Aviation Discussion

[me123]

Frankly, to compare it to Norfolk is laughable.

Doesn't Perth have quite a big oil and gas market? That would surely drive business traffic? It's got a population of 2 million, quite a large proportion of which will be emigrants from the UK who may want to visit friends and family, and of course vice versa. Being the only sizeable town for several hundred miles in any direction will add to its potential catchment area.

I think there would probably be enough end-end traffic to justify the route, but I'm sceptical that economy passengers would sit on a 3-3-3 Boeing 787 for 17 hours, when they could travel with another operator and have a break. The passengers in the premium cabins might fund it bearable, though.

 

[ivanhoe]

I think for the three week tourist, it could be a useful flight. Quite often, Perth may miss out on that itinerary but it could be a useful start and finish to the holiday. The proof will be in the bookings it attracts. As somebody has said, going out to Australia and return is less time sensitive for a tourist as it is say for business reasons. Personally, I'd prefer a leg stretcher in either Dubai, Singapore. Interesting development though for both Qantas and the Dreamliner.

 

[fowler9]

Qantas to fly from London to Australia non-stop

Do they?

 

[WatcherZero]

Frankly, to compare it to Norfolk is laughable.

I disagree, the entire third of Western Australia has a similar population to East Anglia with the combination of Norfolk and Suffolk being similar to Perth and the remoteness of East Anglia even within the UK is a good analogy, the next significant population centre to Perth is 1000 miles away while the next significant city to Norwich (London or Leicester) are both over 100 miles away.

 

[freetoview33]

Do they?

Not now that is why it had the word "to" suggesting it will in March 2018.

This was mentioned before by Virgin Atlantic I believe, saying Australia would be able to have non stop flights to/from the UK!

http://www.travelmole.com/news_feature.php?news_id=1117723&c=setreg&region=2

"Virgin Atlantic is planning non-stop flights between London and Perth in Western Australia, cutting out the need for a stopover in Asia.

Virgin Atlantic will use Boeing's new 787 Dreamliner on the non-stop services, starting in 2011.

Virgin Atlantic is ordering 15 of the 787-9 Dreamliners - with options on another eight 787-9s and purchase rights on a further 20 aircraft.

The 787-9 Dreamliner burns around 27% less fuel per passenger than the A340-300, the aircraft it will replace in the Virgin Atlantic fleet.

The new aircraft will enable Virgin Atlantic to operate direct flights between Australia and the UK, with non-stop services between London and Perth. It is anticipated that the flight will take approximately 16 hours.

“The traditional stopover in Asia and the Middle East on flights between Australia and the UK will become a thing of the past, said Virgin.

The importance of popular stopover destinations like Singapore is likely to diminish further as Middle East airlines such as Emirates, Etihad and Qatar increase their services out of Australia.

However, Virgin Atlantic has flagged that the Dreamliner will allow it to explore new destinations in Asia, with Bangkok tipped to be the first.

Sir Richard Branson, chairman of Virgin Atlantic, said, "Virgin Atlantic has always been about innovation. Being the first airline to operate non-stop flights between Australia and the UK is both pioneering and incredibly exciting.

“These services also show Virgin Atlantic's continuing commitment to the Australian market, with plans to expand our network to Melbourne on the drawing board."

Yes Virgin Atlantic withdrew from Australia but they did predict this 9 years ago, the aircraft, airport too.
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And there are a few military runways in Western Australia that could accept it if Perth couldn't in an emergency.

 

[me123]

I disagree, the entire third of Western Australia has a similar population to East Anglia with the combination of Norfolk and Suffolk being similar to Perth and the remoteness of East Anglia even within the UK is a good analogy, the next significant population centre to Perth is 1000 miles away while the next significant city to Norwich (London or Leicester) are both over 100 miles away.

Perth is a city that is extremely isolated, but prospers on the back of this. Despite having a relatively modest population, it has become a big economic centre including having a significant manufacturing, service and shipbuilding industry, as well as being a major oil and gas centre. It is the big economic centre for the region.

Norfolk and Suffolk cannot even be considered isolated by UK standards, let alone when compared to the vast continent of Australia. Most of both counties are within a commutable distance to London, which is the main economic centre in the South of the UK. I have nothing against Norwich (and have never been), but it is not a major economic hub. I don't have figures to hand, but I reckon that there are significantly more professional jobs in Perth than there are in Norwich just going on the nature of the demographics.

The population numbers may be comparable, but in terms of the economies they are completely different.

Comparing the airports gives a good representation of this. Norwich airport has a small handful of flights a day, with the bulk of other traffic in the region going to the big London airports. Perth, on the other hand, has quite a busy airport with an impressive range of destinations.

