Will American Airlines Get Its 787s in Time for International Travel?

While the major airlines who offer trans-Atlantic flights are salivating over the return of international travel to the United States on November 8, American Airlines is in a holding pattern.

The reason?

The big guns have yet to arrive.

Boeing Inc. has not delivered a series of its 787 airplanes to American, according to a report in Forbes.

“Continued delivery delays with Boeing 787 aircraft provide unique challenges in planning international flying months in advance,” American said in a prepared statement provided to Forbes. “We’re working closely with our partners at Boeing to plan for outstanding deliveries in the coming months and how they’ll best fit into our schedule.”

But Boeing said the holdup is on the Federal Aviation Administration’s end. In a statement to Forbes, the FAA has concerns with the newly minted 787s.

The FAA “continues to engage with Boeing as the company works to demonstrate the reliability of its proposed method for inspecting certain undelivered 787 airplanes.”

Meanwhile, as Forbes noted, American’s competitors are already adjusting. United is adding five extra flights to London by early 2022, making it 22 daily flights to the U.K., while Delta has also made schedule additions internationally. Delta will add 15 daily international departures to 13 different cities in December just from New York’s John F. Kennedy International Airport alone.

An American Airlines spokesman said the carrier will wait until it knows when its 787s will be delivered before announcing a 2022 schedule.

“Year-to-date we’ve added 29 new international flights to our schedule,” the spokesman said. “Our network planning team is hard at work building a summer schedule that will connect customers with the destinations most important to them. We expect to have more to share about our summer international flying schedule before the end of the year.”