Will shorter legs reduce fuel burn?
I was interested to see a statement in last week's Flight International that by re-introducing intermediate refuelling stops on long sectors such as Europe to the Far East fuel consumption could be reduced by around 10%. We all know that the more fuel on board the higher the more burnt but surely adding an additional stop will in itself cost fuel. The extent will obviously vary according to how far the airport is off the great circle route and the amount of holding and taxiing required.
I'd be interested if any pilots or flight planners out there quantify this and give some examples. For example, what saving would LHR-BAH/MCT-SIN give compared to LHR-SIN non stop? Also what would be the best stopovers on the Europe - HKG route?
An additional factor would be increased station costs and of course greater block hours with associated crew costs (offset to some extent by a reduced need to carry relief crew) but they now of course account for a smaller proportion of costs than two years ago.