[flyingcanadian]

AMcWhirter,

Thank you for the courtesy of your reply.

I was referring to the WESTBOUND direction which has headwinds, like all westbound flights,
and was reporting from an article which I had read in a SQ editorial or a Singapore
newspaper. The article mentioned that depending on winds, flight routing, which depends on
other aircraft movements and ATC, the Westbound flight could take upto 22hrs.
I have flown LAX-SIN several times, but always in J/C class, but even that was too long a flight without being able to get off the A/C and stretch one’s legs as such!

The CEO of SQ has been interviewed several times and he believes there is a market for EWR-SIN
flight, and SQ will have a monopoly here as THAI have ceased their Non Stop USA routes, and no
USA carrier seems to want the route.

Since the thread was on the LHR-PER Non Stop, how long is the return leg PER-LHR expected to
take with headwinds and routing?

[paulkaz]

Hi flyingcanadian best wishes to you for the new year.For the last few years both virgin aus and qantas have offered the same flat bed international business class on the syd/mel – per a33o routes. Occassionally a 737 sneeks in. Jetstar uses a very squeezy a320/1.

[flyingcanadian]

Happy New Year to you PAULKAZ.

Thank you for the info re the domestic SYD/MEL-PER ROUTE.

I am a *ASE and *A is not really prevalent in AUS. The Family members I have in Australia have deceased, so my visits are now few and far between.

I was just reading an article on the LHR-PER-LHR NON STOP and it was saying as has been related in this thread that
1) QF would try to use the DOMESTIC TERMINAL IN PERTH
2) The A/C would continue to SYD/MEL to try and take some business from the 3ME carriers, and
also a FLAT BED IN J/C on the Domestic portion.
They are hoping that a Direct PER-LHR will be preferable to a SYD/MEL/BNE-DXB-LHR.
I know when QF first joined EK, there were a lot of threads on F/J pax prefering the LONG LEG
of the flight to be the 2ND LEG (eg SIN/BKK-LHR) rather than the DXB-LHR which is maybe too short for a decent sleep.If you are woken at midnight, is it easy to get back to sleep again?
I did not know that Flat beds were already on the route as the article did not mention this.

Thank you again PaulKaz and may all your travels in 2017 be prosperous and eventful.
Happy Flying!

[AMcWhirter]

flyingcanadian – I wrote many articles about these SE Asia-USA nonstop flights.

Here are two examples. One posted online in 2012.

SIA to cease non-stop flying to Los Angeles and New York

Another appeared in our print edition. It’s available to subscribers.

In focus

I very much doubt any commercial aircraft would be able to remain aloft for 22 hours without refuelling.

Singapore-New York or vice versa would normally be around 18 up to a maximum of 19 hours nonstop. But it could be a little less depending on the season, direction of travel, routing and so on.

SIA’s A340-500 had four-engines and that gave it routing flexibility. It meant a Singapore-New York nonstop flight could route either via the Pacific or the Atlantic.

As for Perth-London-Perth … all that Qantas will say officially is that it will be around 17 hours nonstop.

Schedule details will be known when flights open for booking in a few months’ time.

[FDOS_UK]

Actually, I could see that the SINNYC westbound flight could take up to 22 hours, under some extreme circumstances, but also doubt any commercial flight could stay up so long, so a tech stop would be mandated.

Accordingly, I do not find Flyingcanadian and Alex McWhirter’s opinions to be mutually exclusive.

[Flightlevel]

Concur,only flying on a very fuel efficient program is that maybe possible and ofcourse a scheduled airline captain knowing the headwinds would have to stop for fuel to keep within minimums for diversions and go arounds!

[rferguson]

[quote quote=780287]It’s interesting how the Qantas <span class=”vm-hook-outer vm-hook-default”><span class=”vm-hook” style=”color: rgb(0, 153, 0); border-color: transparent transparent rgb(0, 153, 0);”>Australia</span><span class=”vm-hook-icon” style=”display: inline-block;”></span></span> – UK operations will pan out.

Personally, i’d always struggled to see how Qantas could make a success out of it’s PER-LHR direct flights. It seems according to a friend I have that works in Qantas’ head office in Sydney that plans are already in place to re-jig the entire QF Australia – UK operations.

Qantas currently operate two daily flights from Australia to London. Both via DXB, both on A380 aircraft. It’s no secret that the MEL-DXB -LHR service has suffered from poor loads. Especially on the DXB-LHR leg. Qantas restructured the LHR services a few years ago to try and make their UK operations more profitable by re-timing the MEL flight and although this has reduced costs by having aircraft on the ground at LHR for shorter periods of time the flight is still not busy between DXB and LHR. The A380 is simply too big a beast to fill. Whilst the flights are generally busy MEL-DXB the majority of those passengers leave the aircraft in DXB to fly onto other destinations in europe with EK.

So…can Qantas justify adding more seats to the UK? Well according to my mate, they don’t want to make the mistake of having too many seats to fill and the network will be restructured again. One plan being discussed is that the SYD-DXB-LHR service will remain as is. MEL-DXB-LHR will be dropped with EK moving in to fill the gap to DXB and beyond with a QF code. And…the IMHO the most clever plan….the PER-LHR 787 will actually originate in MEL, take the current QF9/10 flight numbers and operate MEL-PER-LHR as a one stop service. Exciting stuff!

Qantas certainly has plenty of time to fine tune its plans. I don’t think i’ve ever seen an airline generate so much PR blurbs about an aircraft (one already in service for loads of other airlines) than QF has with the 787. They’ve been talking it up already for a good year speculating on routes it could perform. Six weeks ago they officially released the configuration and seating details (over a year before taking delivery of their first aircraft) and here we are in December 2016 and they are making route announcements for March 2018!

[/quote]

Seems my source has come good 🙂 Qantas will soon (officially) announce that the PER-LHR flight will actually originate in MEL (although it’s being reported on some forums already), flying MEL-PER-LHR and the current MEL-DXB-LHR will terminate in DXB. Apparently SYD-CDG is to be announced in the near future too.

https://www.ausbt.com.au/how-qantas-non-stop-perth-london-boeing-787-flights-will-work

[Author]

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