Platy

The reporter from the The Sun (UK - reproduced on news.com.au) recommends the classic two sector journey after enduring the full flight in economy (for economy flyers).

He also reports 23 empty seats in economy (not sold or left empty deliberately or no shows?).

And sat next to a couple who had been "bumped" from the original Melbourne flight via Dubai only to be seated separately - a reality far from the wining and dining of the media pack at the front or the aircraft gushing over Joyce!

Dave Noble

The information is available on seatguru for the 787

32" pitch 17.2" width economy
38" pitch 20.5" width premium economy
46/80" pitch 23-24" widrh business

for A380

31" pitch 17.5" width economy
38-42" pitch 19.5" width premium economy
78" pitch 21.5" width business
78" pitch 22" width 1st

10 across economy on A380 vs 9 across economy on a 787

Extra legroom seats are chargeable for those in economy - regardless of one world status ( except iirc for those with Qantas Platinum 1 status )

Dave Noble

Given the number of 1st class passengers that Qantas handles a day at Heathrow, I am not surprised that it has not soent additional money to open up another lounge just for a max of 14 passengers daily

Those that are entitled to access and want a 1at class lounge can avail themselves of one rather than use the shared business/1st lounge

Platy

Nor am I surprised. But that said, the catchment wouldn't be 14 pax a day would it (when you take into account your CLs, P1s, WPs). And don't airlines make revenue by back charging partner airlines when the partner airline's passenger use the lounge? (As an aside, it would seem surprising that the so-called alliance partners don't cooperate more in allocating their respective resources).

They may be entitled to use other lounges (and certainly it may be financial preferable for QF to rely on other airlines' lounges for those that expect an F lounge), but that entitlement may be moot if the QF passengers are not informed upon check in of their options (which they may be...or they may not) and the passengers are not the sort of folk to study the complexities of lounge access rules.

But yes, accepting the generic point halving the potential number of passengers across all classes would affect the cost-benefit of the QF operation at LHR!

Volvo Mike

And just like that, the 787 is back in Perth.

Dave Noble

It is only 14 1st class passengers. I would not expect the airline to put on a lounge for those other passengers that could use it if it was available.

Airlines , ime, do not fall over themselves to recommend a competitor's lounge, so would be surprised if they were being pointed in BA or CX's direction

Those that don't know , I suspect do not overly care

Those that really care about overall product and pick accordingly - would they be rushing to travel on QF? I wouldn't rate QF's 1st class product as one of the top ones

orbitmic

Ah thanks, I didn't realise I was still on the book for that record! I guess "symbolically" it feels bigger to do Australia-Europe nonstop but perceptions can indeed be misleading!

orbitmic

I think it's not so much about geography or technicality as about economics. The Oceania-Europe market is actually still not huge - well below, say, Europe-America, Europe-Asia, or Oceania-Asia, and historically, much of it has focused on Australia-UK in both directions for (post-)colonial and familial reasons. That said, Australian tourists numbers are fast growing in other parts of Europe including the South of France and Italy, and the number of non-UK European tourists to Australia is booming so it is not inconceivable that in, say, 5 or 10 years, such nonstop links would indeed be economically viable, but right now, I personally doubt it.

luftaom

I wonder just how accurate that economy class seat width is. Yes the classic way to make a 777 10 abreast and a 787 9 abreast is to shrink the aisles - but there's only so far they can be shrunk.

Have a look at AA's website - which lists the seat widths (for the purpose of using a car seat for infants). https://www.americanairlines.com.au/...false&from=Nav

On the same aircraft they have seats a full inch narrower than Qantas.

davidj1

If you ask on the street who wants 30 free business class tickets, who will say no?

dddc

It's not just the aisles that get shrunk, but the seat widths too. Look at Cathay 777-300ER on Seat Guru, still showing 18.5" width at 9 abreast, however they are moving to 10 abreast. Look at AA's 777-300ER and the width is listed at 16.2" to 17.1". At it's worse that's a loss of 2.3" of width per seat. But that's between all seats so you've lost 4.6" between you and your seat mate. All these airlines saying they are making the trip more "comfortable" because they chuck a bit of mood lighting on and feed you a few chocolate bars are trying to hide the fact that you are being squeezed into a narrower seat than before.

All my average size and even short friends who have flown the 787 in Y have hated it for being so narrow. When QF announced it was flying it on the Perth - London route, I was more excited about QF1 going via Singapore again.

airsurfer

That is indeed true, in tropical areas like DRW the temp rarely exceeds 32C and happens all year round, while MEL can reach 40C in a heat wave, but only in summer.
But Australian airports are close to sea level.
Si-called hot and high airports like JNB. NBO, MEX, UIO are far worse due to the altitude. And yet, JNB and MEX however have scheduled A380 flights.

The article in the Guardian is nice with the hour-by-hour report.
But is is not extraordinary.
Last year I flew DXB-AKL and back and the 15h eastward and 16.5h westward was no worse to endure for girlfriend and me than the 9h DXB-CPT flight. And the distance traveled ? The eastward trip was 14700km because we flew completely south of Australia due to taking advantage of jet streams. The flight was 'kind of a record' for me: is was almost 13500km ocean only from the east coast of Oman to Auckland except for those tiny Maldives, which was a nice view.
I bet there a very few scheduled flights which fly over 13500km over sea only.
The flight back was over Queensland, Darwin, east of Indonesia, straight over Singapore and then India, the more 'common' route from the Middle East to Oceania.

About 'shrunk seats': that can be true, but I feel less uncomfortable in modern Y than in the 1980's Y. But don't forget that the average pax waist size has grown.

s0ssos

Not to pick on you in particular, but that is because the "world" you speak of thinks there is nothing between Australia and Europe that is note-worthy. It isn't a very funny thing.

DH188

Given your relentless negativity about QF, I can pretty much guess the outcome.
I'm not necessarily disagreeing, just wondering why you'd even consider using them?

orbitmic

I don't think that is the reason at all, and certainly not for me at any rate. I think the reason is very simply that we think of Oceania as the antipodes of Europe. The fact is that Oceania is massive and that therefore Perth is nowhere near the antipodes for London but there is a tendency to think of "Oceania" and "Europe" as single points of sorts.