Air Tahiti Nui

1 · POSITION

Air Tahiti Nui’s Poerava Business is a thirty-seat cabin on the Boeing 787-9. The airline fits Collins Aerospace Parallel Diamond seats in a 2-2-2 configuration across five rows, each 152 cm apart, and each seat converts into a bed 198 cm long. A partition between seats supplies privacy. The airline names the cabin for the black pearl and describes it as decorated in the colours of the ocean and white sand. [1]

2 · THE ROOM WAS DRAWN BEFORE THE SEAT WAS CHOSEN

The interior is the work of the design firm Teague, engaged around the fleet renewal that followed a 2015 purchase order and lease option for four 787-9s to replace the airline’s A340s. Teague’s account makes the tiare mā’ohi, the national flower of the Islands of Tahiti, the anchor of the cabin. Custom finishes and fabrics in turquoise and aqua are set against a bright white interior with blue lighting overhead; the business cabin uses rich blue fabrics with touches of sand-toned leather. [3]

3 · THE WELCOME IS TREATED AS PART OF THE PRODUCT

The airline says each of its people is an ambassador for the islands, and describes a greeting of a smile, ukulele music and a tiare flower, giving Maeva as the Tahitian word for welcome. Its 787-9 carries 294 seats in three classes. In the business cabin the amenity kit holds a trio of moisturising products from the local brand Heiva, and the wine list was curated with Olivier Poussier, named World’s Best Sommelier in 2000. [2, 1]

4 · THE LONGEST SECTOR IS FLOWN IN TWO PARTS

Papeete is joined to Paris through Los Angeles rather than directly. The airline puts Los Angeles to Papeete at about seven hours thirty minutes, and says the Paris leg adds a further ten hours thirty minutes from Los Angeles. Counting the stopover, it gives the whole journey as about twenty to twenty-two hours. The business cabin is therefore occupied across two sectors and a ground stop rather than one continuous flight. [4]

5 · ⚑ CANDOUR

⚑ No page fetched here gives the airline a founding year, so the register’s 1996 is not confirmed by these sources. The seat count, the 152 cm spacing and the 198 cm bed are the airline’s own figures for the 787-9 and must not be read across other aircraft. The account of the interior is the design firm’s own; the airline’s pages name a seat supplier but no cabin designer. The journey times are the airline’s approximations and include stopover time. [1–4]