American Airlines Admits It Has Too Many Broken Seats And Too Much Duct Tape—Airdrops 60+ Technicians Into 6 Airports

American Airlines seems to have more issues with broken seats than other airlines. United and Delta cabins are sometimes in disrepair, but American planes fly with seats taken out of service more than other carriers. I’ve seen this happen on the first flight of the day, and I’ve seen flights operate for days and weeks without having this addressed. Aviation watchdog JonNYC flags a new program at American Airlines to fix this. AA“AA will launch OneCabin on Sept. 14, a new internal program aimed at improving cabin cleanliness, appearance and functionality across its fleet. The airline is adding 60+ maintenance techs and deploying dedicated teams across CLT, DFW, LAX, MIA, PHL and PHX to speed repairs… — JonNYC (@xJonNYC) August 29, 2026 I explained that this was coming back in April. Chief Customer Officer Heather Garboden shared this with employees after the first quarter earnings call. I see this myself when I fly, is that we have too many broken seats. We have too many IFE systems that do not work. We have duct tape where we should not have duct tape. I am excited that we have created a team within Tech Ops whose sole focus will be making sure our aircraft interiors look the way they should for our customers. We are just starting to build that up, and by the end of the summer I expect we will see significant improvements in our aircraft interiors. I’ve been on this soapbox for years. And I’m thrilled to hear that American Airlines finally gets it and plans to do something about it. It’s delayed – it was supposed to have made real progress by end of summer, and won’t start until fall – but it’s finally happening. When I’ve asked the airline about it in the past I’ve been challenged: should we delay everyone on the flight to fix this? And my answer is that they should be doing proactive cabin maintenance. They should be doing overnight line maintenance. That the condition of the cabin matters: When passengers are sitting in duct taped seats, with broken armrests or out of service tray tables, they are not getting the product that they paid for. When seats are taken out of service that’s fewer passengers that can fly, it’s fewer upgrades that can clear, and that breeds resentment from loyal flyers whose upgrades don’t clear. And looking at that in the cabin simply is not premium. It devalues the whole experience. American Airlines has come around to understanding that they have a revenue problem more than a cost problem. They’re a high cost airline, as I’ve written for about 15 years. The only way they can make money is by generating a revenue premium. Underinvesting in cabin maintenance cuts against that. Fixing cabin issues will help. Topics on this page