Calling it an ‘early Christmas present’ to itself, UPS has taken delivery of a 767-300F from Boeing. The aircraft flew from Boeing’s Everett assembly facilities to UPS’ San Antonio hub on December 23rd. The last 767-300F to be delivered to UPS from Boeing took place at the end of October.
UPS’ newest aircraft
The delivery of the new aircraft was announced by UPS on Twitter, calling it an early Christmas present. The 767-300F is registered as N374UP and is the 77th active 767 in the UPS fleet.
According to BOE Family Flights, the twinjet had performed two taxi checks and rejected take-offs on December 14th and 16th in advance of three test flights. These test flights took place on December 16th, 20th, and 22nd.
As for the delivery flight, this took place on December 23rd, flying from Everett, Washington, to San Antonio, Texas. Flight 5X9500 took off at 11:00 and landed at 16:23 local time with a total flight time of three hours and 23 minutes.
Four more 767 freighters for UPS
According to Boeing’s website, UPS now has just four 767-300F aircraft yet to be delivered. This is actually just eight percent of undelivered 767s, with the majority (81%) going to rival shipping company FedEx. The remainder have been ordered by unidentified customers.
In recent months, the delivery of 767s to UPS has been fairly steady. Prior to this latest delivery, the most recent 767 freighter was delivered on October 29th, and the 767 freighter before that was delivered on October 13th. These are registered as N373UP and N372UP, respectively. Unsurprisingly, the next 767 heading to UPS will be registered as N375UP.
We got an early Christmas present. Say hello to our newest addition, N374UP. 📷: @Boeing pic.twitter.com/r6kzMyptht
— UPS Airlines (@UPSAirlines) December 23, 2020
Modernizing the UPS fleet
These new aircraft deliveries are keeping the UPS average fleet age low, and more respectable as much of its existing fleet are getting high in their years. The company’s fleet of 277 aircraft has an average age of 19.9 years. In fact, the airline’s oldest 767-300Fs are 25 and a half years old. 30 767s are over 20 years old.
The 767s, however, are not the oldest aircraft in the UPS fleet. That honor goes to the carrier’s 75 Boeing 757s, which have an average age of 27.4 years old. The five oldest 757s are over 33 years old.
Impressively, UPS is still operating two out-of-production aircraft – the Airbus A300 and the McDonnell Douglas MD-11. Of these, the company has 52 and 40, respectively. Strangely, some of UPS’ newest aircraft will also soon be considered ‘out-of-production,’ as it takes delivery of some of the last Boeing 747s to ever be built.
In July of this year, Boeing pulled the plug on the 747 program, leaving UPS and Volga-Dnepr as the final customers. At the time of writing, UPS has just nine undelivered jumbo jets, while Volga-Dnepr has yet to take three.
When do you think UPS will retire its older jets? Let us know your thoughts in the comments.
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