For equivalent configurations, the A380 has about 130 pax more than the 744.
744ER 317 A380 450
Now this is a premium config. But if we go with the 744 two class of just over 400, you will still have the same relativity of about 150+ additional pax on the A380.
OQD is Manila as we type, getting a rub and tug to put in about 40 extra seats. Over the next 12 months all dugongs will get it. They remove the last zone in bizzo, move premo cattle into that zone and add a few seats. Then add more cattle seats into the old premo zone. As well as removing a galley and lav from the main deck and adding a few seats in their place. I think the new config comes in just below 490 seats. Not 555 like airbus wanted but better that what it had.
Strong rumours were floating about a week or two previous to this about "an announcement that very few people will like" - coming from ExCo during an appearance in Perth.
Letters are going out! Would you like to cash in your Long Service Leave?
Ah yes. Let's increase the loss for international whilst it serves our political purposes. Rather than have a 10 year master plan, I'm more convinced than ever that this mob just makes it up as they go along.
I detect a private equity bid. It will be timed to execute before the next election so that Julia Gillard, etc. are powerless to stop it. They tried it at $5.70 and they will try again below $1.50.
For Jamie Packer, it gets foreign punters to the Casinos he wants to build all over the country.
In fact the gambling could start on the aircraft when its wheels up.
I am with you Sunfish. QF International is on the market. Keep domestic, and then bring in JQ as the new International airline for this country. Plain as the nose on your face. Was always going to be as Dixon handed over to Joyce. One would hope they will pick more viable companies than the last two choices of Dixon, one has gone broke, the other struggling. Vale QF, you deserve better than this, this is not what all former staff and management who worked so hard to make you what you were. If only, if only, Borgetti had got the job, QF would be starting to hum by now, instead its only a matter of time before it joins TAA and Ansett into the dustbin. Beautiful airlines destroyed by bean counters and management. I could weep.
The 380 will be better suited to the $300 plus oil we will be soon seeing.
Zappie. When the A380 was being designed, late 1990s, crude oil was $US15 - $US20 per barrel. This is the future [!] and oil is now five to six times as expensive, which would have been at the high end of expectations back then. If it takes oil to be nearly 20 times as high as it was when you were designing something to make that something viable in the market place, then there are some serious problems with the modelling.
Keg. Cashing in LSL might not be a bad deal for people with large amounts, instead of getting assigned 14 days LSL every Bid Period, when you don't want it. At least you get something of value, instead of being sent on forced vacation one quarter of your life.
Sunfish. Packer would want an airline? Why? He doesn't know anything about running an airline. Seriously, though, you'd reckon the scarring he got from the last foray would still not have healed yet. But these guys do have thick hides, it seems.
Last edited by Captain Gidday; 25th May 2012 at 00:33.
They have bled Longhaul dry and in any case are hopelessly out of their depth and run out of ideas/cash to do anything with it. This is an act of desperation.
Flog it and leave it for the sharks to do with it what they will.
What of the employees in the new structure / potential sale? Engineering (whats left), reportedly to follow Strambi to the domestic branch. What will private equity get for its cash?
It will be most interesting, nay, telling, as to what occurs, by just observing where all the flight ops Management types scurry to, in order to save their own hide.
Last edited by blow.n.gasket; 25th May 2012 at 02:13.
But the host at the CEDA lunch, Pottinger joint CEO Cassandra Kelly, joked that it now takes three people at Qantas to do what Borghetti used to do at Qantas.
It will be most interesting, nay, telling, as to what occurs, by just observing where all the flight ops Management types scurry to, in order to save their own hide.
More likely they're going to be scurrying for promotion. Chief Pilot Domestic. Head of Flight Operations Domestic, Head of Training Domestic, Head of Audit Domestic, etc, etc. I can picture a bunch of people in there tidying up their resumes already.
Meanwhile, at the coal face, everything changes and nothing changes.
Rather than have a 10 year master plan, I'm more convinced than ever that this mob just makes it up as they go along.
Seriously, though, you'd reckon the scarring he got from the last foray would still not have healed yet. But these guys do have thick hides, it seems.