I would challenge Qantas' claim that Perth could be a gateway to Western Australia (I think that Dubai offers a better gateway from the whole of the UK to the whole of Australia).

 

[atillathehunn]

Extremely weird to compare Norfolk/Suffolk with Perth.

Perhaps populations match, but surely that doesn't strike you as a valid comparison tool? Perth is a thousand miles from the nearest city of a million people and more. Suffolk is an hour into London. I absolutely fail to see your point, and reject it logically.

I would imagine the fuel situation over London actually helps the pilot, nice little request for priority landing coming into LHR and in the pub half an hour before everyone else in the traffic overhead.

As someone said above, it could be that the Perth city authority or airport has had some financial card in this route. The clearing passport part is a good point, and clearing the international border in a small airport is a model that has been proven to work; Dublin, Shannon and Manchester to come are examples of this.

Well, they wouldn't do it if they didn't think the numbers would run.

 

[Kite159]

That non-stop flight would be good if you had the money to pay for the fare (which will probably be higher than flights with a stop-over).

Although 16 hours on a plane would get boring after a while (I did Shanghai - Heathrow last year and landing was more than welcome after 12-odd hours in the air)

 

[fowler9]

That non-stop flight would be good if you had the money to pay for the fare (which will probably be higher than flights with a stop-over).

Although 16 hours on a plane would get boring after a while (I did Shanghai - Heathrow last year and landing was more than welcome after 12-odd hours in the air)

Yeah, I've done 12 to 13 hours three tmes and enjoyed myself watching films and what have you, was getting a bit stircrazy by the time we landed though.

 

[atillathehunn]

That non-stop flight would be good if you had the money to pay for the fare (which will probably be higher than flights with a stop-over).

Although 16 hours on a plane would get boring after a while (I did Shanghai - Heathrow last year and landing was more than welcome after 12-odd hours in the air)

I think 16 hours locked up in any reasonable constrained space would be boring.

So much depends on comfort of seats, service, food, availability of sleeping pills and alcohol, attractiveness of cabin crew, mental state.

Sometimes it's a punishment.

Other occasions time flies. I'll get my coat.

 

[Tim R-T-C]

If you get the noisy person behind you and the recliner-from-takeoff ahead of you, that flight is going to seem like a nightmare. But then a 13 hour, even a 6 hour flight would be equally awful in that scenario and probably seem just as long.

 

[Peter Mugridge]

Yeah, I've done 12 to 13 hours three tmes and enjoyed myself watching films and what have you, was getting a bit stircrazy by the time we landed though.

My longest flight has been 8h32; I spent the entire time looking out of the window... If i was visiting Australia, I would certainly prefer this direct flight than one with a stopover ( unless they go back to the days of allowing people to stay on board during the stopover ).

 

[Bletchleyite]

The airport's flight information display is usually accurate; this is especially obvious at smaller airports when the codeshare will often be shown alongside the prime number (as opposed to scrolling) to pad out the departures board and make it look a bit more exotic.

Aviavox-running airports tend to announce it all the time. I heard "KLM, Continental Airlines and Northwest Airlines to <wherever>" in that grating Dutch accent so many times at Schiphol it's like an earworm. (KLM used to codeshare on just about everything from AMS, probably still do).
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My longest flight has been 8h32; I spent the entire time looking out of the window... If i was visiting Australia, I would certainly prefer this direct flight than one with a stopover ( unless they go back to the days of allowing people to stay on board during the stopover ).

Can't see why I'd want to stay on board - I'd be more likely to book a several-hour stopover to get out and about round the city.

 

[atillathehunn]

Aviavox-running airports tend to announce it all the time. I heard "KLM, Continental Airlines and Northwest Airlines to <wherever>" in that grating Dutch accent so many times at Schiphol it's like an earworm. (KLM used to codeshare on just about everything from AMS, probably still do).
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Can't see why I'd want to stay on board - I'd be more likely to book a several-hour stopover to get out and about round the city.

It's quite hard to find a KLM departure from Schiphol that is not code shared, and frankly sometimes with airlines I think they've made up to pad out the numbers.

I think it must be a generic voice. The same voice does our automated 'library is closing in 20 minutes' thing at university.

Quite agree on the stop over! Airlines seem more keen on letting you do that now. I've seen Addis Ababa and Istanbul in the recent past alone just on long layovers.

It might be different if you were on a 'rush home' job, but thankfully we haven't had one of those for a few years.

 

[Peter Mugridge]

Can't see why I'd want to stay on board - I'd be more likely to book a several-hour stopover to get out and about round the city.

Airport hassle.

If I wanted to visit somewhere, I'd book it as a destination in itself.

 

[Tetchytyke]

If i was visiting Australia, I would certainly prefer this direct flight than one with a stopover ( unless they go back to the days of allowing people to stay on board during the stopover ).

