I’ve flown Auckland – Los Angeles – London and back several times and all I have needed is an ESTA: https://esta.cbp.dhs.gov/esta/.

The transit time is only a couple of hours and most times I have had to clear immigration, collect my bags and return to the check in desk. This would have meant that I could have just walked out of the airport and gone where ever. I just put on my arrivals card that I was in transit.

A wing on it’s own is unstable in pitch.

Well, apart from highly advanced designs like the B-2B blended wing design 😉

I liked the concept posted here not so long ago, with the A340 being converted into a new Beluga.

Not much help to your question, but years ago I flew Germanwings from Edinburgh to Berlin, then got the train to Hannover (which was a couple of hours).

Or, if they still do it, you could go bmi from EDI-LHR then bmi regional from LHR-HAJ?

Both ways are much longer than EDI-HAJ direct though!

That’s what I was implying MSR: I would rather get an extra weeks leave, for example, to be able to take the time off when I wanted to.

I would happily cash in the bank holidays for either money or extra holidays that I can take when I like. Not being religious, I’d rather not be forced to take time off when the Christian calendar dictates. But I guess that’s what I get for living in a Christian based country. If I was living in an Arab country for example, I guess I would be issued with a different set of holidays.

Then there are the issues induced by almost everything being closed at once.

The bulkiness will only affect the drag. Which will primarily affect the fuel burn and range capability. Given the wing design, the Trent 500s need to move enough air over the wings to generate the required lift to overcome the weight. So if the wings are at their maximum design capability (size/weight) and the engines are still not powerful enough, then maybe they need to stick four Trent 900s on there!