COVID-19-related travel restrictions that are leading operators to deploy their most efficient aircraft first, even if it means bumping older-generation models from shorter routes.
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