Staying on board during the stopover was worse than getting up and stretching my legs, there's nothing worse than being cooped up knowing you're not actually moving anywhere.

That said, flying from here to Australia I'd much rather have a stopover, even just for a few hours, part of the way there.

 

[Techniquest]

If I had the choice of a direct Heathrow to Australia or a trip with 1 or 2 stopovers, I'd go for the latter for the leg stretching etc!

 

[fowler9]

On the way to Australia we stopped for a week in Hong Kong, that is the ultimate leg stretch. Ha ha.

 

[atillathehunn]

Extremely unscientific sample, but we've seen there is an approximate estimate for a market comprising both non-stop preference and stop-over preferable.

I would imagine they're banking on business contract traffic holding up the J class tickets, and selling Y as part of a open-jaw entry/exit into Australia, along with VFR out of Perth which has been noted as having a wealthy British diaspora.

 

[WatcherZero]

Staying on board during the stopover was worse than getting up and stretching my legs, there's nothing worse than being cooped up knowing you're not actually moving anywhere.

That said, flying from here to Australia I'd much rather have a stopover, even just for a few hours, part of the way there.

I preferred the 23 hour flight to Sydney where we didn't have to leave our seats to the 26 hour flight where we had to get off for an hour so they could fumigate the plane.

 

[atillathehunn]

On the way to Australia we stopped for a week in Hong Kong, that is the ultimate leg stretch. Ha ha.

Quite a leg stretch. I find it's better to get some air, and if you see the city, walk everywhere to tire yourself out for the next installment of Cramps on a Plane.

 

[Tetchytyke]

On the way to Australia we stopped for a week in Hong Kong, that is the ultimate leg stretch. Ha ha.

Last time I flew out I went through Hong Kong, landed in the morning from Manchester, day in the city, flew out that night. Cathay Pacific even gave us vouchers for food and a city tour.

Coming back we had a week

 

[Western Lord]

To all of the wimps who can't take 17 hours on a nice smooth jet, remember that in 1957 TWA were flying Lockheed Starliners (the ultimate Constellation) from San Francisco to London in 18 and a half hours, with four thundering Wright Cyclones in your ear (although, as with many piston jobs at the time, you were lucky if all four were still running on arrival). I believe that the record for a piston engine airliner was over 23 hours for a TWA London-Los Angeles flight (must have had headwinds!). It must be said, however, that the seat pitch was somewhat more generous in those days.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Seat pitch and width are precisely the issue


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[atillathehunn]

To all of the wimps who can't take 17 hours on a nice smooth jet, remember that in 1957 TWA were flying Lockheed Starliners (the ultimate Constellation) from San Francisco to London in 18 and a half hours, with four thundering Wright Cyclones in your ear (although, as with many piston jobs at the time, you were lucky if all four were still running on arrival). I believe that the record for a piston engine airliner was over 23 hours for a TWA London-Los Angeles flight (must have had headwinds!). It must be said, however, that the seat pitch was somewhat more generous in those days.

I did long haul with my ex if you want to talk about an audible assault on the senses? Noisy, cantankerous, unreliable and can make something simple turn into an eternity.

Seriously though, how did they get the fuel range?

 

[Robertj21a]

Is it my imagination or did Easyjet start flying to Moscow in recent years (2014-5?) - but don't seem to fly there any longer ?

 

[atillathehunn]

Is it my imagination or did Easyjet start flying to Moscow in recent years (2014-5?) - but don't seem to fly there any longer ?

They did, yes. However, shortly after that the Russian economy collapsed and political and economic sanctions were placed on Russia. The Rouble crashed and the routes were suspended. With the EU meeting this week to discuss sanctions on Russia again with the intention of imposing more I don't see the situation changing soon.

 

[Tetchytyke]

With the EU meeting this week to discuss sanctions on Russia again with the intention of imposing more I don't see the situation changing soon.

I think the thing that really did it for EasyJet was just what a PITA it is to get a visa for Russia.

 

[AlterEgo]

I think the thing that really did it for EasyJet was just what a PITA it is to get a visa for Russia.

Yes, it never looked like a good idea given the operation was very much set up to take traffic from Britain to Russia and not vice versa. You just can't nip away for a weekend in Moscow as you can with all the other cities on Easy's route map. A tremendous shame, because Moscow is a brilliant and mesmerising place.

 

[atillathehunn]

I think we are looking at multiple factors for the truth.

You are right visas are a pain to get. But also reflect on the fact that BA and Aeroflop have slashed capacity and service on the Moscow - London (and Europe generally) route, that outbound Russian demand is gone.

I think we are wrong on both sides to say one single issue is at fault. Evidence points to a combination of the two.