LHR-PER: should BA have done it
 

Suggestion that QF will announce the opening of a non-stop LHR-PER. With current arrangements, this will most certainly involve EK codeshare and not BA one and it is conceivable that it might hurt the BA LHR-SIN-SYD.

TK is also apparently still working hard on plans for a nonstop IST-SYD.

Quite bluntly, since this is related to new aircrafts coming in, should BA have done this, maybe attempting to obtain 8th freedom rights from Oz to fly LHR-PER-SYD instead of LHR-SIN-SYD?

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/de...-perth-london/

Even in a premium seat this sounds like a nightmare flight!

Can't see many economy pax attempting this more than once.

That's a long flight, and frankly, I'm surprised there's the traffic forecast to maintain it. That's why BA pulled off Perth in the first place. Though obviously the cost basis of a non-stop service should be far more advantageous than the indirect ones used to be...

Technically, flying on to Sydney with traffic rights would be 8th freedom - 6th is connecting traffic via your home hub. And of course operating this way increases the cost basis again, so would have been unlikely even if the rights were available (which I imagine QF, Virgin Australia et al would have objected to quite vociferously to).

I'd happily take this. Straight into Perth then a short hop on to Melbourne or Sydney

After 7 hours sitting on economy my legs start to hurt, 11 hours its not fun, so I can't imagine 18 hours.

And that's with me walking around every hour or so.

I am reminded of my flight 15 years ago from SYD to JNB. Where we set off and flew and flew and flew, and then after 5 hours we landed at Perth to refuel, before setting off across the deep blue sea!

PERSYD block times are just over 4 hours, but that's hardly a short hop! You'd be much quicker going via Singapore.

Yes, it's certainly long, but is 22+ hours with a tiring airport stop which is largely uncomfortable for Y passengers, including going through security etc again really preferable to 18 hours nonstop? To be honest, based on the people I know, most would see a single nonstop flight as a very definite advantage over two long haul flight, which is the alternative.

And in J, while I have never done 18 hours flights, I have done several 15 hour ones and will do the 16 hour DOH-AKL in a few months. My experience with the 15 hour flights is that quite frankly, they are not harder to cope with than 11 hour ones and one often sleeps better (and they were not even solo seats which I think the new QF 789 will be). Perth is an increasingly important economic centre and also has a wealthy population which makes it a potential candidate for leisure premium flying. I really wouldn't be surprised if the flight was quite successful, and paradoxically, BA's connecting network from LHR may be a strong reason for it!

Some good points, especially @orbitmic re Perth's wealthy population, diaspora and business ties.

What interested me was finding out that QR's upcoming DOH-AKL service (launching 5 Feb 2017) would surpass LON-PER as the longest flight by distance, clocking in at 9032 miles, 23 miles longer than Qantas's proposed UK-AU non stop.

Further, the AKL flight's block time is actually just 16h10 westbound (17h30 eastbound), so given that both flights would take a similar route direction, the LON-PER flight might actually be less than 18 hours.

Ah I didn't realise and your point is particularly relevant as, as I mentioned, we are booked on the DOH-AKL! It is in fact very logical that the two are comparable in distance and interestingly, the DOH-AKL uses a 772 (and 2-2-2 layout in J) so the new Qantas flight should be more comfortable both in terms of seating and air quality.

Slightly off topic, but it is something I'd genuinely like to know. What's the proportion of economy passengers on that kind of flight who purchase an all inclusive (or partially inclusive, such as flight+flydrive+hotel) holiday, which may happen to be on BA? Because most of those would really only do it the once, irrespective of the service.

What's the size of the market in such a hurry they would pay way more money to avoid the opportunity to restore circulation to their legs? Not THAT big.

I did SIN-EWR which was 18 and a bit hours. It was exceedingly boring as after the duration of a normal Asia to Europe flight you have the equivalent of London to BAH ahead. Utterly dull.

The aim is to fly people from Perth but also people from Sydney, Melbourne, Adelaide, Brisbane and all the regional ports in Western Australia also.

Considering the capacity of the Qantas 787-9 will be 42 Business, 28 Premium Economy and 166 Economy for a total of 236, I don't think it will be hard to fill the aircraft.

Some people don't want to stop in Dubai or Asia and just want to get there, and stopping in Perth is no different to the alternative. It will have the cachet of being the first direct Australia to UK service too, so people will want to give it a go. Australians have a good knowledge of Qantas as just about everyone in the country has a Frequent Flyer card with them!

I wouldn't do it for fear of being stuck with someone with whom I have no desire to share any kind of enclosed space for so long, e.g. noisy, smelly etc.

That would not be nice!
13 hours is about my limit.

But in J you would have no neighbour. The 789 offers an evolution over the 330 J suite, which is really quite nice!