The Australian airline Qantas is redirecting its main non-stop international route between Perth and London Heathrow, after the US intelligence services warned that Iran might be about to launch a major attack on Israel using ballistic missiles and drones.
Normally, Qantas operates a daily flight from Melbourne to London-Heathrow via Perth as flight QF9, departing from Perth at 6:30 PM and arriving in the UK at 5:05 AM the next day.
The route usually takes the Boeing 787-9 Dreamliner over Oman and the United Arab Emirates before crossing the Persian Gulf and flying over Iraq before reaching the European continent.
With a distance of 9,000 nautical miles (16,700 km), the non-stop flight is at the limits of the 787-9’s range, so any attempt to avoid the rising tensions in the Middle East means Qantas can no longer operate the flight without a stopover.
As a result, Qantas will not operate the QF-9 service as non-stop flights from Perth to London from Friday, April 12, until at least April 15. Instead, Qantas will now operate the flight via Singapore as flight QF-209 with a brief stopover of just over an hour. The departure from Melbourne was rescheduled to leave four hours earlier to arrive in London at 5:05 AM as scheduled.
On Thursday, the US embassy in Jerusalem issued an urgent security alert restricting the movement of employees and their families from traveling outside the greater Tel Aviv areas, as well as Jerusalem and Be’er Sheva areas, until further notice. The embassy warned that the «security environment remains complex and can change rapidly depending on the political situation and recent events.»
On Friday, Australian authorities echoed these warnings, alerting their citizens that the security situation in Israel could «deteriorate rapidly, with little or no warning.»
The return flight from London-Heathrow to Perth will continue to operate non-stop due to the prevailing tailwinds.
