Night Watch,
I think the Rat was a pre-first-flight customer for both the 707 and 747? Indeed Billy Boeing rejigged the 707 to become the -138.
404 Titan,
As far as maint costs go with the new materials, one suspects that with the prospect of 115 airframes, Qantas has managed to wring out some guarantees out of Boeing regarding that side of things.
And wasn't Qantas pretty early-on with the RR-powered 744s?
And any news on what the plan is for the 743s? I had thought some of the (expected) 777s were going to be to replace them.
I suspect the whole race is not over yet.
Just noticed this quote in the QF announcement on the ASX website (
http://www.asx.com.au//asxpdf/200512...zk5hk8t55s.pdf):
“Under the fleet plan, the Qantas Group will acquire 115 B787 aircraft”
And further on…
“[Mr Dixon] said Qantas would require up to 145 engines”
Now I’m no mathematician, but that’s (145/115 = 1.26) engines per aircraft.
Either that, or the cat’s out of the bag on Boeing’s cunning plan to roll out a single-engined variant in a few years…
Wonder if they’ll get 207m ETOPS on that lot…
It's a Boeing, so I'll be a-going... but not on less than two donks!