What began as a modest effort to introduce premium economy seats on Emirates aircraft evolved into the world’s largest fully in-house makeover programme for its entire fleet of over 260 aircraft costing $5 billion as globally airlines, faced with delays in supply of aircraft post COVID -19, poured money into refreshing ageing jets to ensure passenger loyalty and satisfaction.
The Hindurecently visited Emirates’ state-of-the-art engineering facility in Dubai to get an exclusive, up-close look at the world’s biggest and most ambitious fleet refurbishment project that includes stripping off old seats, replacing them with either new seats or new upholstery, new carpets, and repanelling side walls refreshed with new colour tones. Going forward, the aircraft will also get a new in-flight entertainment system and Starlink WiFi announced at last week’s Dubai Airshow.
Aboard an Emirates Boeing 777 nearing its full makeover, everything is treated with utmost care – seats are carefully packed in a bubble wrap, wall panels are cushioned with thermocol sheets, and carpets are sealed in protective polythene and yet more rolls of carpeting are stacked neatly to protect them from dust and implements being used by technicians busy fixing cables under cabin panels and restoring lavatories.
The mega face-lift project was first announced four years ago at Dubai Airshow 2021. Initially, 105 aircraft, including both Boeing 777 and Airbus A380, were to undergo installation of a new class comprising 56 premium economy seats. Over time, the retrofit programme expanded to encompass a cabin refresh for 219 aircraft that includes new Business class seats, refreshed First Class and Economy class seats,new carpets and colour palettes for wall panels. Emirates’ signature ghaf tree motif also features prominently throughout the interiors, including hand-stencilledpanels in the First Class Shower spa on the Airbus A380s. The airline’s new Boeing 777-9s on order, meanwhile, are delayed by over five years.
Emirates announced last week that the second phase of this initiative, covering 111 aircraft, is scheduled to commence next August.
Aboard an Emirates Boeing 777 nearing its full makeover, everything is treated with utmost care. Photo credits: Special Arrangement
One of the biggest challenges faced during the project implementation was the lack of hangar space, which meant aircraft undergoing refurbishment had to be parked outdoors at Dubai International Airport under searing heat of up to 60 degrees Celsius. Senior Manager, Base Operational Maintenance and Recovery, Emirates, Chris Welham, explained that to protect both the aircraft machinery and engineers, the airline sourced specialised cooling units from companies worldwide, which circulate air inside cabins to the lowest temperatures allowed by Airbus and Boeing.
As everything was being done in house and for the first time, another challenge was removing entire rows of seats and taking them out of the aircraft.
“I’ve got no docking, no hangar. I have to get all 76 business class seats off in a day.That’s the target I have in order to make the rest of the plan work,” Mr. Welham recounted. To respond to this, catering trucks were rented from ground handling company Dnata and modified. Because the Boeing 777’s exit doors are five feet high—lower than the eight feet of Airbus A380—hydraulic scissor platforms used for seat removal had to be specially adapted for safe and efficient operations.
The engineering team of 350 members working on the projects were assembled from scratch so everything being tried out was new to everybody. “No one had ever tried to do this before, so we kind of all learned together.”
Trials began on an A380 in July 2022, where experienced engineers took each cabin apart piece by piece and logged every step. From removing seats and panelling to bolts and screws, every action was tested, timed and mapped out to prepare the most efficient template for removing and reinstalling in the safest manner possible.
“We made up hundreds of templates, so that we could work out the best way to put these things back together again. Over a period of 60 days,we actually did the cabin modification on it about seven times,” says the Senior Manager. The trial aircraft was dismantled several times, and has now been scrapped. Few airlines in the world can afford to use an aircraft for such a trial and error exercise.
As a result, the engineering team has progressively reduced the refurbishment time, now completing a full facelift in just 21 days for Airbus A380s and 18 days for Boeing 777s. Each project even has its own codename: Falcon for the 777s and Phoenix for the A380s. It was conceived in house instead of a facility outside for a faster turn around time.
Asked when the project will conclude, Mr. Welsh says, “It’s never going to end. The rest of my career will be spent doing these cabin retrofits,” as even the first batch of planes may later receive newer seats and further upgrades.
Published – November 25, 2025 04:47 pm IST
