China Southern to Start A380 Service to Los Angeles from Oct 2012
China Southern to start daily A380 service on Guangzhou - Los Angeles route, from 12OCT12. This will replace Boeing 777-200ER service, and reservation for A380 flight begins on Thursday 26JUL12.
This will be CZ's first scheduled international route by A380.
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Yes, indeed.
There is some interesting background information in today's South China Morning Post (only accessible online for subscribers). The article is titled "China Southern gets into dogfight with Air China" and suggests that CZ's application for PEK-NYC and PEK-DPS flights with the A380, filed more than a year ago, are still undecided by the Chinese Civil Aviation Authority. Apparently, there is pressure on CZ to wet lease their A380 to CA for flights out of PEK, in order to get approval for some own routes out of PEK. CZ officials are quoted that such a claim was "outrageous".
It also says that they lose money on every flight PEK-CAN/HKG. Also the large number of cycles reduces useful life of the precious planes.
Quite interesting, for those who can access this newspaper.
A question that must be asked: Will they limit babies to a certain deck?
The CAN-LAX leg is known for abundance of infants due to the concentration of China adoptions being handled in Guangzhou's US Consulate and the CZ flight being the only nonstop to the US.
Interesting to see many differt A380's at LAX, QF,KE,SQ, and now this, wonder there is enoughbig gates for them.
They will have 7 new gates that were all built for the A380 (3 boarding ramps) in the new Bradley Intl Terminal, which is supposed to be open by next year. Actually, the first gate is supposed to open in September. For now, they only have 2 gates which can accommodate the plane, which means that there is usually one A380 that is stuck at the remote terminal (bus in and out). The QF flights are early in the morning so they are ok, but the AF and SQ planes frequently end up in the bus lot.
I'm guessing that they can't take off with a full load, because the 747-400 can't, but Garuda and others have offered 747 services to as far as Tokyo and Incheon, so presumably the runway is long enough to service China as well. The two planes have pretty similar runway length requirements.
There is some interesting background information in today's South China Morning Post (only accessible online for subscribers). The article is titled "China Southern gets into dogfight with Air China" .
Quite interesting, for those who can access this newspaper.
hina Southern Airlines' talks with Beijing-based Air China (SEHK: 0753, announcements, news) about plans to jointly fly the Airbus 380 on international routes from the capital have stalled, an insider told the South China Morning Post (SEHK: 0583, announcements, news) .
The Guangzhou-based carrier, which hoped to operate the A380 on flights from Beijing to Bali and New York, will launch in autumn its first international A380 service - from Guangzhou to Los Angeles - since it introduced the jumbo jet in October.
The airline now flies three A380s from Beijing to Guangzhou and from Beijing to Hong Kong, and a fourth aircraft has yet to be delivered.
"We are burning money on every single A380 domestic flight, as it's designed for long-haul flights," said an executive at China Southern who declined to be identified. Short-haul flights increase the number of flight cycles and cut the lifespan of the A380's four engines, pushing maintenance costs sharply higher.
China Southern prefers to operate the A380 from Beijing because foreign firms prefer to locate their mainland headquarters there, making the city a more lucrative hub for international flights than Guangzhou.
However, the insider, a China Southern executive who declined to be identified, said Air China did not want China Southern to divert its international passengers.
The Civil Aviation Administration of China intervened and asked China Southern to wet-lease some of the A380s to Air China in exchange for rights to operate flights from Beijing.
In wet leasing, a company leases cabin crew and pilots along with the aircraft.
"It's completely outrageous. Why on earth do we have to let Air China operate our A380s, given that we have the expertise to run it?" the China Southern executive said.
Air China spokesman Rao Xinyu declined to comment on any talks between the two carriers and on Air China's involvement in China Southern's application to operate international flights from Beijing.
While theoretically Air China cannot interfere in China Southern's application, which is purely a regulatory matter, an analyst said other factors could come into play.
"However, given that Li Jiaxiang, the director general of the Civil Aviation Administration of China, is a former Air China chairman, I wouldn't be surprised if the regulator found in Air China's favour," the analyst said.
