KARFA

I wasn't really responding on that point, just your assertion that a farewell flight from LHR-CWL wouldn't sell.

Whether it happens or not it a different point and all the arguments for and against have been raised in the thread already. But if it did, although you wouldn't wish to go, I think many would and BA would easily sell every seat.

skipness1E

To you. Which is fine. The key point is, you can always find reasons not to do something and sneer at what others enjoy. Farewell flights mark an end of an era, they tend to sell out. KLM’s MD11 flights were hugely oversubscribed for example. It could be a PR gift as a fond farewell, the end of an era, retiring staff etc. Not some “lame 20 minute jolly to Cardiff for losers”, a one hour out and about ending in CWL. But that would require imagination and leadership. Something too rare in UK 2020. So yeah, green agenda, Greta Thunderburg, why bother even trying etc, too hard, can’t possibly be done. Britain 2020 people, what’s the actual point?

BOH

....and they would sell for a very hefty amount too. I wouldn’t buy one personally but am looking at it from the business and PR perspective.

BOH

But they haven’t, not by you or anyone else. This is maybe why I am asking

kanderson1965

The one thing that the COVID-19 lockdown has shown is that a lot of things we do in life are not required and we can survive without trying to constantly achieve things.

BOH

The above. 100%. Very, very few doers in the UK nowadays, plenty who will happily scupper and shoot down in flames what others suggest. Many of the same negative type in another thread regarding an inspired initiative to try and get a 744 to a museum. Gotta despair sometimes at UK 2020 after what QF recently made happen with 744 ops ending 👍

BOH

But is it permitted by people with maybe a more positive outlook and attitude of trying to achieve things to continue to? Or do we just all give up?

Dave Noble

A key bit there - farewell flights marking the end of an era - the era of the 747 is not ended with BA choosing to remove from service

With the KLM MD11, that was the last passenger flight of the MD11 - similar to the final flights of Concorde - which other airlines did major events when they just retired their own MD11s?

Running a Scout Group, running Scuba courses for Scouts in NSW and doing foster care

Prospero

You keep posting the same argument and continue to misread the mood.

https://www.airfrance.co.uk/GB/en/lo...r_volAF747.htm

https://news.delta.com/tags/747-farewell-tour

https://www.qantasnewsroom.com.au/me...-of-the-skies/

https://mediacentre.britishairways.c...?ref=HeroStory

kanderson1965

Most of us, if we are honest with ourselves, achieve little, if anything, of any significance in our lifetime that justifies the effort beyond that required to get by.
I doubt, if I had the chance to hear my own eulogy, that I would be disturbed to hear the phrase “He never did get to fly on the final BA 747 flight”.

Dan72

But two of the three instances you mention were pre-COVID. Qantas, who did farewell flights during COVID, appear to have made it work for them, but at the time Australia was in a very different (much more positive) place on COVID.

I don't see BA pulling off such flights without critical reporting. The idea that this would be all positive PR is naive and BA will know that. The parallels with 'demise' and 'end of an era' will be an easy and obvious line of reporting of a very British organisation that exemplifies so many of the country's difficulties at this time.

If COVID restrictions are increased further it would be a non-starter, as the flights would also invite accusations of recklessness, by encouraging people to take unnecessary travel. I really don't see BA calculating it's a risk worth taking.

13901

People on this board keep on referring to Qantas. But have other airlines made anything like that for their 747s, 380s, 340-600s, 777s? Air France has retired the 380s, Virgin the 747s and 346s, Delta its 777 fleet: I might've missed it, but have any of those companies organised a farewell flight of sorts?

A P Yu

I think AF did an A380 something for crew / staff only

opus99

I don’t think that’s fair to say. They are refusing to a fair well flight not a coronavirus vaccine. To say there aren’t many doers in the U.K. would be unfair, take for example the effort they’re putting into actually making a coronavirus vaccine which is the leading one atm. That’s the doing that actually matters. Like honestly, people are being pragmatic about the times we are in. If it were normal times, I’m sure BA would’ve done something. It was the backbone of their fleet and they would’ve made TONS of money from it and we all know BA loves money more than anything else. But in these times, it doesn’t make strategic, economic or marketing sense to conduct those flights even if the flight themselves are cash positive.

QF is highly irrelevant as they are in a different situation from BA with regards to labour relation and the kind of media attention they are getting. QF is not being dragged across the house for being a national disgrace with every move they make being watched. The number of times I’ve seen “BA can’t pay their staff but they are taking deliveries of 787s” obviously they don’t understand how the business works (the financing has already been provided) but they dont care, they have just been rubber stamped this idea from the press about BA. Not that they don’t deserve it but they certainly don’t need more of it. This is a time where you cannot afford to make wrong decisions even if it’s just about a fair well flight.

if you will really miss that much you can watch the last one depart from Heathrow, the pilot will probably do a wing wave. Or probably not! Who knows lol

DFB_london

A lot of talking on here. Talk is cheap so...

It’s time some of the more ardent posters just pick up the phone to BA and get the credit card out and charter a 747.

If you’re so convinced there’s demand put your money where your mouth is and do it.

Perhaps someone else can sell time slots to watch one being ripped to bits for those of us with less find memories* glad to see it go.


* which are:
The mid J monsters - a cabin configuration anyone in F will be celebrating going to the scrap yard.
20 years of ingrained filth due to BA neglect (not unique to 747).
failed apu units and boiling hot boarding the majority of the time.
cabin temperature that froze Y and boiled the F cabin.
Increasingly frequent hydraulic and engine related delays.
dirty broken loos.
broken seats.
often broken IFE with low resolution screens on mid J.
broken ovens.
the (relatively) cramped F cabin (vs 777 and 380).
interior wall hangings broken, badly fitted or covered in filth.