Lufthansa has officially said goodbye to its Boeing 737 fleet after 48 years.  A B737-300, with registration D-ABEC (“Karlsruhe”), flew from Frankfurt to Hamburg on 31st October on special flight LH9922, for a joint event with Lufthansa Technik.

Over the decades, Lufthansa has had a total of 148 B737 of almost all generations. At the beginning of the 1960s, the then Chief Executive Officer of Lufthansa Technik, Professor Gerhard Höltje, pushed the project forward and supported the joint development of a short and medium-haul jet with Boeing. The cabin design and the positioning of the engines under the aircraft’s wings were based on the long-haul aircraft of the time.

With the start of the winter schedule, all six remaining B737-300 aircraft flew their last commercial flights on 29th October. The planes will be transferred to Florida in the coming weeks, where they will be resold. In future, Lufthansa will offer continental services with a single type of aircraft, the A320 family, which will result in synergies in various areas, such as pilot licensing, cabin crew and planning and provision of spare parts. Lufthansa currently operates around 150 A319, A320 and A321s, including four A320neos.

On 19 February 1965, Lufthansa was the world's first purchaser of 22 Boeing 737-100s. Almost three years later, on 4 February 1968, Lufthansa landed the first B737 in Hamburg. In May 1988, the first co-pilots were trained to fly the B737, which was also the first aircraft to witness to the reunification of the two Germanys as it was the first aircraft to land in the former GDR at Leipzig Airport.