Qantas continues to add new destinations for its innovative Project Sunrise, in which the airline plans to offer flights lasting more than 18-21 hours. By 2025 the Australian flag carrier plans to link Sydney and London, which will be the world’s longest flight lasting 21 hours and covering 10,878 miles, surpassing Singapore Airlines’ current record with its Singapore (SIN) – Newark (EWR) route.
In an initial phase, the company expects to launch ultra-long routes from Sydney and Melbourne to major global financial centers: New York, London, Paris and Frankfurt.
According to an interview with Qantas Group CEO Alan Joyce by The Times, Project Sunrise also plans to link Australia’s east coast with Sao Paulo and Cape Town and mentioned adding non-stop services to Chicago and Miami in the United States.
Previously, Qantas had announced a route between Brisbane (BNE) and Chicago O’Hare (ORD) on Boeing 787-9 Dreamliner to start in April 2020, but these plans were cancelled in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic crisis.
Qantas the leader in ultra-long-haul flights
Qantas has been an airline that has always dreamed of connecting Australia to the world in a single hop, in 1989 the company made its first non-stop flight between Sydney and London Heathrow in a Boeing 747-400, since then it has not stopped making the most unimaginable flights.
By the 2023 summer season, Qantas will operate five of the 20 longest routes worldwide including services between: Perth (PER) – London Heathrow (LHR), Sydney (SYD) – Dallas (DFW), Perth (PER) – Rome (FCO), Melbourne (MEL) – Dallas (DFW) and Auckland (AKL) – New York (JFK). The majority of all these flights have a duration of more than 17 hours.
Currently the Boeing 787-9 Dreamliner is the mainstay for ultra-long-haul missions, its high efficiency and performance has made all these routes possible with profit margins, unlike the older four engine aircraft such as the Boeing 747 and Airbus A380.
When Qantas launched its non-stop services between Perth (PER) and London Heathrow (LHR) in 2018, it allowed Australian travelers to save four hours of travel time with a ticket price 20% higher, rather than making any connection via Singapore, Hong Kong or Dubai. In addition, this service became the most profitable route in the company’s entire network, returning to operating at a profit on its flights to the UK, after a decade in the red in this sector.
Selected aircraft
At the end of the previous decade, Qantas had to choose between the Airbus A350 and the Boeing 777X to start its project. In the end, the European manufacturer was the big winner, offering the Australian airline a modified A350-1000 for ultra-long-haul flights to connect the Australian east coast with Europe and the United States.
The new Airbus A350-1000 will have a capacity of 238 passengers in four classes, the least configuration of this aircraft model on an airline. The airline will offer 6 First Suites, 53 Business Suites, 40 Premium Economy seats and 140 Economy.
The A350-1000s could in the future replace the Airbus A380s and be used on the company’s main trunk routes in Los Angeles, Singapore, Hong Kong and Dallas.
See also: Qantas announces flights between Auckland and New York
