Qantas A380 at Gatwick

[RooFlyer]

@Flashback spotted a QF A380 at Gatwick today/yesterday.

The view from my "office"

Arrived in Scotland with a heart stopping moment. Just tootling along the road and saw this motorbike coming from a side road and watched the rider go over and just slide along the road. Luckily no other traffic and I was able to pull over and he was fine but I had to lift the bike so he could...

www.australianfrequentflyer.com.au

Turns out there was another there, 2 weeks ago, a charter, OQJ. Does Qantas really have enough A380s to let ones go on charters?

 

[moa999]

Does Qantas really have enough A380s to let ones go on charters?

If you pay them enough $$s anything can happen.
And this regular customer pays up.

 

[elanshin]

@Flashback spotted a QF A380 at Gatwick today/yesterday.

The view from my "office"

Arrived in Scotland with a heart stopping moment. Just tootling along the road and saw this motorbike coming from a side road and watched the rider go over and just slide along the road. Luckily no other traffic and I was able to pull over and he was fine but I had to lift the bike so he could...

www.australianfrequentflyer.com.au

Turns out there was another there, 2 weeks ago, a charter, OQJ. Does Qantas really have enough A380s to let ones go on charters?

No - that came at the expense of QF11/12 not running an a380 for a service or two as something else hiccuped I believe.

But if you pay QF enough money, they'll make it happen.

 

[Himeno]

Does Qantas really have enough A380s to let ones go on charters?

No, but Qantas won't look at it like that.
Charter = fully booked aircraft with confirmed $$$$.
Normal service = maybe not sold out, only $$.

If they are going to get more money out of a charter, then they are going to take it, even at the expensive of a normal service.

 

[RooFlyer]

If they are going to get more money out of a charter, then they are going to take it, even at the expensive of a normal service.

Yep, that's what I thought.

Sorry, we aren't flying the public next Thursday or Friday, as we've contracted to fly the entire Formula 1 circus across to <wherevever it goes>. Sorry for the inconvenience to our customers, but gee, its good money!

 

[Flashback]

@Flashback spotted a QF A380 at Gatwick today/yesterday.

The view from my "office"

Arrived in Scotland with a heart stopping moment. Just tootling along the road and saw this motorbike coming from a side road and watched the rider go over and just slide along the road. Luckily no other traffic and I was able to pull over and he was fine but I had to lift the bike so he could...

www.australianfrequentflyer.com.au

Turns out there was another there, 2 weeks ago, a charter, OQJ. Does Qantas really have enough A380s to let ones go on charters?

Today around 7.20am - it landed right after my flight with ET hit the tarmac

We were taxiing to the terminal when I spotted it on the landing runway.

 

[Cossie]

Yep, that's what I thought.

We flew out of Adelaide yesterday afternoon and announcements were made in the Qantas lounge for people on the charter flight to Singapore to go to the gate.

 

[Brucetiki]

We flew out of Adelaide yesterday afternoon and announcements were made in the Qantas lounge for people on the charter flight to Singapore to go to the gate.

I think that was to do with the LIV golf tournament in Adelaide over the weekend.

Back on topic. I was tracking QF1 on Monday and noticed another Qantas A380 not far behind. Was curious what it was doing, but yeah looks like a charter.

 

[RooFlyer]

Googling round a bit suggests that it may have been an exclusive charter to board a 2 week cruise at Southhampton, then return.

 

[Quickstatus]

They do it by replacing one return flight on the regular routes like QF1/2
Guaranteed return plus increases yields on adjacent flights.

we've contracted to fly the entire Formula 1 circus across to <wherevever it goes>.....exclusive charter to board a 2 week cruise at Southhampton

And in the past charters apparently used by members of the Exclusive Brethren

 

[RooFlyer]

They do it by replacing one return flight on the regular routes like QF1/2
Guaranteed return plus increases yields on adjacent flights.


And in the past charters apparently used by members of the Exclusive Brethren

You probably hadn’t gotten down to my last post when you wrote that

 

[Quickstatus]

You probably hadn’t gotten down

I did but I thought "exclusive" was related to the cruise not so much the group in question

 

[Spacetravel]

I will be affected by this, currently due to fly out on QF11 today scheduled at 8:35PM on VH-OQI. Looks like it was delayed leaving SIN as QF332 and is now running late causing a flow on delay to QF11 which is now scheduled to depart at 10:30PM. If it slips another 30 minutes due to the curfew we won't be going anywhere today.

 

[Quickstatus]

I will be affected by this

Sorry to hear. It was delayed 3.5hrs leaving LGW and made up some time and scheduled to arrive back in SYD approx 2.5hrs late - It made up approx 1hr somewhere in that journey.

Usually the A380 coming back from LHR arrive back in Sydney at 0540hrs. This leaves them about 12hrs to operate QF11 or 9hrs to operate QF1
This QF332 was scheduled to arrive back at 1740hrs, 5 minutes after the usual departure time for the usual QF11 which necessitated one off scheduled departure of 2035hrs for the 1st May QF11 . A turn around time of just under 3hrs has been done before for an A380.

I wonder what happened at LGW?
Is QF obligated to wait for all the passengers of a charter if one/some are late?

 

[elanshin]

I wonder what happened at LGW?
Is QF obligated to wait for all the passengers of a charter if one/some are late?

Probably if $$$$$$ is involved.

Or they couldve had any sorts of minor mechanicals they had to sort out (or get from LHR).

 

[jb747]

They've done these flights regularly. I did them on the 380, and I think the 747 as well. They don't always go to another destination though. Mostly they've simply taken 100% of the seats on the day's normal service.

 

[jb747]

Is QF obligated to wait for all the passengers of a charter if one/some are late?

They have people managing the group, and in my experience they were extremely well organised, and very pleasant to deal with.

 

[RooFlyer]

They don't always go to another destination though

In this case its speculated that they went to LGW to more easily get down to Southampton to get on the cruise.

 

[mrflyby]

This charter would have been a lot more flexible if so many weren't stuck in Abu Dhabi still.

 

[moa999]

Booked long enough in advance, not hard to schedule in and flex bookings around it.

Although at least the first flight seemed to have the normal QF1 operating near simultaneously.