AQUAPLANE1
In normal times there are plenty of routes across all airlines that are only viable due to their carriage of freight, which covers the bulk of the cost of the operation. And whilst the freight charges have gone up, the levels of freight actually decreased during the height of the pandemic. Key industries like car manufacturing, which is the bulk of a lot of transatlantic cargo routes had a massive decrease in demand throughout the spring and summer.
Don’t underestimate the importance of cargo to all long haul operations. Saying low cost long haul doesn’t work is short sighted when there could be £100k+ worth of goods in the hold.
In the case of Singapore, the route was profitable largely due to the cargo carried. Unfortunately due to take off performance issues, the cargo was often offloaded instead of passengers and baggage, which led to the company losing the contract. Poor management yes, proof that the concept doesn’t work, absolutely not. I believe they learned their lesson from this and capped passenger numbers on the Buenos Aires to Gatwick route which was also often performance limited with a sizeable cargo load.