American Airlines to switch Chicago to London to 787 operation

The spread of the Boeing 787 continues with American Airlines making a major change to its timetable, and converting its Chicago O’Hare to London Heathrow route to Boeing 787 operation only.

American Airlines Boeing 787 on approach to Chicago O’Hare – Image, Economy Class and Beyond

The route which operates with a mixture of equipment – in the past it has used Boeing 767s, Boeing 777-200s and Boeing 777-300ERs, is being swapped to 787 operation only.

The airline will be using the smaller Boeing 787-8 on this route

The service will be initially three times a day from 5th March 2017, with the service going four times a day from 4th April 2017.

The operation will be revised as follows:

AA090 DEPART ORD 09:00 ARRIVE LHR 22:45
AA086 DEPART ORD 17:05 ARRIVE LHR 06:50+1
AA046 DEPART ORD 19:20 ARRIVE LHR 09:05+1
AA098 DEPART ORD 22:20 ARRIVE LHR 12:05+1

AA099 DEPART LHR 07:45 ARRIVE ORD 10:20
AA047 DEPART LHR 08:40 ARRIVE ORD 11:15
AA087 DEPART LHR 12:15 ARRIVE ORD 15:15
AA091 DEPART LHR 17:15 ARRIVE ORD 20:00


Commences: 5th March 2017
Booked Equipment Boeing 787-8
Data: Airlineroute

American Airlines configure their 787-8s in a two and a half class configuration:

• 28 Business Class seats in a 1-2-1 formation with 60″ of seat pitch
• 55 Main Cabin Extra in a 3-3-3 formation with 36″ seat pitch and 17″ seat width
• 143 Main Cabin seats in a 3-3-3 formation with a 31″ seat pitch and 17″ seat width.

Interestingly, whilst there are more amenities (uniform fleet, updated IFE system, power and WiFi on plane, for Main Cabin/Main Cabin Extra passengers), you’ll notice the squeeze at seat width is the typical tight seat that airlines love to stick in to cram more people aboard their Boeing 787 Dreamliners.

American Airlines operates the route jointly with British Airways. It compete with United Airlines and Virgin Atlantic on this route pair.

It’s an interesting move by American Airlines to dedicate a single fleet between Chicago and London. It will bring uniformity on the route, and passengers should be aware what they’ll get.

How long this will last is another matter. Capacity varies on this route currently mainly due to the mix of 767s and 777s. How this pans out in the longer term will be the big question…

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