Another proposal being studied by both carriers was to swap some seats on the A380 with other aircraft operated by Air China, with the aim of minimising the loss of passengers from Air China to China Southern, another person close to the matter told The South China Morning Post.
"The application for air rights from Beijing is still in process," said Xie Bin, a spokesman for China Southern. The applications for the licences for Beijing-Bali and Beijing-New York flights had been submitted more than a year ago, he said but did not comment on why the approvals were taking so long.
Xie said the airline plans to use A380s to replace Boeing 777s for the daily flight between Guangzhou and Los Angeles from October 12. The firm's website says an economy-class ticket will cost 4,880 yuan (HK$5,928), or 6,216 yuan with tax.
I'm really interested in how this works out. I plan on taking the A380 CAN-LAX route this December.
That was an interesting read; thanks for sharing. I don't see CZ getting PEK-NYC off the ground unless it kisses up to CA in a major way. In spite of the fact that CZ is the biggest Chinese airline, it doesn't hold a candle to CA or HU (no central government backing here, but those guys had the good sense to include a number of influential party members in their senior ranks, move their HQ to Beijing, and get involved in running airports) with respect to political influence. I believe part of the reason MU has so many prime slots at PEK is because they haven't blocked CA's initiatives to grow in Shanghai, though I will concede that many of their frequencies have existed for many years (i.e. before PEK reached capacity).
There's a ton of award availability on the CAN-LAX route post 10/12/12; however, anyone else planning to book with Skymiles?
I'm considering it for my next year trip, since i need to burn my skymiles.
Wish delta allow you to redeem F
Anyone have experience booking CZ with skymiles? I tried booking China Airlines last year, but the agent keep having problem finding seat/route (even though EF shows availability), so i gave up.
I'm considering it for my next year trip, since i need to burn my skymiles.
Wish delta allow you to redeem F
Anyone have experience booking CZ with skymiles? I tried booking China Airlines last year, but the agent keep having problem finding seat/route (even though EF shows availability), so i gave up.
Yes, and it's pretty easy, but my trick is to book via DL's Beijing office (you can find their number online); otherwise you'll need to deal with the Singapore call center, which isn't especially customer oriented.
Regarding CAN-LAX, I give it an 80% of getting 380 service, but if CZ happens to get approval for PEK-JFK, CAN-LAX will probably continue to run on old airplanes.
Yes, and it's pretty easy, but my trick is to book via DL's Beijing office (you can find their number online); otherwise you'll need to deal with the Singapore call center, which isn't especially customer oriented.
Regarding CAN-LAX, I give it an 80% of getting 380 service, but if CZ happens to get approval for PEK-JFK, CAN-LAX will probably continue to run on old airplanes.
Oh, crud. So it's not finalized for CAN-LAX route yet?
How bad is their old airplane?
Oh, crud. So it's not finalized for CAN-LAX route yet?
How bad is their old airplane?
Yes it is finalized. Look in EF you can already see that it is scheduled from 10/1. I've redeemed a lot of Skymiles for CI. The first few times I just HUCA because I wasn't confident that EF matched actual availability. Unfortunately you can't see business availability on CI. MU for example is 100% incorrect 100% of the time. I don't even know why they list it. It's worthless information. After figuring out that they agents might have to long sell CI or go to a different part of their booking tool it normally only takes me one call. Sometimes I get an especially clueless rep and have to call back or ask for a supervisor.
I had no problem confirming the CAN LAX CAN round-trip on CZ the other day using Skymiles in J.
]Yes it is finalized.[/b] Look in EF you can already see that it is scheduled from 10/1. I've redeemed a lot of Skymiles for CI. The first few times I just HUCA because I wasn't confident that EF matched actual availability. Unfortunately you can't see business availability on CI. MU for example is 100% incorrect 100% of the time. I don't even know why they list it. It's worthless information. After figuring out that they agents might have to long sell CI or go to a different part of their booking tool it normally only takes me one call. Sometimes I get an especially clueless rep and have to call back or ask for a supervisor.
I had no problem confirming the CAN LAX CAN round-trip on CZ the other day using Skymiles in J.
If CZ manages to work things out with the central government before 10/12, its 380s will be flying out of PEK instead of CAN.
