Narrowing The Gap

Widebody-style premium product is increasingly finding its way onto narrowbodies – will Australasia’s airlines follow suit?

With the retirement of Virgin Australia’s first two Airbus A330-200 aircraft, VH-XFA and -XFB, from Australian service, VA has returned to using narrowbodied Boeing 737-800 aircraft on some transcontinental flights from Brisbane to Perth. The secondhand VH-XFA and -XFB won’t be long mourned by passengers used to the newbuild A330s from -XFC onwards, which have on-demand inflight entertainment, angled lie-flat Weber 7811 seats in business (soon to be B/E Super Diamond reverse herringbone fully flat beds with direct aisle access), and more spacious seats in economy.

But they were a big step ahead of Virgin Australia’s Boeing 737s.