Qantas is busily preparing to restart international flights from next month. The airline will begin with flights from Sydney to London and Los Angeles, currently on sale from 14 November 2021, and gradually ramp up services over the following months. It sounds great, in theory. But Qantas doesn’t actually have enough planes to operate all … Continued
Qantas operated its longest ever “commercial” flight yesterday, flying 107 passengers non-stop from Buenos Aires in Argentina to Darwin. Flight QF14 took off from Ministro Pistarini International Airport in Buenos Aires at 12.44pm on Tuesday, local time, before heading south for the 15,037km trip to Darwin. (The actual flight path was 354km longer than the … Continued
Update: Qantas has delayed the resumption of flights between Brisbane and the United States, but still plans to use Airbus A330s when these routes resume in 2022. Qantas plans to gradually resume international flights from 18 December 2021. But with Qantas’ Airbus A380s not returning to the skies until mid-2022, the Boeing 747s retired and the delivery … Continued
If you’ve tried searching for flights to Australia over the next two months, you’ve probably noticed there are very few seats available. There are a very small number of flights with expensive Business or First Class seats available that might get you home before December. But most of the “affordable” flights on sale are sadly … Continued
Update (15 October 2021): Regional travel within NSW has been delayed by a week until 1 November 2021. The NSW government has confirmed that regional travel within NSW will be able to resume in late October 2021 for people who are fully vaccinated, and early December for everyone else. Under the NSW government’s 3-stage reopening … Continued
Many airlines are now planning to resume international flights to and from Australia by Christmas, with Qantas and others betting on a mid-December reopening of the country’s international border. Meanwhile, other airlines that have continued to operate loss-making international flights into Australia throughout the pandemic are preparing to ramp up their schedules within months. Many mainstream … Continued
It’s been a big week for Launceston Airport in northern Tasmania. Virgin Australia this week announced it will add a non-stop service from Launceston to Perth, running 3x weekly on Mondays, Fridays and Sundays. The seasonal route will operate from 5 November 2021 until 30 January 2022. It comes as Virgin’s inaugural Launceston-Adelaide service took off … Continued
Qantas will fly Airbus A330s from Brisbane to Los Angeles and could redirect some of its flights to London via Darwin, instead of Perth, when international flights gradually resume. These are part of the flying kangaroo’s plans revealed today to restart substantial international flying from mid-December 2021, based on the timeline of Australia’s COVID-19 vaccination … Continued
Qantas will now continue flying from Sydney and Brisbane to Norfolk Island until 30 June 2022, after Air New Zealand announced it will not be able to take over the routes from the end of this month as planned. Air New Zealand has long held the Australian government contract to service the routes from Brisbane … Continued
For Australians stranded overseas, it has never been harder or more expensive to get home. It’s also never been harder for the international airlines trying to repatriate Australians. The Australian government’s extremely low international arrival caps haven’t just locked out many tens of thousands of Australian citizens who are desperate to come home. The caps have … Continued
Rex has extended the grounding of its Boeing 737 fleet and cancelled many of its domestic flights for at least several more weeks, as a result of the extended lockdown in Sydney and COVID-19 restrictions in other Australian cities. Rex has not operated any Boeing 737-800 flights since 18 July 2021. ZL689 from Gold Coast … Continued
Over the coming month, Qantas will operate six “special commercial flights” from Darwin to London. In each instance, the Boeing 787s need to position to London anyway to operate repatriation flights back to Darwin on behalf of DFAT. So, Qantas has decided to sell tickets on the outbound sectors as well. “As the national carrier, … Continued
