Southwest Airlines recently took delivery of its 200th 737 MAX 8 aircraft. In the last quarter, Southwest Airlines witnessed a promising delivery rate with 25 new aircraft deliveries.
The brand-new aircraft was delivered to the airline on August 18 to from Boeing facility in Washington to the airline's Phoenix Base. The airline exclusively operates the Boeing 737 fleet, with over 800 aircraft across all variants.
Southwest Airlines received its 175th 737 MAX 8 on May 11. Since then, in just over three months, the airline has reached yet another milestone with its 200th aircraft. The airline received 25 new aircraft in the last 14 weeks.
Southwest Airlines has a healthy order book of MAX aircraft, with a total order of 462 examples. That includes 270 of the MAX 8s, and the remainder 192 are the MAX 7s. While no MAX 7 has been delivered yet, the airline is still awaiting the remaining 70 of the MAX 8s.
So far, the airline has taken delivery of 812 aircraft, of which 783 are in operation. The airline operates 412 737-700s and 207 737-800s with an average fleet age of 11.7 years.
The airline is steady with its fleet modernization plan and continues to phase out the older 737-700s and place them in storage.
Southwest Airlines exercised options for the delivery of 30 Boeing 737 MAX 7 planes next year, and converted 24 existing MAX 7 orders to MAX 8, as per a recent SEC filing. The move came on the backdrop of Boeing announcing that the first delivery of the 737 MAX 7 was delayed to 2024 as it tries to secure Federal Aviation Administration certification.