The signs of a struggling kangaroo

Qantas have been struggling to make money on their international routes for years now. To try and turn this around, they’re cancelling their joint venture on the Kangaroo routes with British Airways and aligning themselves with Emirates instead. The single daily services to Sydney and Melbourne will operate at similar timings but operate via Dubai instead of Singapore.

Qantas did operate a twice daily services to both Sydney and Melbourne for a time with lunchtime departures from Heathrow. Certainly one of the services routed via Hong Kong (Sydney I recall). This allowed the aircraft a shorter time on the ground in London, however if the services aren’t profitable there is no point in operating them. Whilst Qantas are still struggling on the London services the evening departures are still the most attractive due to the onward connections offered to other cities in Australia and New Zealand. The inbound flights from Australia are also times to connect from most detinations too.

British Airways also cancelled their direct service to Melbourne a few years ago and have scaled back their Sydney service to a single daily flight, the original second flight now terminating in Bangkok and having 8 hours on the ground there. British Airways are also switching their Sydney service to a 777-300 at the beginning of the summer schedule.

It will be interesting to see what BA do once their joint business agreement with Qantas ends at the end of March, however with so many carriers offering connections to Australia now will new services be commercially viable?

Both are contributing factors. Airframe maintenance is primarily forecast on operating hours. Engine maintenance is often based on cycles however.

I would have thought that maintainence would also be a factor, seeing as the aircraft is flying longer distances, it will need checking over more often, wouldn’t it…?

I think for a lot of the long distance aircraft, cycles are more important, landing and pressure cycles put a lot of stress on the airframe, engines operating at max for tax offs etc, and is often the determining factor in aircraft life (an aircraft life in hours is probably an average).

This article I googled helps explain:
http://www.airspacemag.com/need-to-know/NEED-lifecycles.html

I would have thought that maintainence would also be a factor, seeing as the aircraft is flying longer distances, it will need checking over more often, wouldn’t it…?

Also, the same thing used to happen with OASiS Hong Kong Airlines’s B747 fleet when they were around. Their inbound flight used to arrive into LGW very early in the morning, and it didn’t leave until late evening. Now instead of the aircraft just sitting on the ground doing nothing all day, they used to do pilot training and did touch & go’s down at Manston airport in Kent (I know because I went on a couple of these flights!).

tenthije’s suggestion of doing another flight in between the arrival and departure would not work because the airlines would then end up having to have a seperate crew based in outstations in order to operate these flights.

I would say that Skymonster’s original point about it being to do with the time “when passengers want to travel” is the best answer though. Take flights to/from USA to the UK as another example. BA/VS/UA/AA all have just one (possibly two!) flights departing from the USA in the morning which arrive into the UK in the late evening, whereas they have quite a few more leaving in the evening that arrive early morning. The reason they do not have more flights departing in the morning is simply because the large majority of people (inc. business travellers!) will mostly want to fly overnight so that they can arrive into the UK in the morning and then go straight to work.

British Airways do exactly the same with their flights to Johannesburg, two 744’s arrive into Jo’burg at 6.55 and 9.30, then hang round all day and depart at 8pm and 9.40pm.
All to do with timetabling and not running empty,

Looking at 2 airplanes at one city is not a large enough sample.

Airlines (and manufacturers) routinely track all kinds of statistics within individual airline fleets. For example the A380 fleet at Emirates might fly 12.3 hours per day and 2.3 hours per landing, whereas the A380 fleet at another carrier might fly more or less, depending upon many factors (not the least of which is also crew utilization). The technical staff is often quite proud of the utilization on a particular airplane fleet, “we fly our 777’s 16.3 hours per day and the industry average is only 14.5,” or some such. Of course, if you fly them too hard, then you have to pay the piper with reduced reliability. Fly them not hard enough and you are not using the asset efficiently. Try to fix them up during “down” season (whenever that might be for your markets) so that you can fly them hard during “peak.” If you have old airplanes, you can afford not to push them too hard, they’re paid for. If you have new airplanes you want to fly the wings off them to pay down the debt/note asap.

Almost all airlines have some stations where airplanes sit for hours, this varies with the time of the year and how hard the airline chooses to fly the fleet in general. With the fluctuations in the world economy over the last 5 years or so, there have been many changes as airlines continue to tweak. To compare the flight schedule for an individual airline at one airport 20 years ago to now is almost worthless in my opinion.

Really? As I recall the old 747s used to come in around 7-8am and depart again around 11 am. That changed with the introduction of the A380.

Um, I don’t think any of their flights used to come in around 7-8am, I have used Qantas every 2 years for the last 15 years and not once did I ever come in that late in the morning.

EDIT: Perhaps I should use something a little more official as my source. It’s also beginning to look like the early arrivals and late departures are something recently introduced (after the A380 was introduced).
Qantas flight 32 (LHR-SIN-SYD) had it’s engine explode at 10:01 am Singapore time on 4 November 2010.

And nope, that is not correct again, the Qantas services I used from LHR used to depart after 21:30. Even last year they were departing this late in the evening, and even last year they were arriving before 6am.
The exception to this was always about a midday rotation, which has existed for years, and which I have also used before. It’s only recently (this year) that it has been moved forward to 11am.

It certainly wasn’t a late evening departure, which is what they have at present.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qantas_Flight_32

Yes it has been a late evening departure, see above, I’ve used it several times.

