The changing shape of Virgin Blue – Plane Talking
August 26, 2010 – 10:52 am, by Ben Sandilands
Some big changes began rolling out at Virgin Blue today.
The decision to equip and expand the domestic and international routes with A330-200s will come with the yet unannounced cabin product changes that bring the airline Virgin America style seating in a very upmarket and exclusive business class across its entire fleet which also gets significantly improved economy class appointments.
The dropping of Johannesburg is not a reflection on the operational performance of the Boeing 777-300ER but about it being inappropriate for a long remote ocean route where the big twin engine jet is restricted, for very very good reasons, to ETOPS 180 minutes rules.
V Australia had to fly the jet for as much as three hours longer than a four engined jet (red line) to avoid the no-go zones shown in the Great Circle Mapper image below.
That put it at the end of its tether for full payload flights, and penalised it with the costs of the much longer flight paths.
The A330 is unbeatable for operational economics in its size and range category for the foreseeable time, as airlines drum their fingers waiting for Boeing and Airbus to sort out and deliver credible performances from their delayed 787 Dreamliners and A350s.
Prediction: The A330 choice will set the longer term future of Virgin Blue, or whatever it is called from some time ’soon’ to that of an operator that acquires advanced model A380s, simply because it will grow into them, and unit size becomes critical for airports such as Sydney, Los Angeles and London.
In the interim, also expect more fleet review changes concerning the withdrawal of the Embraer 170s, the use of more Embraer 190s, and according to some rumours,
a medium sized turbo-prop for key short haul regional routes