Dallas: Southwest Airlines Co. quietly took delivery of its first Boeing Co. 737 Max jetliner, cancelling an employee celebration in Dallas to mark the milestone because of the devastation in Houston caused by Hurricane Harvey.
The jet’s Tuesday arrival at Southwest marks the first at a North American carrier for the Max, which has shattered sales records at Boeing. Record rainfall and flooding has shut down Houston, one of Southwest’s original markets from the early 1970s.
“Respecting that many of our folks can’t get out of Houston or are impacted, it just didn’t seem right to do that,” Dan Lansdon, a spokesman for the carrier, said of the ceremony that had been scheduled yesterday. The Southwest jet, with tail number N8710M, landed 16 minutes early at Dallas Love Field, according to Flightaware.com. That’s fitting for the Max, which glided through development months ahead of schedule, entering the commercial market in May with Malindo Airways, the Malaysian affiliate of Lion Mentari Airlines PT.
Southwest still claims the title of launch customer for the Max 8 after placing the initial order in 2011, a role it has served for three earlier 737 models as the largest buyer of the single-aisle plane.
The Dallas-based carrier has 200 of the upgraded Max planes on order with Boeing and plans to take delivery of the first 14 this year. The airline’s pilots union tweeted a photo of the aircraft landing on Tuesday.
