henry999

Thanks. You are quite right.

I’ve played around with this and here’s what I found. But before I explain I want to acknowledge three caveats. (1) As I said in my earlier post, I understand that the flightpath on any given route is not always the same. (2) As we all know, airline timetables are sometimes more aspirational than realistic. (3) The airspeed of a longhaul flight will not be constant throughout the journey.

With these factors in mind, I have made some ‘back of the envelope’ calculations.

According to QR, my flight leaves at 0225 and arrives at 0500, for a flying time of 16h35.

According to the Great Circle Mapper, it’s 14 535 km from DOH to AKL. The route shown on the GCM appears to pass directly over Port Hedland, WA (PHE), which is corroborated by b74l's comment to my original query. The GCM makes it 5 703 km from PHE to AKL.

5703 / 14535 = 39.2% of the flight is between PHE and AKL.

39.2% * 16h35 = 6h30, i.e., the flying time from PHE to AKL.

The time difference between Port Hedland and Auckland is five hours. So when it’s 0500 (the ETA) at AKL, it’s only midnight in WA. Therefore, since it takes six and a half hours to fly from PHE to AKL, the plane must be over PHE at something like 1730, local time.

According to HourWorld, sunset in Port Hedland on 29 December, the day in question, is at 1848, with twilight lingering for almost another hour.

Thus, I’m not expecting it to be dark quite all the way across Oz.

However, that still leaves the two big questions unanswerable at this point. (1) whether that flight on that day routes within view of Uluru and (2) whether that flight is late / on-time / early so that, flying into the encroaching darkness, there is enough light left to see anything by the time we get there. Oh, and not to forget: this is pretty much the middle of the rainy season, so cloud cover could well be a factor too.

We’ve already been to Uluru and very happily circumnavigated the base. All of the present musing simply arises from the question of whether we might be able to see it from the air, this time.

Cheers.

Grace B

Must admit, I think your chances of seeing it on this flight are slim, but who knows. There isn't a lot of twilight in those parts. I've only ever seen it once from the air, when a friendly pilot on a SQ flight pointed it out.

Anyway, hope you enjoy the trip....

henry999

Thanks. We always do.

Oxon Flyer

You can review the path this flight takes each day on the excellent flightradar24 playbacks.

If you follow a live track, FR also helpfully shades the map from day to night, so you can tell if the plane is somewhere where it's still light.

remdk

henry999 I agree with Oxon Flyer that you use something like Flightradar24 to track historical flights.
Also in your calculations you appear to have omitted flying time between Port Hedland and Uluru! This must be say 1-2 hours and flying West to East you are flying into the night!

henry999

Thanks; I'll do that.

Erm ... no, I didn't. That's why I wrote

> whether ... flying into the encroaching darkness, there is enough light left
> to see anything by the time we get there.

b74l

Ok..running some flt plans and considering these flights must still avoid the UAE and route over Iran exiting Doha..no matter where over central and east Australia the route that day takes u..it will certainly be dark..including if u hit the jackpot and the route took u directly over Ayers Rock.

DOH-AKL departs at 2335 Zulu time (Zulu time is commonly known as GMT..it’s basically the standard same time airline flights are planned at)..Doha local time will be 3 hrs ahead of Z time ..therefore ETD local time is 0235..it shud take somewhere btwn 11-12 hrs to reach anywhere central Australia. In DEC..Ayers Rock sunset is 725pm local time ..Ayers Rock is also 10 hours ahead of Zulu time..so if ETD DOH is 2335z..and air time to Alice springs/Ayers Rock is at least 11 hours..ETA Ayers Rock will be at least 1035z, or 835 PM local time..so no dice any visual on that iconic site Uluru.

The aforementioned Flightaware is a good public tool to view the routes.

A little off topic..as far as how flight dispatchers plan these flights..among the many eastbound route options available are daily flexible routes issued by Australia ATC called the AUSOTS

If u open the ‘picture’ link ..while a very busy image..u will see the daily system of flexible random route tracks published. The red color routes will be the eastbound tracks that the DOH-AKL (and SYD/ADL/CBR/MEL/BNE) flight’s can be planned by. As u can see..they vary greatly. Uluru however will be in the vcty of AYE or AS Navigation aid (AYE=Ayers Rock/AS=Alice Springs).

Its impossible to say what the best route of the day will be..but I hope this helps in understanding how these flights are generally planned...the best bet would be to simply ask one of the flight attendants to ask the crew for u how the flight will traverse Australia..I’m sure the crew wud hv no problems relay that info back to u via the F/A...

Smid

A separate question, we're now booked down to Auckland from ARN starting on Easter Sunday (a peak periodish, suprisingly covered by last Ł1300 sale).

We arrive at 4am. We took at least an hour to get through the immigration last time because we didn't think uk passports worked on the quick gates, but know that now.

Is there much happening at 4am, or 4:30am (expected out onto pavement possibly). Is the bus to town working? We were considering an onward flight to christchurch, because given its a Tuesday the train doesn't run down that day to do the hop via Wellington...

I know hotels won't be open till about 2pm, 10 hours is a lot to kill if wanting to stay around Auckland.

