Qantas Project Sunrise goes ahead, 12 new A350-1000s ordered

[dajop]

One of the biggest issues flying east from EU to AU is that the stopover always seems to interrupt the optimal time to be asleep to minimise jetlag.

It's not so bad on the flights that depart EU mid-late morning and transit SE Asia/HKG, continuing on to Australia arriving in the evening. But QF2 timing agree totally.

 

[justinbrett]

We’ll probably never know the commercial arrangements between Airbus and QF (nor Boeing if they’d got the gig) for the non-recurring engineering (NRE) to adapt the A350-1000 to meet the PS requirements. It would make sense if Airbus sprinkled some of those costs across the total QF order but they probably wore some of it to be free to sell the end result.

But again, that's literally how it works, the Airbus spends the money on development, they get it back in unit sales. They aren't selling the aircraft at cost price.

The cost to develop the A350 program was reported to be 15 billion Euro - which means to date, the first 10 million euro for every A350 sold funds the development, before any profit is made (in addition to the actual costs of building the aircraft).

Even if the cost spread over the 12 aircraft was 50 million each, that largely gets lost in the noise of bulk customer discounts - QF switching from Boeing to Airbus for not only PS but the 737s was quite a win for Airbus.

 

[Quickstatus]

QF10 had to call in at remote KTA for a top up in fuel as the flight had encountered headwinds and lacked sufficient to make it nonstop from LHR to PER

I've twice been on an A380 LAX-MEL when it had to drop into SYD for a splash and dash and the A380 has been known to drop into NOU for similar too on a DFW-SYD. These occurrences were IMO good fuel management compared to emergency low fuel situations which would be poor fuel management. It is just the cost of doing business on ultra long routes.

 

[DC3]

While unusual and not something I can recall previously occurring, today QF10 had to call in at remote KTA for a top up in fuel ….

Apparently, weather conditions changed during the flight so the plane's route had to alter.

 

[leesionn]

The recent announcements suggested PER-LHR and MEL-DFW could be candidates for PS aircraft to free up B787s for new services. But that does also beg the question where they rotate to/from rather than just back and fourth.

Surely MEL-DFW could be a candidate for a standard A35K when they take delivery of them? That way 1 or 2 PS aircraft don't need to be taken up at any given time? PER-LHR makes sense for the PS ones, as that can be used to do a LHR-SYD leg too.

It’s possibly a limited market for these type of aircraft? But SQ would be obvious, TK may or may not have ordered some (or just pinched the numbers on weight saving on a premium heavy config to stretch the range of a regular A351?). BA could well give it go? Not sure about other Euro airlines? The American airlines probably won’t touch it but the ME could while they still have cheaper fuel!

I found the reporting on TK's order confusing - they kept talking about ULR but that could also just be a way of how they talk about differently configured aircraft (e.g. when Emirates ordered the A350-900, they called the ones with the crew rest area "ULR".

They've got 15 A35K on order, with 8 being earmarked as "ULR" (this could just be those with the larger business class cabin). However, they also want to do IST-AKL nonstop, and this is a touch longer than SYD-LHR, so they may inevitably have to purchase the ULR variants for this.

Other airlines I read that have expressed interest in the A35K-ULR are BA and SQ, but nothing firm. So I think TK are the most likely one to actually order them.

 

[justinbrett]

The recent announcements suggested PER-LHR and MEL-DFW could be candidates for PS aircraft to free up B787s for new services. But that does also beg the question where they rotate to/from rather than just back and fourth.

From what I've seen it's PER-LHR & AKL-JFK

I imagine ability to sell F is a major factor in the decision.

 

[elanshin]

What if its a schedule thing as well?

Is there any new scheduling possible if we consider say SYD-LHR-PER-LHR -SYD -JFK etc

 

[justinbrett]

What if its a schedule thing as well?

Is there any new scheduling possible if we consider say SYD-LHR-PER-LHR -SYD -JFK etc

I think it's definitely possible for JFK - that sunrise line doesn't continue from AKL to SYD.

 

[elanshin]

I think it's definitely possible for JFK - that sunrise line doesn't continue from AKL to SYD.

I meant also on the timings at LHR this could alleviate the tight window to operate SYD-LHR from the curfews if PER - LHR frames are also incorporated into scheduling.