Delta Air Lines (DL, Atlanta Hartsfield Jackson) has admitted during the annual investor call that the induction of a total of seven aircraft, including A220-100s and A330-900s, will be delayed by the ongoing United States government shutdown.
"With non-essential work at the FAA [Federal Aviation Administration] shutdown, our Airbus A220 start date is likely to be pushed back due to delays in the certification process. This is also hampering our ability to put seven other new aircraft deliveries into service," CEO Ed Bastian said.
The airline did not go into detail regarding how many aircraft of each of the types are affected.
"There is some potential impact on some other fleets, namely, the A330-900neos and it gets back into certification issues that we certify seats and crew rest and things of that nature, Wi-Fi systems that with the government shutdown become problematic for us. So there's not an immediate impact, but it certainly could have an impact, downstream, on us," COO Gil West added.
The carrier specified that the possible delay of the introduction of the A220s will not have any impact on the network, as all flights will continue to operate with older types of aircraft which are due to be replaced with the new units.
"We are not going to be canceling routes or flights. We will just delay the introduction of that specific aircraft type," Bastian said. Delta added that the financial impact of the delay will likely be negligible.
According to the ch-aviation schedules module, Delta plans to debut the A220-100 on services from New York La Guardia to Boston and Dallas/Fort Worth on January 31. The airline has not yet scheduled the debut of the A330-900s, of which it has thirty-five on order.