AA Aircraft Updates, New Routes to the Caribbean and Latin America, and Other Airlines News This Week

The past week has seen a fair share of interesting updates in the airline world. Today, we’ll take a look at the significant changes that are coming to American Airlines’ narrow-body fleet, some exciting new routes to the Caribbean and Latin America that are on the horizon, and more.

Pour yourself a cup of your favorite hot drink and settle in for this week’s roundup.

American Airlines Upgrading Transcon Experience

Flying across the country with American Airlines will be a whole different experience once the Oneworld airline receives the first of its 50 brand-new Airbus A321XLRs.

These state-of-the-art jets will feature 20 of American’s recently unveiled Flagship Suites. Configured in a 1-1 layout and each with a lie-flat bed, a privacy door, and direct aisle access, the Airbus A321XLR will be one of American’s most premium aircraft to fly.

Additionally, these Airbus A321XLRs will be the first of American’s narrow-body aircraft to feature a premium economy cabin.

Initial routes are expected to be on transcontinental routes from Los Angeles (LAX) and San Francisco (SFO) to Boston (BOS) and New York (JFK). As American receives more of the aircraft type, we expect it to operate longer, transatlantic routes on more niche routes with less demand.

We can expect to see the first of these jets flying by the end of 2025.

Air Canada Increases Connectivity to Latin America

Central and South America are great places to escape the cold U.S. and Canadian winters, especially for those living in and around Montréal or Toronto.

Thanks to Canadian flag carrier Air Canada, there’ll be new ways to head to both of those regions this winter with the addition of 5 new and resumed routes.

The resumption of Toronto (YYZ) to Lima (LIM) is slated for Friday, December 5, followed by Montreal (YUL) to Lima on Saturday, December 6. Both routes to Lima will operate twice weekly.

Air Canada’s route map will also add 3 more off-the-beaten-track destinations in Central America. Once-weekly services from Montréal to Belize (BZE), Toronto to Puerto Escondido (PXM) in Mexico, and Vancouver (YVR) to Tepic, Riviera Nayarit (TPQ), also in Mexico, will take off for the first time on December 8, 17, and 17, respectively.

Air Canada will be the first and only airline to connect Canada with nonstop service to Puerto Escondido and Riviera Nayarit.

American Airlines Retrofitting Airbus A319 and A320s

This week saw more aircraft updates from American Airlines. In the spotlight are the airline’s Airbus A319 and Airbus A320 jets, which will be retrofitted with more first-class seats and have seatback screens removed.

According to JonNYC on BlueSky, the first of the jets to go under the knife will be the airline’s 32 legacy Airbus A319s. The main positive of the retrofit is that American will add a third row of first class — and with it a slightly better chance of scoring an upgrade. The downside is that the final remaining seatback screens in American’s narrowbody domestic fleet will be removed.

Next to be retrofitted will be the rest of American’s Airbus A319 and A320 aircraft that were acquired during the merger with U.S. Airways. An extra row of first class will be installed on both aircraft types.

It appears that the number of seats in economy won’t be reduced to fit in the extra premium rows. Rather, American will move or remove some lavatories.

Rapidly Expanding Caribbean Low-Cost Carrier Eyes 7 More U.S. Cities

Arajet is a start-up, low-cost airline based in the Dominican Republic. Since it started operations in 2022, the airline has slowly built out its route network and introduced flights to the U.S. for the first time early this year. You can currently fly Arajet nonstop to the Dominican from Miami (MIA), Newark (EWR), and San Juan (SJU) in Puerto Rico.

The airline is already hoping to significantly expand its U.S. presence after applying to operate additional routes to the following 7 U.S. cities: Atlanta (ATL), Denver (DEN), Houston (IAH), Los Angeles (LAX), Philadelphia (PHL), Providence (PVD), and San Francisco (SFO).

Counting its routes to Boston (BOS), Chicago (ORD), and Orlando Sanford (SFB) that are also scheduled to start later in the year, the 7 new airports would bring Arajet’s total number of U.S. destinations to 13, as first reported by The Bulkhead Seat.

More Lounge Improvements Coming to Miami

Given Miami International’s status as an important international hub airport, the variety and quality of lounges is surprisingly lackluster.

The situation should improve somewhat should the application be granted for a new lounge space of almost 14,000 square feet in Concourse E.

American Airlines also recently announced an overhaul of its lounges in the D concourse, which should take place in the coming years. In the near future, passengers flying Oneworld premium cabins or with eligible Oneworld elite status will soon be able to enjoy a brand-new British Airways Lounge, which is set to open its doors before the end of 2025.

Until then, if you’re flying out of Miami’s Concourse D or E, I highly recommend a visit to the American Express Centurion Lounge. The excellent runway views and reliably good food make this one of my favorite Centurion lounges in the network.

Air France-KLM and Qantas Deepen Relationship

Air France–KLM and Qantas have announced new codeshare flights and reciprocal benefits for elite status holders.

Partnerships between airlines are often mutually beneficial for passengers — as well as the airline’s bottom line. It makes most sense when the airlines belong to the same airline alliance or don’t belong to an alliance at all.

As Air France-KLM is part of SkyTeam and Qantas is a Oneworld member, this partnership is niche. The first codeshare will be on Qantas’ nonstop service between Paris (CDG) and Perth (PER), which will now also feature an Air France flight number.

An example of when this would work in your favor is if you flew Air France from New York (JFK) to Paris then connected onto Qantas’ nonstop flight to Perth.

The enhanced partnership also opens up the possibility for Air France-KLM Flying Blue elite members to redeem miles on Qantas first-class flights for the first time. Flying Blue Ultimate status holders will also have access to Qantas’ stunning first-class lounges.

We expect more details to be released soon regarding the reciprocal earning of miles and status-earning points.

Final Thoughts

Another week, another bunch of updates in the ever-dynamic world of airlines and aviation.

Thanks to new aircraft, new routes, and a swath of lounge updates at MIA, there’s a lot to look forward to. We’ll be back this time next week with more.