THE newest Qantas A330-200 is headed for the record books after a 17,000km non -stop delivery flight from France to Melbourne. The airline is waiting for confirmation from the Australian Sport Aviation Confederation that the 20-hour flight was a world record.
The new plane, VH-EBB, is the airline's second A330 and landed in Melbourne on Christmas Day after the marathon flight from the Airbus factory in Toulouse.
"We believe we have achieved a distance-without-landing milestone of 16,910km , improving on the current record of 11,249km which was accomplished on a flight from Toulouse to Santiago, Chile, on March 21, 1998," said executive general manager aircraft operations David Forsyth. "The distance flown by VH- EBB demonstrates the range capability and efficiency of the A330-200. "
VH-EBB joined its sister, VH-EBA, on Cityflyer routes yesterday and will be used between Sydney and Brisbane, Melbourne and Perth.
The twin-engine aircraft are the first of seven A330-200s and six bigger A330 -300s ordered to replace older 767-200s as Qantas's mid-size workhorse.
They are part of a multi-billion dollar Airbus deal that broke Boeing's stranglehold at Qantas and will see the introduction of 515-seat A380 super jumbos in 2006.
Meanwhile, the last Boeing 747-200 in service at Qantas headed off to an American desert retirement this week. VH-EBS, The City of Broken Hill, entered service in 1981.