And to use another youtube video, sorry, does this look like a 9/10 pm departure to you? :p

Don’t think there’s any need to be condescending, do you? 🙂

I don’t really see what the issue is here, or what’s different to what Qantas have done for the last 15 years. I have used Qantas on several occasions to travel to Australia in that time and the schedule has remained pretty much unchanged and stable for that period.

Really? As I recall the old 747s used to come in around 7-8am and depart again around 11 am. That changed with the introduction of the A380.

The title of this video seems to vouch this. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cg9emRYPagY

EDIT: Perhaps I should use something a little more official as my source. It’s also beginning to look like the early arrivals and late departures are something recently introduced (after the A380 was introduced).
Qantas flight 32 (LHR-SIN-SYD) had it’s engine explode at 10:01 am Singapore time on 4 November 2010.

Let’s work backwards from that 10:01 time.
It had been in the air for 2 hours. So 10-2 = 8am.
Let’s say the stopover was 2 hours? 8-2 = 6am.
The flight to Singapore is 13 hours. 6-13 = 17:00.
LHR is 8 hours behind SIN. 17:00-8 = 9am depart from LHR (give or take a few).

It certainly wasn’t a late evening departure, which is what they have at present.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qantas_Flight_32

And to use another youtube video, sorry, does this look like a 9/10 pm departure to you? :p http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FbzRd5vQWFc

posted in wrong thread

I don’t really see what the issue is here, or what’s different to what Qantas have done for the last 15 years. I have used Qantas on several occasions to travel to Australia in that time and the schedule has remained pretty much unchanged and stable for that period.

Matt, what do you mean when you say “16hrs isn’t enough”? Do you mean it is enough?
CASA’s flight time limitations are broadly similar to EASA’s but are slightly more limiting when it comes to longer duties, and in particular, those duties that cross different time zones. Flying the SIN-LHR route would constitute a time free of duty in excess of 17 hours. It’s not whether “12hrs” is enough, but whether they are legal to fly according to CASA’s regulations.

I don’t think it’s a crew issue. 16 hours isn’t enough (it would be more like ~12 hours for the crew who have to do flight planning etc.) to go to a hotel room and get a good sleep.

That’s what I would have thought tenthije, it could add on an onward third leg journey to another European city (Frankfurt? Kill two birds with one stone, drop the unprofitable SYD-FRA 747 flight. Add on an extra leg to the LHR flight and increase utilisation whilst keeping Frankfurt on the destination list :diablo:).

I’m sending an email to Qantas now, I’ll post the email and the reply once (and if) I get one.

Would it not be possible for Qantas to fit in a round trip JFK on behalf of BA? Or do bi-laterals not allow that? Maybe other destinations closer to home (LHR).

Another possible idea….
Perhaps Quantas keep its planes on the ground long enough so the same crew can fly it back.

Granted, not much of a reason, but it might be one factor.

I might just do that 😉 Kev.

Why not email Qantas and ask?

Regards,

kev35

Thinking about it further, Air New Zealand (who fly, unsurprisingly, similar route lengths and sectors to Qantas) have their planes on the ground at LHR for a maximum of 7 hours. Far less than Qantas’ 16.

You make good points – I did neglect to mention scheduling, but then how come the majority of flights depart the Far East in the morning and arrive at LHR in the afternoon… Now that seems totally counter-intuitive and goes against what you’ve just said.

I’ve got my new game sorted.

Just as long as its not “Airline Tycoon” :p

So it does beg the question, can you tell how poorly an airline is doing by how many hours its fleet is sat on the ground?

No! But don’t let your armchair airline scheduling expertise get in the way of missing the point.

For what it’s worth QF airplanes also sit in LAX all day – usually two A380s and a 747… It’s all to do with scheduling flights at times when passengers want to depart and arrive, and ensuring the point-to-point flights allow convenient connections to other cities not directly served.

Take QF1 SYD-LHR… It’s scheduled to block on at LHR at 06:20 – great for onward travel either by air or land, and good for business travellers who need to go to work when they arrive and not waste time. If they turned it straight around at LHR, QF2 would likely be leaving LHR again around 10:00. That’d put it back into Sydney sometime after 19:00 which, by the time they’ve allowed passengers to get through immigration and customs, would be too late for a lot of onward connections to the rest of Australia and the Pacific. Depart QF2 from LHR when it does and it arrives in SYD at 06:50, and not only is it good for connections in SYD, it also means business travellers can be in town at the start of the business day rather than having to waste an evening.

Same is true for South African (and Kenya) flights – they are scheduled to depart London after the end of a business day in the UK, and arrive in South Africa before the start of the next business day – same is true in the opposite direction. That’s when passengers – especially the high-yield business and first class passengers – want to travel. And passengers don’t waste a daytime in flight – they have a full day, depart late, sleep on the flight, and arrive in time for another regular day.

If you think Qantas – and South African and Kenya – are missing a trick, look at the times BA schedule their flights to the same destinations and you’ll find that they are at broadly similar times for the same reasons – it’s when passengers want to travel. Airlines have tried to shift these very long haul schedules to improve utilisation but it doesn’t work – if the schedule doesn’t workable hers take an alternative (like Emirates) that allows them to depart and arrive when they want rather than go for an inconvenient schedule.