Last month my colleague Mark Caswell reported on the possible use of Darwin, rather than Perth, for Qantas’ nonstop flights to London.
Today Qantas has confirmed it will not be using Perth as a departure point for its nonstop London service when it resumes.
The carrier says it is currently negotiating to use Darwin as the departure point instead.
If Perth is eventually used this will not happen at least until April 2022.
International flights are still on track to restart from December 18 when Australia hopes to have a vaccination rate of 80 per cent.
It means the Melbourne-London flight would route via Darwin.
If that is not possible then Qantas says it will route Melbourne-London via Singapore.
Says CEO Alan Joyce:
“At this stage, WA (Western Australia) doesn’t intend to open to international travel until sometime next year. We look forward to operating this flight via Perth again when circumstances allow.”
Again I would stress that nothing is definite at the present time.
Qantas itself says, “International flights remain subject to Government and Regulatory approval”.
Business Traveller will update you with further developments as they happen.
