Originally Posted by
BEA 71
A very good example was the Singapore-London sector, where 747īs sometimes were lacking the range, and had to stop at Frankfurt for refuelling.
It could also carry the load of two smaller size aircraft which was a great relief on this particular route.
I've had a bit of experience operating that route over the last three decades and our 744s certainly were not in the habit of having to make fuel stops en-route because they couldn't "make" London.
On a bad day with perhaps a temporary fuel system limitation or a day when the whole of north western Europe had very poor weather (meaning a high required reserve fuel figure on arrival in the London TMA) then maybe it happened but it certainly was not a feature of "normal" SIN-LHR 744 ops where I worked.
It was also interesting to operate the 777 on that same route and compare the fuel/payload the 777 (especially the -300) needed vs. the fuel/payload our colleagues on the 380 on the same route were carrying...if you could see those numbers you'd probably understand why the accountants like the "big twins", but I accept for many the 380 provided the superior passenger experience.