Originally Posted by
maggot
???
Seriously?
Return from previous 2 crew overnight home from Asia and stump up for a 20hr tod?
This is airline management perspective: They don't do it themselves, so it is merely an efficiency gain.
The FAA consider ULR flying on a case by case basis.
There is no such consideration in Australia.
CAsA will blanket improve the TOD extension (ie: GREATER than 20 hours) then Qantas can swing the aircraft into whatever they like.
Chairman's lounge membership is a wonderful thing.
The FAA is currently using a case-by-case approach to approve ULR city pairs. They are approving these operations by issuing a nonstandard operations specification paragraph, (OpSpec A332) "Ultra Long Range (ULR) Flag Operations in Excess of 16 Hours Block to-Block Time" to air carriers intending to conduct ultra-Iong-range operations.
16 hours considered ULR...
Haven't Qantas extended that to 20 already?
The case-by case- basis of approval for the FAA requires route data, scientific modelling: a rather long list.
Three "research flights" on a different aircraft ain't it.
Qantas prefer the FUD concept of approval.