Qantas axes daily Boeing 747 Sydney-Los Angeles flights

Hi Christopher, currently the GDS/booking system shows QF11/12 remaining as an Airbus A380 on all days after the switcheroo, but we'll keep our eyes on this in case this is updated.

Qantas also announced further tweaks to its North American network on Tuesday, including a reduction in A380-operated services on Sydney-Los Angeles. While the airline will maintain a daily service, six flights a week will be with the double-decker superjumbo, with a Boeing 747-400 to operate the seventh flight. 

From Australian Aviation

Hmmm until I see something from QF directly or a change to the booking system, I will hazard a guess that AA has this wrong. QF will want daily F between SYD-LAX

Looks like I was wrong. 

Still very surprised by this change.

Any reason why the QF would need to sub an A380 from SYD-LAX to operate the SYD-DFW route daily? They can do SYD-DFW daily without affecting other routes (which is what they do over busy periods anyway).

Im sure the only reason they have been able to operate SYD-DFW previously and upcoming is when all A380s are in service/non are in  maintenance in Manila. 

That's been the reason when QF SYD-HKG seasonal A380's. 

But SYD/MEL-DXB/LHR is 5 x A380's

SYD-LAX - 2 x A30's

MEL-LAX- 2 x A380's

SYD- DFW- 2 x A380's (assuming daily).

1 A380 in MNL for maintenance for most of the year.

I'm thinking the "missing" A380 from the US routes comes down to the flight times. With the long layovers in the US (~7 hours at DFW, ~15 hours at LAX), the round trip times per aircraft (~40 hours for DFW, ~45 for SYD-LAX and ~46 for MEL-LAX) tips it over to needing just over 2 aircraft per route for daily, so they need that "day off" on one route to make up the time and keep the timetables from slipping each day.

If just one flight returned from the US 2 or 3 hours earlier, there wouldn't be a problem.

Probably slot-constrained at LAX.

They could have just replaced QF17/18 with the AA flight and used that landing slot. Chris makes a pretty compelling case for retaining that timing in the schedule.

Runway slots aren't the issue for AA at LAX. Gate space is.

They also want more connection options for the AA flights. I could see them moving to an ~10am LAX arrival, but I don't see AA wanting an ~2pm LAX arrival.

Thats a good point! The 747 is quite nostalgic though - people will seek it out.

It's not the one aircraft in a literal sense, it's referring to the utilisation of said 747. That would rotate through various routes in line with maintenance and deployment requirements. 

Who knows, planes move and position all the time.

The amount of aircraft needed to run a route comes down to the length of the flight, turn around time and if the aircraft sits around doing nothing.

eg, SYD-TYO is around a 9 hour flight. 1 aircraft could fly north to Tokyo, spend 2 hours on the ground unloading/reloading and be back in SYD in around 21 hours - thus only needing 1 aircraft for a daily flight. QF however leaves the aircraft sitting in Tokyo all day, so that the total trip time for the current SYD-HND return flight is closer to 36 hours, thus requiring 2 aircraft for a daily flight.

Combining routes together which the aircraft operate in turn can reduce the amount of aircraft required. eg AU-LHR takes takes 21 hours each way. Add in turn around times at each end, and it needs 3 aircraft to operate daily. Combining the routes so that the aircraft operates SYD-LHR-MEL-LHR-SYD allows them to reduce the requirement of 6 aircraft for both routes to 5 (which has lead to delays during this year due to the very short turn around times at MEL).

This change would allow QF to rotate 747s from MEL to SYD so that an aircraft might run MEL-LAX-MEL-HKG-SYD-HND-SYD-HKG-MEL-LAX across a week.

Depends. The 332 can do AKL-LAX (so PER-DXB).

I'm guessing HKG.

QF has a request in for 3 extra flights to HKG (28/week up from the current 25)

HKG would be my guess... Manilla second. Another China destination third.

AA has rights to 4 gates at TBIT and they can use them for any flight they want.

QF flights are not bussed at LAX (unless something has gone very wrong). QF refuses to allow LAWA to give them a bus gate. QF aircraft park at TBIT and after unloading are towed over to spend the day near the hangers before being towed back to TBIT in the evening for the return flights to Australia.

Some morning AA international arrivals are bused to TBIT in order to use the CBP FIS as the T4 CBP area was closed.

Flew on QF17 in Y recently, it was excellent. So good to be able to land at LAX in the afternoon and make easy connections for the evening before a decent sleep. Did have to get bussed though from one of those remote gates. Bloody marys and a nice shower in Admirals lounge eased the pain.

Qantas use gates at TBIT. No bussing. 

You would see at least 2 planes most days as QF does maintenance there.

Agreed. QF would rather have aircraft on the ramp at TBIT waiting for a gate then use a hard stand and buses. The only time you'll see a QF flight using buses and hard stands at LAX is if something has gone wrong with airport operations.

Back when the new TBIT was being planned and QF was looking at sending the 380 there back in 2007/2008, they all but forced LAWA to put in 380 gates in phase 1 because they didn't want to use buses and threatened LAWA that they'd cut flights to LAX and send them to SFO instead if they didn't get those A380 gates.