chornedsnorkack

Qantas flies a route to New York, with stopover in Los Angeles, but cannot carry passengers inside USA.

Would any Qantas planes have the range to fly to New York through Tijuana or Vancouver?

How popular is the NY route? Could Qantas consider flying A380 there?

number_6

The problem is that there isn't much pax traffic to YVR for QF -- sufficiently little that the SYD-SFO-YVR tag-on has lost money, and it was mostly done in preparation for the 2010 Olympics. Even SFO is less desirable of a destination than LAX -- sufficiently so that QF pulled out of SFO 20 years ago despite owning an office building on Union Square and having a large cargo operation at SFO (which it kept, using trucks from LAX to the SFO hangars -- quite a sight to see the QF logo on a semi in California). So LAX-JFK is it unless some magic happens. As for fleet capability, the 744ERs could do SYD-JFK non-stop with a limited load, but not JFK-SYD. I believe the 744ER has the longest range within QF's present fleet. But the LAX transit is considered desirable by most pax and not clear that a non-stop could command any premium or attract new business.

Globaliser

Plus LAX-JFK is a premium route in its own right. So that suggests that if you want to include people who are going to do a 2-stop trip, LAX and NYC are likely to be good candidates for that.

A non-stop would also run into the same problem as all of the ultra-long haul operations running and talked about: the cost of fuel. It's not so much what the aircraft could theoretically do, but how much fuel you need to burn just to carry the fuel you need to fly the last chunk of the flight. If you load an tonne of fuel at SYD, there's only about half a tonne left by the time you get to LAX, simply because you've burned that much to carry it that far. It gets progressively worse as the flight gets longer.

nonce

The LAX-JFK and v.v. flight also is timed to connect with the LAX-MEL flight as well as the LAX-SYD flight. I remember years ago flying this route with only 100 PAX on board but earlier this year I did it on a Saturday night and was told the load was close to 300.

We may one day see a SYD-DFW non stop with any luck but I cannot see a SYD-JFK non stop happening unless the cost of fuel forces those with private jets back into F/ J on commercial carriers. With the demise of the US investment banks and private equity market I can actually see QF's premium cabin loads dropping significantly for the next 24 months anyway.

bensyd

Fly to Tijuana? Is that a joke? As lovely as I'm sure Tijuana is where do all the pax go when they land at an airport that no other OW carrier serves?

macabus

I can't believe four people answered the OP's question without mentioning Tijuana.

Congrats bensyd on paying attention.

Surely the OP is up to shenanigans.

NZ_Flyer

I believe NZ are looking at a direct AKL-JFK route when they get their new 787's. Although AKL is closer to JFK than SYD or MEL so it's not so much of an issue fuel wise.

DownUnderFlyer

I am pretty sure they don't fly empty between LAX and JFK....

The issue with such long flights is not only fuel but also the passengers and crew. It is quite something to be in an aircraft for more than 15 hours at a time.
SIN-EWR as one of the longer scheduled flights at the moment would still be a bit shorter than SYD-JFK.
AKL-JFK on the other hand is quite a bit shorter than SIN-EWR.

thadocta

As DUF mentioned, crewing is a major issue - SYD-LAX-SYD is (IIRC) a four day trip for cabin crew - adding in a LAX-JFK-LAX turnaround and it becomes a seven day trip (I am sure one of our CC members will elaborate on this).

So instead of needing four crews to operate a service, you need seven (obviously a lot more than this, but you get the picture).

This is why the previously mooted tags to DFW and ORD have been canned, the costs associated with it would greatly exceed to revenue.

Dave

eoinnz

To further on what thadocta has said, it does take a lot of crew to operate the extra LAX-JFK shuttle

A typical Los Angeles trip is 4 days (some are 5 but we'll keep it simple)
To operate that flight daily, taking into account minimum rest requirements and having a standby crew in Sydney requires 105 cabin crew

A New York trip is 7 days. To operate that flight daily and again taking into account minimum rest requirements requires 165 crew.

Assuming that the crew are hired to operate these patterns only which of course isn't the case, it's just to calculate figures

And a bit of related information - to operate 1 A380 requires around 150 cabin crew, and at any one time there are over 250 cabin and tech crew in LAX

chornedsnorkack

How does the range of baseline A380-800 compare against B747-400ER?

DownUnderFlyer

A380-800 is about 8200nm and the 747-400ER is about 7700nm.

chornedsnorkack

So, A380-800 can fly everywhere B747-400ER can, fly comfortably where B747-400ER struggles and fly with some effort where B747-400ER simply cannot.

7700 nm and 8200 nm are both still air ranges. The whole 747-400ER world fleet of 6 frames was built for Qantas, so they could fly LAX-MEL, and 747-400ER struggles with that. Which is 6883 nm by ground, but more than this against headwinds.

Where do the 6 Longreach planes currently fly? Those are prime candidates for A380, and Qantas has 20 firm orders, and is talking of more.

7400 nm ground from MEL would run short of US east and even Texas (while SYD to Texas or Denver would be marginal). But Ciudad de Mexico would be in. 7400 nm would also exclude the whole Europe. Whereas Rio de Janeiro would be reachable. ADL-GIG is 7358 nm, basically dead south (and well outside 330 minutes ETOPS range - which Australia does not have, so 4 engined planes are ETOPS free).

eoinnz

The 6 current 747-400ER always operate MEL-LAX and regularly SYD-LAX. As all 6 are configured "Pacific" with the 64/66 J class section this is where Qantas would prefer them to fly.

However if another service is operated by a 747-400, there is no reason why the ER won't be used on it, if they need an aircraft. The ER has been spotted in LHR/HKG/JNB frequently.

serfty

Had an ER subbed for QF29 ex MEL a while ago ... plenty of op-ups that nights as WHY was fully booked.