Southwest Airlines Special Liveries (and where they are right now!)

Today, I offer a quick distraction from the normal food pictures that I post here…

One of the really cool things of Southwest Airlines are how we do our unique plane liveries (i.e. – paint jobs on our aircraft!)  As I’ve worked at Southwest, I’ve travelled to airports, and I always get excited when I see one of our special liveries on the ground!  I’ve always made a point to take a picture of special livery aircraft the first time I see it somewhere.

Today, Southwest released the “Tennessee One” (which at one point was the same plane that was the SI one!).  You can watch the official video from Southwest here.:

Tennessee One

As I looked for these planes while I was waiting for flights, I wondered–how could I predict where the planes were?  Or if I was landing in one of our larger airports (Midway, McCarran, Skyharbor, Orlando, etc), what planes would I see?  Were there any heading my way while waiting for a flight?

Well, one weekend, I solved that problem.  Each of these planes have a story (mostly related to our history, to marketing, or to the locations we fly), and here’s a list of all of the ones that I know of that either ARE or WERE painted with special livery.  You can see where they are today!  (If no history shows up, that bird may no longer be in the air for us…)

(Special thanks to FlightRadar24.com for making this possible!)

Name Registration
2,000th 737NG & 5,000th 737 produced 2,000th (N248WN), 5,000th (N230WN)
35th Anniversary N238WN
500th 737 N281WN
Arizona One N383SW
“Beats One” N909WN
California One N609SW
Charles E. Taylor One N289CT
Colleen Barrett Classic/Heroine of The Heart N714CB, N266WN
Colorado One N230WN
Florida One N945WN
The Fred J. Jones N201LV
Green Plane N222WN
Heart One & Two N8642E & N8645A
The Herbert D. Kelleher One N711HK
Illinois One N918WN
Jack Vidal One N601WN
The June M. Morris N607SW, Original, Canyon Blue
Lone Star One N352SW
Maryland One N214WN
Metallic Gold One N792SW
Missouri One N280WN
Nevada One N727SW
New Mexico One N781WN
Nolan Ryan Express N742SW
Penguin One N280WN
Shamu N713SW, N715SW (No longer Shamu)
Silver One N629SW (Original, Silver Paint, Now, “Canyon Blue”)
Slam Dunk One N224WN
The Spirit of Hope N443WN
The Spirit of Kitty Hawk N300SW, N301SW, N302SW
Spirit One N793SA
Tennessee One N922WN (Originally, the “SI One” (for Sports Illustrated))
Tinker Bell One N912WN
Triple Crown One N409WN
Warrior One N8301J

 

4 Comments

  1. Thanks so much for posting this. I was scouring sites everywhere to find how to locate/book flights that operate on specially-painted planes!

    • Sure thing! Note that the liveries have changed somewhat–we’ve sold a few of the old planes, and replaced them with new ones. Some of the N-numbers have been updated… I’ve tried to update them as best as possible, but there’s some here (like the Arizona One) which have been replaced.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *