Today is a momentous day for Delta and probably a bit nerve-wracking for American.  The first-ever Delta revenue flights on the brand new Airbus A220 jets departed early this morning from Dallas to New York.  Shortly afterward, other A220 flights at LaGuardia took off for Boston and Dallas.  Delta has packed this quirky new jet (formerly known as the Bombardier CS100) with premium amenities and are going after American and United in some of their strongest hubs.

Delta’s New A220

The Airbus A220 is a small mainline jet, roughly the size of an ERJ E190 regional jet but operated by mainline operators (instead of regional operators like Mesa or Republic Airlines).  Delta went with a premium-heavy seating configuration: 12 seats in First Class, 15 Comfort+ seats, and 82 regular main cabin seats.

I should point out, however, that these “regular main cabin seats” are 18.6″ wide, making them Delta’s widest main cabin domestic seat.  That’s great news for people like me who may need to drop a few pounds!

A220 Main Cabin. Image courtesy of Delta.

Main Cabin lavatory (with window!). Image courtesy of Delta

Overhead luggage bins are massive, definitely an upgrade from legacy aircraft.  In addition to the wide coach seats (in a nostalgic 2-3 layout across the cabin, reminiscent of the soon-to-be-retired MD80), every seat will have in-flight entertainment screens.  This is a huge right hook to American, who has bet everything on in-flight entertainment on your own device instead of seatback screens.

A220 First Class seat. Image courtesy of Delta

The First Class seat has been redesigned and looks phenomenal.  The seatback IFE screens in First are the largest in Delta’s domestic fleet!

First Revenue Landing at DFW

(All the below images are by Andy’s Travel Blog, please contact me if you’d like to use them)

I was on the ramp at DFW Airport today to welcome the first ever revenue landing of the Airbus 220, flight 2952 from LaGuardia.  It was cold and windy and the weather guys completely missed on their forecast of clearing skies.  The A220 came in de-crabbing due to the crosswinds.

Finally the lovely new Airbus flared out and came to a nice soft landing on 35R at DFW Airport and began a short taxi to Terminal E.

We jumped in the truck and made our way over to the gate, just beating the A220.

From up close, the A220 is sleek and looks fast.  It basically has the same nose as the A350 (just smaller) and just looks fantastic.  Once she parked at the gate I was able to walk around most of the aircraft while trying not to interfere with any ground operations as the jet prepared to go right back into the skies.

(Note that the underside of the nose has the original name of the A220, the CS100)

From almost every angle, this jet is a looker!

I’ll wrap up with one of my favorite pictures of the day, the beautiful new Pratt & Whitney GTF engine.  It’s incredibly efficient but also just looks fantastic.  Hope you enjoyed this fresh look at the A220, and I hope to share my first flight thoughts with you soon!