NZ announce first 789 route

Perth is the winner with Air New Zealand announcing its first route with the Boeing 787-9 will be AKL-PER in October next year.

Chief Executive Officer Christopher Luxon made the announcement at the official opening of the airline’s Customer Innovation and Collaboration Centre in Auckland today. A feature of the centre is the only Boeing 787-9 full cabin interior outside the factory in Seattle.

The cabin mock-up has outlined how Air New Zealand will outfit its interior with 302 seats in a 3 class layout.  18 lie flat Business Premier seats, 21 Premium Economy seats and 263 economy seats.  All seats feature a new entertainment system which is slimmer and has a higher resolution than that on the 773.

'We've taken advantage of new inflight entertainment hardware and that's allowed us to introduce new monitors and also allowed us to slim down the back of the seat considerably from those which have had inflight entertainment. (in the past) That allows much more personal space."

Air New Zealand program director Kerry Reeves with in flight service manager Priyanka Girish
Photo / Dean Purcell /nzherald

Read more on the new 789 cabin and the first flights to PER at Air New Zealand's Flying Social Network HERE or the nzherald HERE