Anyone got comments, ideas and practicalities of getting off the AKL flight at 4am?

b74l

When we arrived ..the only other flight arriving was LAN fm SCL..do immigration was pretty quick.

We just took a cab to downtown CBD..our hotel wudnt be ready till at least 3pm they told us when we arrived ..but they did let us keep our bags there and gave us access to the gym so we cud shower and change. After that we walked around by the harbor, had breakfast and took an AM harbor cruise..then a hop on/off city bus tour..then it was suddenly 1pm..we walked back to the hotel and luckily our room was ready.

The next AM we flew down to ZQN for the day ..so we were glad in a way our hotel room wasn’t ready cause we took full advantage of seeing a lot of downtown AKL that morning thru afternoon

:D!

Both departures and arrivals landside areas of the airport will be busy at 4am.

The more expensive airport bus to town runs all night long. From 0445 it runs every 15 minutes. The cheaper local bus 380 to Onehunga (where it connects to a train) also runs from 0455, but requires some NZ coins for the fare ($3.50) or an AT HOP card which you can't buy at the airport until 6am; and might not be optimal with heavy luggage.

If you make it through immigration and the bio-security quickly, both options would get you into the city at 6am although you aren't exactly in a rush.

stephenjc

We're arriving the week after you, and we're just flying straight down to NPE on the 08:20 flight (full flex tickets). By the time we've got through security (especially bio because of our bikes), get bags and bike boxes, walk across to the domestic terminal, grab a coffee (wine?), it shouldn't be too long to wait.

Cabbage

Just back from AKL having departed from ARN.

A few random observations that may help others:
- ARN lounge is pants
- IFE was much more comprehensive on the 777, but still lacked some recent films. The 787 IFE library was more limited.
- we booked the STPC hotel and got the Oryx Rotana. A very average hotel, but ok as free. Transfer was terrible in a very poor mini bus (e.g. no seat belts, and some seats broken) that it wasn't big enough to take everyone on the return trip. We got on so not sure what happened to those left behind. Mini bus runs every 30 mins on the hour and half hour both ways.
- arrived in AKL at 5am and were kerb side at 5.30am. That included a bio check on our walking shoes. UK machine readable passports worked fine.
- we took a cab to our hotel and there is a flat fare of NZD 65 with the cab firm we used (different firms have different flat fares).
- the Crowne Plaza let us into our room when we checked in at 6.30am. Obviously space dependent, but well received. Lounge upgrade at CP worthwhile (NZD 90 per day).
- Qantas AKL lounge is average, but a refurb is due soon.
- Return 777 flight run out of Champagne before the doors closed. Very disappointed. We were told the customers on the flight on the way down had drunk it all. So we were offered a white wine spritzer!
- Food of good quality, but seemed very similar menu on all 4 flights.
- old grey pjs on both 777 flights. Were told new white ones were on A380s only.

Probably sounds quite negative, but not meant to be. Great value on the sale fare, but I feel standards are slipping.

Firipu

From the recent menus that I have seen, they all seem to be serving the same menu items both to and from Doha. I can see how a frequent traveller may start to get bored with the menu after a few trips/flights.

How were the loads up front?

:D!

Same.

Agree on these points

I have to say that the 17 hours passed very quickly and I never got the feeling of really wanting the flight to be over right now. E.g. lately on BA J BKK-LHR, which is a daytime flight, about 9 hours in I was starting to go crazy

On the other hand, I found the 5am arrival to be a bit too early, seeing as if you want to eat before arriving you have to be up at 3am AKL time, then I was exhausted by 6pm and I ended up waking up at 4-5am every day for the rest of the trip... Despite being first off the ARN-DOH, basically only had time for a quick drink in Al Mourjan before it was time to go to the AKL gate. If any Y pax were connecting, they would have needed to rush, not ideal before 17 hours in Y. So maybe there is a good scheduling reason for these timings but I would have preferred the outbound flight to be shifted a bit later, since the plane spends 9+ hours at AKL anyway.

Same for the return, could be shifted a bit earlier since a 1500 departure from AKL kind of means you can't do much in the morning and arriving at 2300 in Qatar is also a bit late. Was aiming to only have a nap and then go for an early morning walk around Doha (so it wouldn't be so hot) but that failed.


I was already bored of the menu by the return flight... chose exactly the same things as outbound

Also seems a bit silly to serve "breakfast" as the second meal in the DOH direction (I appreciate that it's morning in AKL but we aren't there any more) though I'm happy to eat breakfast food at any time of the day

I suppose there isn't anything stopping you from ordering the "breakfast" as the first meal

Completely full both ways - but 2 people were upgraded AKL-DOH (couldn't tell whether they used miles or op-up from Y - Y seemed to be full too but didn't investigate fully)


Anyway for the price paid (GBP 1300) and even though I had to pay for my own hotel in DOH, happy to go again any time, still need to visit the South Island...

Morland

The timings are changing on the outbound, we are doing ARN-AKL at the end of next month and the timings are
ARN 0755 - DOH 1600
DOH 0225 - AKL 0500

March return timings are basically the same
AKL 1515 - DOH 2335
DOH 0135 - ARN 0605

so planning an STPC on the way out as we’re just over the 8 hours, although still have that awkward 5am arrival. Not long to spend at DOH on the way home though.